LITTLE RUSH SCHOOL
DISTRICT No. 7
Little Rush School Site in 1965
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By Ada McDonald Whybark
We came to the Comanche country from Wichita Falls, Texas, in 1900, settling ten miles northwest of Rush Springs, I.T. This community was later named "Rockyford."
Our family was, my father, mother, and five brothers. I was 14 years old at the time this country was opened to Settlement. I remember people registering to select their land at the Lawton land office, and we all called Lawton "Rag Town" at that time. I lived in the Rockyford community until 1912, when I married Thomas P. Whybark. We moved to the Little Rush community which was in the extreme northeast corner of Old Comanche County. It was seven miles northwest of Rush Springs, I.T.
In 1902, a settler on the land just north of the Little Rush School moved away and this land was taken up by Elmer Rockhold. I cannot recall the name of this early day settler, but there were four members of his family who died, and were buried in a little plot of land a short distance north of the Little Rush School. So far as I know there were no other burials at this location, nor were there any tombstones bearing inscriptions, at these graves. For years this tiny burying ground was enclosed with a barbed wire fence.
When we moved into this community, the Little Rush School had been established, and had been in operation for about ten years. I've heard my neighbors tell of the early days from 1901 before we moved into the community. This is a list of the teachers who taught at Little Rush School #7 as I remember:
Miss Iris Roland
Emmet Brightwell
Will McGranaham
Mrs. Clara Bryant
Miss Ida Lee Worsham
Miss Etta Penn
Mrs. Crawford
Mrs. Ada McCormick
John Liming
Abbot Liming
Miss
Thurza Cox
Miss Tempest Damon
Miss Tommie Gault
Miss Helen Hickam
Mr. &
Mrs. Earnest Evans
Jake Bowersox
Mr. & Mrs. Earnesl Evans taught together at Little Rush for 14 years.(1) They now live in Rush Springs, Oklahoma. This was after the time that oil was discovered in the north pari of this community, and the increased population made a two-teacher school necessary.(2)
There were many good families settled at Little Rush, and we had both Sunday School and preaching at the schoolhouse. When the elderly people died or moved away from the community, everything seemed to have died out, excepl for the oil and gas field.
(I) Additional historical information on Little Rush School District No. 7 by Mrs. Verdie (Roberts) Williams, now living adjoining the Little Rush School site. John H. Williams original homesteader of the land where the school was located, donated an acre for school purposes. It was in the southwest quarter of section 1 1 , T 4 N, R 8 W, I.M. The first building was a one-room, frame. It later was made into a two-room, two-teacher school and for a short time was a three-teacher school.
(2) Comanche County school records in the Lawton Court House reveal the organizational meeting for School District No. 7 was held April 22, 1902. School Board members elected at that time were: J. M. Geiger, A. J. Yoakim, and John H. Williams. Mrs. A. J. Dickerson was the first teacher of record at District No. 7. Ed.
copied from: Prairie Lore, October 1966, volume 3 number 2
In recognition of