They were looked upon as being quite sufficiently educated
for all that Windomville could possibly expect or exact of them.
When the old schoolhouse was destroyed by fire in the winter of
1916, Alix Crown contributed fifteen thousand dollars toward the
construction of this new and more or less modern structure, with
the provision that the town board should appropriate the balance
needed to complete the building. On completion the schoolhouse
was found to have cost exactly $14,989.75, and so, at the next
township election, the board was unanimously returned to office by
an appreciative constituency, and Miss Crown graciously notified
by the assessor that she had been credited with ten dollars and
twenty-five cents against her next year's road tax.
The Literary Society always met in Miss Miller's "room," not
because it was more imposing or commodious than any of the others
but on account of its somewhat rarified intellectual atmosphere.
Miss Angie's literary attainments, while confined to absorption
rather than to production, were well known. She was supposed to
have read all of the major poets. At any rate she was able to quote
them. Besides, she had made a study of Dickens and Thackeray and
Trollope, being qualified to discuss the astonishing shortcomings
of those amiable mid-Victorians in a most dependable manner. She
made extensive use of the word "erudite," and confused a great many
people by employing "vicarious" and "didactic" and "raison d'etre"
in the course of ordinary conversation.
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