Historic Ford School Returns To Original LITH Site

It only took about 15 minutes Friday to haul the 135 year-old Ford School 1,000 feet down Algonquin Road from Algonquin's old Stonegate Nursery.  The last 50 feet north and 15 feet up to its original site in Lake in the Hills' Ford School Park was a bear, though, and took almost another hour.

"It just kind of got me in the stomach when I seen that thing roll down the road," said 94 year-old Albert Ebel who began his education at the one-room school in 1923 when he was only 5 years old.  "My folks sent me to school early so my older sister could pull me through the snowbanks," said Ebel.

Over the past year the Lake in the Hills Historical Society begged and cajoled an estimated $25,000 in money, material and manpower to save the Ford School from a wrecker's ball and move it back where it was before it was abandoned and relocated in 1946.  Society head Bob Spooner said once the school's jacked down onto a new foundation, volunteers will restore the it to the way it looked in 1922. "We have pictures of that," said Spooner.  "We've got everything but the maple flooring," he said.  "It had maple flooring.  You know anyone with some old maple flooring?" 

In the pic:  Hauling the old Ford School down Algonquin Road was actually the easy part Friday.  Crews had to use a winch to pull it up from the road to its new/old location in LITH's Ford School Park.