The restoration of the one-room schoolhouse in the Route 66 hamlet of Phelps, Missouri, marked a milestone Friday by reinstalling the bell tower and bell on the century-old building, reported the Joplin Globe.
The nonprofit Phelps School Community Center started its efforts about a year ago to restore the dilapidated but cherished building, which sits just a few feet north of original Route 66. The schoolhouse dates to the 1889.
Even though schoolchildren eventually were sent to the Miller School District by about 1952, the schoolhouse continued to be used for 4-H clubs, town dinners, quilting meetings and elections through the 1980s.
Over the past year, the community group has worked diligently on the building’s exterior, transforming it from a sagging, decrepit school into a sturdy, shining structure covered in bright white siding and trim. Although one wall of siding and a few pieces of trim are yet to be installed, the setting of the bell tower marked the last major exterior project of the year.
Reggi Carpenter, vice president of the community group and the owner of an auto parts store nearby, said he has been thrilled with the renovation, which has largely sought to restore the school to its former glory based on old photographs of the building. All of the funds, labor and materials have either been donated or have been purchased through fundraisers, he said.
And the renovations aren’t done yet. Interior work will have to wait until spring, project managere Willie Washam said:
He said a big sag in the southwest corner, which has been affected by a persistent leak in the roof, will need to be addressed.
Washam also plans to strip back one of the masonite blackboards, which were installed in the 1930s, to show what had been placed on the walls before then to serve as blackboards — 12-foot boards that were painted black. The windowless eastern wall will be framed on the interior to show where the windows had once been placed, he said.
The group wants to return the building back to its role as a community center. Washam also wants to convert part of the building into museum space for vintage photographs and Route 66 in Lawrence County.
(Screen-capture image of the bell tower being in installed on the Phelps schoolhouse from Joplin Globe video)