Article and photos reprinted with permission of the authors; Gladys Zamzow, School Secretary and DuWayne H. Zamzow, Pommern Central WI History Committee Chairman. Copyright February 2005.

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Gladys Zamzow, School Secretary and DuWayne H. Zamzow, Pommern Central WI History Committee Chairman

A typical day in a one-room school house may have been structured as the following:

• 9:00 A.M. - Arrival time. Ringing of the school bell signaled the children to line up in two lines, boys and girls, in front of the door and then recite the Pledge of Allegiance. Students would file into the school, girls first. Girls sat on one side of the room and the boys on the other.
• 9:30 A.M. - Reading and Recitation.
• 10:00 A.M. - Arithmetic (using lap slate boards)
• 11:00 A.M. - Penmanship exercises using dip pens and ink.
• 11:45 A.M. - Lunch with free play and bathroom break. Lunch was usually carried in a tin syrup pail or lard can. Children would take whatever was available in the house. Often time�s children would have lard and sugar sandwiches or cold pancakes left over from breakfast. Peanut butter (available in the 1890�s) with syrup was another good sandwich to pack. Seasonal fruit and hard-boiled eggs were a staple food as were homemade cookies.
• 12:30 P.M. - Geography and Current Events
• 1:00 P.M. - Spelling (Spelling Bees were common)
• 1:45 P.M. - Chores including restocking the wood for heating and general cleaning of the classroom and schoolhouse grounds.
• 2:00 P.M. - School dismissed.

A typical township being six miles square would have five or six one-room schools averaging between thirty to forty students per school. There was no public transportation, so students walked to and from school each day. During the winter months children had fun making slides in the snow on the huge snow banks along the roadsides. Stone fences along the roadsides collected a large amount of drifted snow. Once the snow plows would open the road, children often tried to reach the telephone wires from the top ridge of the snow banks. The �spring thaw� created sink-holes - what fun to jump on the soft areas of the road often loosing a boot in the mud.

In 1907 a resolution was passed to return to having eight months of school. The first well was drilled in 1913 at a total cost of $325.00 and Mrs. G. Schroeder was paid $8.00 for water witching services. It wasn�t until 1919 that the school was officially named Maple Grove School. Up until that time it was known as District # 1 School.

Over the many years of this school�s history, there were families who contributed of themselves in some way, who gave their time, effort and devotion to making Maple Grove a good school. History shows that Maple Grove grew and expanded with continual positive growth. All of these persons deserve credit. It�s a proven fact that to produce a good school where children truly learn and benefit requires the support of a caring community and of parents who desire the best education possible for their children. One of these families - a group of brothers who called themselves �The Company�, later well known as the Fromm Brothers, are an example of a family that cared about educational excellence in their community. Arthur, Herbert, Walter and Edward all continued their education and went on to school beyond the eighth grade to become teachers. The value and importance of education was held in high esteem in the Fromm family. To be a teacher commanded respect and status. Art, the eldest, acquired a Master�s Degree and all the brothers taught for different lengths of time. Ed taught six weeks, handed in his papers and books, presented his resignation and bicycled back home to Hamburg to join his brothers, John and Henry, in the dream of raising foxes. Not long thereafter, Walter joined them as well. These Fromm brothers had hunted foxes as young boys and had an earnest desire and vision for their future that excited them and never let go of them.

In the late 1940�s Fromm Bros. donated a sizable amount of money towards the modernization of the 1904 building. Back in 1928 Ed Fromm paid $100.00 for the installation of electric lighting and for a new well that needed to be dug in 1936. Two years later it was resolved to have the school term increased to nine months. Modernization of the school continued with the addition of bathrooms and a full lower level kitchen in addition to a multi-purpose room. $50,000.00 was budgeted for these projects with Fromm Brothers donating $45,000 and the Hamburg District No. 1 raising the balance. Shortly thereafter, hot meals were regularly provided by the Fromm Bros. and they also provided bus transportation for the students. It was in 1949 that the school building was painted red and became know as the �Little Red School�.

In 1952 three Hamburg Schools petitioned for annexation to the Merrill School District in Lincoln County. Newspaper headlines read �Hot Dispute in Vote To Annex Hamburg Districts to Merrill�, dated July 31, 1952. Districts No.1 and No.2 were approved while District No, 4 was turned down. The following day the newspaper column read �The inclusion of the Maple Grove School into the Merrill system gives the Merrill-Hamburg School District one of the most modern one-room rural school buildings in Wisconsin, The Fromm Brothers of Hamburg having contributed toward making this little red country school a model in its class. Because of this interest of the Fromms in the Hamburg District No.1 School, the Maple Grove School has commonly been called the �Fromm School� and has received statewide publicity.�

Kindergarten was started in 1957 with Arlene Teske (Mrs. Lavern Teske) as teacher. It is important to recognize one individual who contributed in a variety of capacities toward the shaping of Maple Grove�s future - a teacher, Virginia Punke, who later became the Elementary Coordinator of the Merrill Area Public Schools. Maple Grove was one of, or perhaps, the first consolidated rural school in the state. The schools in the Town of Corning, Lincoln County, were added to the Maple Grove District in 1960.

It is gratifying to note that the Fromm brothers � several who had been teachers at least for a while, never abandoned their belief in the importance of education. Ed Fromm held the responsibility of President of the Merrill Area Public Schools for a number of years along with leadership roles in the State Library Association, Marathon Co. Library, State Historical Society and others. Walter and Mabel Fromm, being of one mind in giving back to their community from the business success that became theirs, established the Walter and Mabel Fromm Scholarship Fund. This was made possible by the liquidation of their ownership assets in the Fromm corporation. The scholarship fund was established in 1976 through the sale of $500,000 in Fromm Bros. Inc. stock and was originally funded by the income generated from this half million dollar investment. This application of funds has lived beyond the life of Fromm Bros. Inc. and was especially dear to both Walter and Mabel. They had no children of their own; however, in a sense all of the scholarship recipients became their adopted children. The success of the Fromm family in the Hamburg area provided the livelihood for a great number of area residents. This story, a sort of folk tale of America, the age-old story of four boys who dreamed of accomplishment and then followed the narrow pathway of that dream, is without a doubt a rewarding adventure. The success can not be expressed in foxes, or in mink, or in ginseng; but in a dream come true in terms of living. Four farm-boys not content with their lives. They knew life could be better. And they made it so!

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Copyright © 2005. Gladys and DuWayne Zamzow. All rights reserved. Reprinted with authors permission.

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