Ash Spring School

This information came from George Crose and was obtained from the Downing Genealogical publication, Roots.

"The ol' school house in Ash Spring was the first school ever built up around the Badger area. It was located down below there on the old road that came up the canyon, not where 245 is now but it was on the old road that came up to what they called the Murray place. The settlement of Ash Spring itself was located between the Murry place and Badger. There was a nice spring there. The schoolhouse was moved from there and relocated near the location of old Badger around 1904. But it was near Ash Spring for at least fourteen years.

From Badger, go down 245 and head up the hill until you come to a flat. Well, just as you get to where it flattens out and you turn and get into the flat, there is a big oak right 200' above the road.

When I went to Ash Spring School, my school session was similar to those of present days as it started in the fall of the year and ran until the first of June.My mother had gone to the original school. The school had anywhere from twelve to eighteen pupils going there when I attended.

The school trustees were like today's school board members. Some of them were; Henry Ledbetter, Ken Cooksey and Leslie Stapp.

I remember all of my teachers. The first time I went to school, I went to an 'old' man by the name of Renfrow. My next teacher was Mary Ducy. My last two teachers, Christina Hackman and Bessie Stewart, were young women teachers.

I had about a three mile walk each direction on my way to school but I didn't mind too much as I walked it with my cousins, Ardian, 'Arlie', and Jim Downing. We didn't have to worry about traffic much in those days because there was only an occasional stage or a horse and wagon or buggy ever ran on the road through Badger. I do remember though that it was a horse and wagon stage that brought the mail up to Badger from Visalia when I was going to school. If we were in school during logging season, we had to watch out for the loads of logs being hauled down the hill to the valley."