A Special Project of the Mt Zion Historical Society
Gray School
The Gray School and it's last six teachers
Alice Reed Gray
Gladys Birch
Izola Huff
Bertha Ovell
Lena Singer Burke
Victor Benigni
The Gray School, Jay Township, Pa
The Gray School
Early School Life
The Gray Hill School House was located near the juncture of Rock Hill and Gray Hill Road and served the students of the
Mt. Zion Area. The last six teachers of the Gray Hill School were Alice Reed Gray, Gladys Birch, Izola Huff, Bertha
Ovell, Lena Singer Burke and Victor Benigni. Victor Benigni boarded at the Ovell residence while teaching at the
Gray Hill School House.
The pioneer school houses and the curriculum offered to the students of the early settlers of Elk County were quite
primitive when measured by today’s standards. The typical early school house was generally quite small,
approximately 18’ x 20’, one room structures with a single outhouse located close by to provide both the teacher and
students necessary facilities. The old Mt. Zion School was said to be a long cabin structure. Heat, if any, was a
pot-belly wood stove generally located in the middle of the room. Oil lamps provided the lighting for the room.
Some of the early schools were conducted in community building. Such was the case in Medix and Dents Run.
In most cases a teacher who came to the community to teach was young, unmarried, with a minimal amount of training.
It was common for them to board with a local resident and would walk to school as did the student attending school.
The teacher was generally responsible for keeping the building clean, providing for the heat, and serving as a nurse
when needed. The Ovell house on Mt. Zion Road boarded a number of teachers who taught at the Gray Hill School House.
The curriculum in the early pioneer school had many peculiarities in habit and in diction, the words "would and could"
were pronounced by some wold and cold, the letter "x" was pronounced sed, and had been pronounced a short time previous
izzard, the words "cubic, music" and others, now ending in "ic", were written cubick, musick, and the words ending "in"
or were spelled and written "our", as honour, labour, etc. In those schools there were no blackboards in use; slates
were used for that purpose, and examples in the lessons in the arithmetic were performed on the slate. The pens used
were made from the goose-quill, the ink from maple bark, copperas and pokeberries. Dilworth’s and Webster’s spellers,
which were succeeded by Comley’s and Byerly’s Murray’s English reader and introduction were the principal books used in
those schools. The arithmetics were Pike’s and Dilworth’s; Walker’s abridged vocabulary was referred to as a standard
on pronunciation, providing the schoolmaster was so fortunate as to have one in his possession. Spelling from memory,
words given out or pronounced by the teacher, produced somewhat of emulation, and as the higher branches were not taught,
the pupils having more time and by frequent exercises in orthography became excellent spellers.
A 1909 Gray Hill School Souvenier Booklet
given by teacher Josephine Koch to her students
(Thanks to Phoebe Ellen Tyler Zuchelli and Diana Tyler for this contribution)
(Click to enlarge pictures)
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