Historic Channahon school building turns 100 as residents share memories

The village of Channahon proclaimed Sept. 14 as Pioneer Path School Day at its board meeting Aug. 21.

Pat Clower, a 43-year board member at Channahon School District 17, feels the honor is well-deserved.

Clower, who graduated from the district and later earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in accounting from Lewis University, said District 17 is “a great district.”

“The parents support their school, their community,” Clower said. “We’ve had great teachers. My kids have gone there. And we’re small. We’re only 20 square miles. We’re smaller than our neighbors. That says to me that we’re more personal, more community based. The kids you play baseball with are the kids you go to school with.”

Prairie Path serves students in third and fourth grades.

The Three Rivers Library District, with branches in Channahon and Minooka, has a collection of eight photos online relating to Channahon schools that also tells some of its history.

The first Channahon Schoolhouse was a two-story white building that stood on the corner of Tryon and Route 6. It was built in 1869 for $18,000. That school burned down in 1922.

The current building was built in 1921, also on the corner of Tryon and Route 6. In its early years, the building held an elementary school and a two-year high school.

The high school was discontinued in 1947 when the classes were consolidated into Minooka Community High School. Additional classrooms, an auditorium and a gymnasium were added to the structure in the 1950s.

[ Then & Now: Channahon High School – Channahon ]

Donna Szoke of Channahon attended school in that building – she graduated eighth grade in 1969 – and then later taught in District 17.

Szoke said during her school years, she was a member of student safety patrol. Duties included insuring kids stayed in the seats on the buses and escorting them to the former Channahon United Methodist Church across the street each week for a hot lunch.

“You could go home for lunch if you lived in town,” Szoke said.

Szoke recalled fun fairs and how, for a time, the third and fourth grades were divided into morning and afternoon to accommodate a large number of students in those grades at the time. She loved how everybody knew everybody else, she said.

“I have so many great memories of growing up in this town,” Szoke said. “I just like it. It’s my home.”

Clower, one of eight children, said six of her siblings attended school in the Pioneer Path building at one time. She, too, was a member of the safety patrol and helped children cross Route 6 to and from school. She was 12 years old.

“I had the flag on the pole,” Clower said. “And I would walk into Route 6 to stop traffic so kids could walk from school over by McCoys – at 12 years old.”

Clower recalled how students volunteered at the school – and that Clower and other students cranked out hundreds of mimeographed copies of worksheets for students from the teachers’ master copies.

She recalled the dedication of teachers who prepared and packed sandwiches at their homes for the students on the eighth grade class trip.

The parents support their school, their community. We’ve had great teachers. My kids have gone there. And we’re small. We’re only 20 square miles. We’re smaller than our neighbors. That says to me that we’re more personal, more community based. The kids you play baseball with are the kids you go to school with.”

—  Pat Clower of Channahon, former student and longtime board member of Channahon School District 17

And Clower recalled how she and her friends went door-to-door in Channahon, asking residents if they could pick their peonies for eighth grade graduation.

“I don’t know if there was a peony left in town,” Clower said. “We’d brought so many flowers. They were all on our stage.”

She said the Pioneer Path building has a certain “feeling” for many people from the Channahon community who attended that school.

“When you walk in there, the nostalgia hits you,” Clower said. “They have artwork on the wall that the kids did. And you can stand in the hall all by yourself and hear the laughter of those kids coming down the hall.”