My grandmother, Miriam Brown Harbaugh, first went to school at the one-room school in Pleasant Valley, Maryland. At that time in 1908, the village consisted of a few houses, a white frame church, and the school. She later went to the graded school at Smithsburg. She recalled that at Pleasant Valley School the “drinking fountain” consisted of a pail of water with a dipper in it. She remembered being intrigued by the Smithsburg School’s hallway fountains with running water.

Another of my Grandmother’s stories about her school years at Smithsburg —

“I see as though it were yesterday, school being let out at 4 P.M., to find Eva standing by the wide open front door of the schoolhouse, with her books tucked under her arm, waiting for me to come down the stair and join her. There were four rooms upstairs, and four rooms down; the lower grades, of course occupied the lower floor and were dismissed a few minutes before upstairs so as to be out of the way when the older and larger groups came trooping down.

Then, came the long walk to the crossroads and up the mountain home. Our home was a distance, just one and one half miles from Smithsburg. We usually reached home about five o-clock. In warm weather, spring and fall, we were inclined to loiter on the way, generally stopping to gather wild flowers that grew by the roadside. This was true especially in the springtime. I’ve mentioned before the bed of Johnny-jump-ups (violets) that grew on the bank between the two “Cold Turns.” Here we stopped each pretty evening on the way home and gathered our mother bunches of the lovely blossoms. Sometimes until we got them home they were wilted and bedraggled, but our mother, nevertheless, was always very appreciative of our thoughtfulness.”