History at a Glance

In about 1905, a school was built in the Pickering area of Mason County. Because there was only one student at the time, the building may have been intended as a temporary structure. In June 1912, a new, more permanent Grant School was built on logged-off land overlooking Pickering Passage. By November 1917, 12 students attended the new school and by 1928, 28 students attended in grades one through eight.

According to the Journal, on Nov. 26, 1915, "The greatest social event of the season was the entertainment and social given at the Grant School on Saturday. People from Arcadia, Hoballa, Shelton, and Harstine Island attended." On Dec. 10, the Journal reported that "there was no school at the Grant school house last Thursday and Friday owing to the teacher having to wear a red flannel rag around her gozzle (sore throat)."

In August 1917, a public float at the Grant School House was completed "which will benefit all who ever cussed the tides when attending meetings there, and will be of great benefit to the school district which provides water transportation to the children. J.E. Jones donated the float, the school purchased lumber, chains, cement, etc., and the community donated the labor. The ladies served lunch at noon." Three years later, an early December storm tore the float apart.

The 1922 Halloween Social at the schoolhouse "proved to be quite a success. We had a large attendance and baskets sold well. The money is to go to playground apparatus." A basket and pie social in October 1923 had "an interesting and lively program," and proceeds were put toward the purchase of a phonograph for the school.

In 1932, a small gymnasium was built nearby. The story in the Sept. 24, 1940, Journal told of moving the gymnasium and attaching it to the school: "By all pitching together, the people of the Pickering area now have a community gathering place which will be sufficient for their needs. They already had the ingredients - a schoolhouse and a gymnasium building - but as two separate buildings, neither filled the need. So the school board decided to move the gymnasium and attach it to the school, if they could find the financing to do the job. W.S. Rempel solved that problem by convincing the community to donate their united efforts in the form of manual labor. He got J.E. Jones to loan a team of horses, Elmer Wiss to loan some cable and supervise the job, and he went over to the Oakland Bay district and obtained the loan of a stump puller from Isaac Gosser. Local volunteers jacked up the gymnasium - a structure of approximately 20-by-30 feet base dimensions - put runners under it, hitched the stump puller to a big tree on the other side of the school building, hitched the Jones horses to the stump puller, and all bent a shoulder to the wheel, so to speak.

"Over three or four Sundays, the gym was jockeyed a matter of 150 feet or so up to one end of the school building. The brawn of the men, nourished by some appetizing picnic dinners prepared by the ladies of the community, provided the power. The school board paid for the work of joining the two buildings into one. Not only does the community finally have a gathering place big enough to meet its needs, but the school children no longer have to cross over to the gym in bad weather for recess and other play periods."

At the end of the school term two years later, the Grant School was closed for good. The three remaining students would be attending school at Oakland Bay in the new term.

In August 1987, 16 former pupils, one teacher, and members of the Mason County Retired Teachers Association and the Mason County Historical Society gathered at the old schoolhouse to share memories and place a Historic School sign on the building. Eva Blake Willis, a retired teacher (1928-33) who attended the event, remembered that in her time there were no big trees around the schoolhouse and it had a good view of the water. She recalled the children once watched a whale approaching a passenger boat and were afraid it might capsize the boat, but the whale passed under a floating log instead. She also said there were mice in the gymnasium, and the children would play with them at lunch time and feed them bits of their lunches. The mice would even sit on the children's shoulders. "The mice were always washing and cleaning themselves, so I taught the children cleanliness habits from watching the mice clean their faces before and after they ate."

Jim Cameron, who attended the Grant School for eight years starting in 1927, remembered that in winter the children would bring sandwiches and vegetables to school for their lunch. The teacher would cook the vegetables on the wood-burning stove to make a hot soup.

When the Grant School closed, the Pickering Homemakers' Club bought it for $10, with the stipulation that the group would maintain ownership of the building and be responsible for its upkeep and preservation. In 2002, the club became a 501(c)(3) organization (eligible to receive tax-exempt donations). In 2006, the organization received state approval to do business as Pickering Community Club. In 2010, the building was designated as a Historic Landmark in Mason County and placed on the Mason County Historic Register.

■ Jan Parker is a researcher for the Mason County Historical Museum. She can be reached at [email protected]. Membership in the Mason County Historical Society is $25 per year. For a limited time, new members will receive a free copy of the book "Shelton, the First Century Plus Ten."