History

Peeples Valley School District #55

Early years: In 1879, records listed Arizona Territory schools, among them were Walnut Creek and Grove, Kirkland Valley and Peeples Valley. 

The girls (Margaret and Elladean Hays) went to school in a one-room schoolhouse in the pasture behind their house. The teacher boarded with them until a new school with a 'teacherage' was built across the road.  A little stove in the center of the schoolroom provided warmth for the pupils, some of whom walked three or four miles to school. Others rode a burro from several miles back in the hills, carrying lunches in lard pails (Sharlot Hall). 

On August 2, 1926, members of Peeples Valley School District #55 met to consider a bond issue to purchase land and construct a new school for Peeples Valley. 

The existing schoolhouse had served the ranching community well since the late nineteenth century, but had its limitations. The wood frame building with board-and-batten siding was cramped, poorly ventilated, and in need of major repair. Moreover, it lacked living quarters for the teacher. Families with school-age children took turns providing accommodations, an arrangement that was often burdensome for the families and trying for the teacher (Rigden 1993; Yarnell/Peeples Valley Centennial 1992).

At the August 1926 meeting, the school board (consisting of trustees C. F. Van Cleve, Hattie Young, and Mrs. Roy D. Hays) unanimously adopted a resolution creating a bond issue to provide $50 for a building site and $2,450 for construction of a school. The issue went before voters in a special election in the fall of 1926. The bond passed with the unanimous vote of eight voters, and was approved by the Yavapai County School Superintendent and County Board of Supervisors (Yarnell/Peeples Valley Centennial 1992).

Under the direction of Roy Hays, the Hays Cattle Company provided the building site for the new facility. Located in Township 11 North, Range 4 West, Section 19, the land lay near the center of the school district, which, at the time, consisted of all of Township 11 North, Range 5 West; all of Township 11 North, Range 4 West; and Sections 1, 2, 3, 10, 11, and 12 of Township 10 North, Range 5 West (Yavapai County 1927). The 1.99-acre building site had originally been part of a 157.44-acre homestead patented by Andrew T. Akard in 1897 (General Land Office 1897). Hays had acquired the Akard homestead and other holdings in Peeples Valley when Hays Cattle expanded operations from California into Arizona in 1912 (Yarnell/Peeples Valley Centennial 1992). George C. Gammill built the school and is believed to have designed it. 

The valley, community, and school are named for Abraham Harlow Peeples (1822-1892), a rancher and prospector who raised cattle in the locality from 1865 to 1870.

The new school opened in the fall of 1927 and the old one was torn down. The new facility featured not only a commodious classroom but also a comfortable teacherage. The first teacher and occupant was George Gammill's mother-in-law, Mrs. Fanny Behrman, a graduate of Tempe State Teachers' College. For her efforts teaching grades 1 through 8 for a nine-month school year, Mrs. Behrman received $150 per month plus living quarters—relatively good pay for a rural Arizona teacher during the 1920s (Arizona Department of Public Instruction 1927-1928 and 1928-1929; Crutchfield 1985). 

Although Mrs. Behrman taught at Peeples Valley only until the end of the 1929-1930 school year, she set a high standard for those who followed. Arizona Educational Directories (Arizona Department of Public Instruction 1927-1964) indicate that Mrs. Behrman's successors and their years of employment were: 

Betty Rigden (1930-1932)

Alice C. Camp (1932-1935) 

Delia McKay (1935-1936) 

Martha Yount (1936-1937) 

E. J. Shumway (1937-1938) 

Evelyn Sharpnack (1938-1941) 

Janet Gallagher (1941-1942)

Hazel Harris (1942-1943)

Julia Story (1943-1944) 

                  (1944-1945)

                  (1945-1946)

Ethel Willey (1946-1947)

Thelma Moyer (1947-1950) 

Marie B. Lewis (1950-1951) 

Waldo B. Christy (1951-1953)

Mrs. Myrtle Sedgwick (1953-1955)

Lillian McGowan (1955-1958) 

Gladys Alftin (1958-1960 and 1961-1962) 

Robert Woodruff (1960-1961)

Pearl Conn (1962-1964). 

The directories lack data from Peeples Valley for the 1944-1945 and 1945-1946 school years.

The hiring of teachers was a responsibility of the school district's three-member board of trustees. Per State regulations, trustees were elected to office for three-year terms. Terms of office were staggered, so that one position came up for election each year (United States Bureau of Education 1918). 

While such regulations were designed to encourage as many local residents as possible to participate in the governing of their community school, in practice, the sparse population of Peeples Valley ensured that the same core group of nuclear and extended families served on the board year after year, or returned to service after a brief hiatus. Trustees tended to include members of the Van Cleve, Hays, Sorrells, Rigden, Harris, Coughlin, McCulloch, Young, and Huddleston families (Arizona Department of Public Instruction 1927-1928 through 1963-1964).

