A unique collection of photographs and personal letters, journals and diaries, newspaper clippings, official reports, readers and textbooks, mail-order catalogues, architectural plans and diagrams recreate the flavor of the Canadian one-room school and the rural communities it served from the 1840's to 1960's. The emphasis is on the human dimension--on the memories, bitter and sweet, of the people who experienced the one-room school as teacher or student, inspector or public health nurse, parent or trustee. The smell of chalk dust and wet mittens, the crackle of the wood fire on a crisp winter morning, the drone of flies in summer's dusty heat all come to life. Chapters are devoted to school construction and furnishings, including the wood-burning stove; the life of country children who often trudged miles to school through snow, dust, or mud, when they could be spared from work on the farm; a typical day in the rural school; readers and textbooks; the Christmas concert; the schoolyard with its playground, outhouses, wood pile, gardens, and horse barn; the influence of inspectors and the school nurse; the role and status of the rural teacher; responsibilities of the trustees; and the decline and disappearance of the one-room system. (NEC)