HISTORY IS FUN ~ Robert D. Caplinger THE OLD SHANNON HILL SCHOOL BUILDING How many times have you noticed the old Shannon Hill School building as you have driven on US 73 going to or from Atchison? For many years, the old Shannon Hill School building has been standing empty and year by year it looks older and older. It is located on the northwest intersection with Neosho Road, three miles west of Atchison. THE POOR OLD BUILDING. Without windows, paint, a door, and a roof to keep out the weather. Nobody to care for it; nobody to help it; it just stands alone, neglected; refusing to give up and fall down. This old building was once new, was used and needed. It provided a place for students to study, a place to gather for parties, to provide a space for community meetings, a place where families held reunions. It was the meeting place for the Shannon Hill Grange. It was the place where Gov. George Glick called the Grange meeting to order; Glick being the first Master of the Grange. (With tongue in cheek) Im tempted to urge the drafting of a petition for folks to sign that would request that the old school building be put on the National Register. If we could get it on the National Register, some enterprising person could draft the papers asking for a Government Grant to restore the original building. That could be done for less than the Three Million Dollars that was recently spent to cover a (109 foot deep and 32 foot in diameter) hole in the ground (the Worlds Largest Hand Dug Well at Greensburg). We could re-establish the original playground that was used by those school kids of Shannon Hill 150 years ago. We could get a grant to provide a picnic area for travelers to pause on their vacation trips; a place where they could contemplate and visit a rural school house of yesteryear.
Posted on: Mon, 18 Nov 2013 20:15:00 +0000