The severe winters of the Dakota prairies seldom slowed down the activities of the country schools. Extreme cold, even 20 or 30 below zero, was not enough to close the schools unless blizzard conditions prevailed. School was called off only when the blowing snow reduced visibility so as to make traveling hazardous. On stormy days I considered it too bad if I could not see the schoolhouse a quarter of a mile away. The call canceling school usually came from the Heringers (John Heringer was school director). When the storm abated, however, we would have school regardless of the thermometer reading. In mid‑winter the sun had barely risen when we started toward the schoolhouse. The snowdrifts carved into ridges and grooves by the wind were blue in the shadows and rosy where illuminated by the sun low in the southeast. The sleds, some with jingling sleigh bells, converged at the schoolhouse where the area around the school building was free of snow. The drifts always accumulated a few feet away from the building.
The school room was icy cold and only slightly warmer than the outside air when we came in on the day after a storm. The condensation from our breaths showed plainly when we blew on our cold hands. The stove is as cold as its surroundings since the banked fire had long since burned out and the firebox filled with ashes. Steps to start the fire begin immediately. The boys shake the grate free of ashes and carry them out to the pile behind the barn. All the coal scuttles are filled from the bins in the barn and brought into the schoolhouse. A layer of scrap paper from the wastebasket and a little wood kindling are placed in the fire box. A half cup of kerosene is sprinkled on top and a lighted match is dropped in cautiously on top of the kindling. The kerosene flares, the paper ignites, flames brightly and the wood starts to burn. Larger pieces of wood are added and as soon as this fuel had subsided into a layer of embers a small shovelful of the hard coal is spread thinly over the fire. It ignites slowly with a bluish flame and a little heat begins to be perceptible close to the stove.
The children, still dressed in their outer clothes and mittens, stand around stamping their feet to keep warm. As soon as the wood is burning briskly they bring up the small chairs and sit with their feet on the base of the stove. The children remain clustered around the heater when the teacher calls school into session and the reading classes go on as usual while the others study. By half past nine the warmth is radiating from the stove and scarves, coats; overshoes and mittens begin to be shed. Soon the children are going to their seats in the rapidly warming room.
Additional coal is added to the fire from time to time and by recess time the room is almost comfortably warm. The bright sun helps to maintain a cozy atmosphere at lunch time and in the early afternoon. Later near closing time the room is often too warm and many of the pupils, including me, become a little drowsy.
A schoolroom cold enough in the morning to freeze water is not a pleasant place to start the day's instruction. To keep the room warm overnight the fire was banked by filling the heater with as much hard coal as it would hold. To slow down the combustion the sliding drafts at the ash door are shut and the damper in the stove pipe partially closed just before everyone leaves. By morning the fuel is almost completely consumed except for a bed of glowing coals. The schoolroom is chilly but not too cold for the children to sit at their desks. As soon as the drafts are opened and coal added the schoolroom becomes comfortably warm.
Source: A History of Foster County 1983 Page 411