TOP
Early Schools

There were two types of early schools before statehood - The Indian schools, and the white "pay or subscription schools."

The Choctaw Nation with the help of church organizations such as the Presbyterians, Methodists and Baptists established the Indian schools.  The Methodist established schools for the Choctaw boys and girls, Fort Coffee and New Hope Academies.  They were the two most important schools in the county.  The Presbyterians established schools at Shady Point, Kulla Chaha, and an academy at Cameron.

Often white children were allowed to attend the Indian schools by paying a small fee.  No rural schools could be organized on a legal basis before statehood.   In the towns until 1898 there were no legal means to establish schools.  They, too, had private and subscriptions schools.  Poteau is said to have established the first school by tax and bond action in the Indian Territory.  After 1902, Poteau and Howe were among the first incorporated towns to use bonds to establish schools in buildings erected by bonds.

A series of schools called, "Moonlight School," were organized in LeFlore County and various sections of Oklahoma soon after statehood.  Schools for adults that taught reading, writing, and arithmetic.  The day teacher offered this free.
 

Some of the early schools:

• Stephen Holson School on the Texas Road west of Holson Creek
• A school at the Cemetery at Summerfield
• A school at Hickory Grove, near Kully ¹
• A school on Long Creek near LeFlore
• A school at Springfield between Summerfield and LeFlore
• Bethlehem was located near the present Harreld's Chapel
• A school on Caston Creek near Wister taught by Walter Scott
• first neighborhood school was at Skulleyville (sic) near the spot where New Hope for girls was established in 1843
• Fort Coffee was for Indian boys
• A small school was established on a small creek near Panama [not Brazil]
• A school on Buck Creek with Dude LeFlore's father as teacher
• A school near Milton called Pine Ridge, in 1874
• Fulsom Chapel at Pocola
• Green Hill north of Cameron on Hwy 112 had a school near the cemetery
• Double Springs was a Presbyterian school and church at Shady Point, east of the railroad tracks at the spring near the Old Lippey home.
• A school at Hodgens
• A school between Howe and Wister on the old Poteau River Crossing

The Fort Coffee Academy occupied the old Military Fort in the extreme northern part of LeFlore County situated on a high bluff, called Swallow Rock, that overlooks the Arkansas River.  After the fort was abandoned the buildings were used as a school for the Indian boys.  Henry C. Benson was the first teacher and W. H. Goode was the first superintendent in 1843.  In the spring of 1844, 33 boys were in attendance, the school was under Methodist supervision and it was their first effort to educate the Choctaws.

The school was located about six miles northeast of the present town of Spiro and operated in conjunction with that of New Hope.  It remained in operation until the Civil War and was not reopened when the war closed.  Nothing remains of the site except a deep rock walled well.  A small cemetery also exists where the body of Major Francis Armstrong is buried.  He was Superintendent of the early Choctaw removal and also Superintendent of the Choctaw Agency when it was established in 1832.  He died 1835 at the Agency five miles east and was brought to Swallow Rock, (Fort Coffee), for burial.
Source: Henry L. Peck, The Proud Heritage of LeFlore County (Muskogee, OK: Hoffman Printing Co., 1967), p. various.

¹ Probably same "Pay School" later referred to as "Hickory Grove" one mile northeast of Kulla Chaha where Mrs. Matta Peck began teaching at age 15y 9mo.