In addition to selecting and hiring teachers, Peeples Valley School District #55 had the authority (per Arizona regulations) to manage and control its school by: providing furniture, equipment, and supplies; calling district meetings for the purpose of creating bond issues; and deciding upon questions of transportation for pupils. The board was required to make reports annually to the County and State superintendents of schools. Trustees also needed to stay mindful of the fact that their district could be dissolved and their school closed, by action of the County, if enrollment fell below eight students for three or more months of a nine-month school year (United States Bureau of Education 1918). That enrollment stipulation kept trustees in constant "recruitment mode." Providing every school-aged child in the district with an education kept enrollment figures up, and the school open. 

Peeples Valley School served from 1927 to 1964 as the public elementary school for Peeples Valley in west-central Arizona. The building consists of a classroom with attached teacherage (living quarters for the teacher). The vernacular one-story building is of wood frame construction with a gabled roof, clapboard siding, and composition shingle roofing. A string of five double-hung windows on the west elevation of the classroom provides the most notable design element. In the mid 1950s, restrooms were added to the rear of the classroom, and a back porch of the teacherage was converted to

a bathroom and vestibule.

The school district was reduced in size in 1936 when Yarnell Elementary School District #52 was formed south of Peeples Valley. Sections 10, 11, and 12 of Township 10 North, Range 5 West, were ceded from District #55 to District #52. Thereafter, the Peeples Valley School District serviced an area of approximately 48,000 acres until the school closed in 1964 (Yavapai County 1927-1964; Yarnell/Peeples Valley Centennial 1992). School records and accounts by alumni and teachers document daily life at the Peeples Valley facility. In general, grades 1 through 8 were taught, and always by one teacher. The only exceptions occurred during the 1932-1933 school year, when teacher Alice Camp also taught 9th grade, and during the 1963-1964 school year, when teacher Pearl Conn had so few students that only grades 1,4,5, and 7 were offered. Peer instruction was an important component of the educational system; older students helped younger ones learn to read, and felt honored to do so. Most students continued their education by attending high school in Prescott, Wickenburg or private boarding schools, or by taking correspondence courses through institutions such as Phoenix Union. Many Peeples Valley students eventually went on to college (Arizona Department of Public Instruction 1927-1964; Bittner 2002; Yavapai County 1927-1964). 

A series of changes were made to the school prior to its closure in 1964:

• In 1939 the building received electricity, resulting in the installation of fuse boxes, "knob and tube" wiring, and six electric lights for the classroom. Part of the system was subsequently updated with a circuit breaker box, meter, and "Romex" type wiring;

• In the 1940s, gas-fired space heaters replaced coal-burning stoves in the classroom and teacherage. The heating device for the classroom was mounted in the northeast corner of that room. The device for the teacherage was installed in the wall between the living room and bedroom;

• Original wooden shakes were replaced by composition shingle roofing in the late 1940s or early 1950s;

• In the mid 1950s, a 12 ft by 10ft addition was constructed off the rear (east) elevation of the classroom. The addition consisted of a vestibule leading to two restrooms. Exterior features included clapboard siding, a gabled roof, composition shingle roofing, metal two-light hopper windows in the restrooms, and a metal casement window on the southern wall of the vestibule. The restrooms made the outhouses obsolete, resulting in their demolition. A drinking fountain was placed inside the classroom when the restrooms were plumbed;

• The screened porch at the northeast corner of the teacherage was converted to a bathroom with small vestibule.

Exterior features included clapboard siding, a three-paneled door, and a wooden-sash, double-hung, one-over-one window;

• A concrete platform was placed over the well in 1956. The men who installed the platform inscribed their names as "J. Coughlin, J. T. Ridgen, and J. Hays."

Changes continued to be made to the property between 1964 and the present (2006). The gablet above the main classroom entry became deteriorated and was removed. The garage with coal shed west of the classroom was demolished, as were the water tank and windmill to the rear of the teacherage. When a sidelight at the teacherage main entry became broken, the glass was removed and the opening was covered with plywood. In 2005 participants in an Elderhostel program caulked and painted the exterior. 

Peeples Valley School closed at the end of the 1963-1964 year because the facility was unable to retain the requisite eight students. Its remaining pupils transferred to Yarnell, which had about 50 students at the time. The Peeples Valley School never resumed classes. Peeples Valley School District #55 remained alive but dormant until July 1, 1980, when it was officially annexed to Yarnell Elementary School District #52 (Hunt 1979; Yarnell/Peeples Valley Centennial 1992). 

The building was rehabilitated around 2006 through a Arizona Heritage Fund grant administered by the State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO). The grant provided: reroofing the entire building with composition shingles resembling the original wooden shakes in color and texture; rewiring the building; and repairing and replacing the floor in the teacherage living room, where joists and flooring have rotted. 

The building is currently under renovations by the current owner, Yarnell Elementary School District #52 through a grant from the Yavapai County Board of Supervisors.

Yarnell Elementary School District #52

In 1936 Yarnell Elementary School District #52 was formed south of Peeples Valley. Sections 10, 11, and 12 of Township 10 North, Range 5 West, were ceded from District #55 to District #52.

Information was provided by Tanya Allen with documentation of where she obtained the information.

Photos from Fay (Sorrells) Hays

Courtesy of Tanya Allen