Wilburn School - District No. Jnt - 1

The Wilburn school served a joint district in Meade and Ford Counties. The school itself was located in Ford County but many families connected to Fowler in Meade County used this school.

The town of Wilburn was established in 1885, on the banks of Crooked Creek just one quarter mile north of the Ford County-Meade County line. One year later there was a school established south of the town. The original school had been a modest, incomplete structure with a dirt floor, no desks, only benches for the students. But soon a new school house was built.

Wilburn as a town saw it's demise when the railroads came through the territory and went south through Fowler. The school continued to exist, however, as a rural school through 1946. The Wilburn Schoolhouse served as an educational, social, and community center for box suppers, literary programs, election day polling, and, during the depression, a meeting place for AAA and governmental programs. After World War II, because of school consolidation, the schoolhouse was torn down.

There are some gaps in the records, but the following is a list of the teachers who taught at Wilburn and the years they taught, arranged by year:

Some of the teachers we know of that taught at Wilburn:

There is a database of the students who attended this school at the Meade County Historical Museum... some of the surnames were: Anton, Austin, Batman, Blanchett, Botkin, Cornelsen, Creamer, Dowell, Dunn, Francis, Fravel, Friesen, Gerber, Grogan, Hamar, Jantz, Kissel, Kroeker, Laws, Little, Long, McBee, Milford, Mingus, Morrison, Newell, Rarden, Reese, Rexford, Schlichting, Simerl, Stonehouse, VanRiper, Wakeman, Wisdom, Wood, Wright, Wussow, and Wysong.

This map shows what sections made up the original school district in 1886. School district boundaries sometimes changed over the years to accommodate families with children.