[B]ROWNINGTON — Facing an uphill battle against time and gravity, 44 New England oxen inched a 19th-century schoolhouse roughly a third of a mile back to its original site Monday where it will be preserved.
The pull, which was managed by Messier House Moving in Montpelier, took the building up Hinman Settler Road. It was done in part to save the historic structure, which is deteriorating. In a Town Meeting Day vote two years ago, Brownington offered up the grammar school to the Old Stone House Museum, which plans to refurbish it and make it part of its unique collection of New England history.
The 1823 building, which housed the first secondary school in Orleans County, was once run by Alexander Twilight, the first person of African-American heritage to graduate from an American college and the first elected to public office.
The Old Stone House Museum has a vast online trove of illuminating stories on the students, faculty and administrators at the Orleans County Grammar School. One story describes an act of mischief in which students let town sheep out of their pens and somehow got them to the top of the school’s bell tower.
In a fitting tribute to the rich history of the building, the resurrection of the oxen haul as transportation Monday made for a scene straight out of an old Yankee tale.
The building’s new home is just up the hill in the heart of Brownington, a neighborhood that is on the National Register of Historic Places. The grammar school now sits alongside a collection of elegantly old structures, all with origins in the 19th century. The town cemetery is at the school’s southern side.
“This place is basically unchanged since the 1840s,” said Bob Hunt, the education director of the Old Stone House Museum.
Gesturing to the working animals behind him, Hunt added: “You are getting a real true view of Vermont back then.”
The bellows of oxen rang out frequently during the pull, echoing in the summer air as 22 teams of handlers gave directions to their livestock in whispers and shouts. Each crew consisted of adults as well as children trained with oxen at local 4-H clubs. The crews directed the animals to stop and start in a symphony of movement that took more than three hours of pulling.
The smallest animals were at the front, while the largest pulled the brunt of the schoolhouse’s weight as it rode atop modern-day dollies.
Roughly 2,000 onlookers swarmed the town to watch the pull — more than double the population of Brownington. Viewers sat on hay bales and took pictures. They included many locals, as well as people from as far away as Massachusetts, Alabama and California.
A few of the oxen were from the Northeast Kingdom, but they included teams from throughout Vermont as well as New Hampshire and Maine.
The tightly orchestrated pull had been discussed ever since the state condemned the old building two years ago.
With the town unwilling to sink any money into the building, residents voted to give it to the Old Stone House Museum.
With Monday’s move, the building is settled back in its original locale, after it was moved from there in 1869. Museum officials said that with the move complete, the next steps include a major renovation.
While plans for the space include keeping a number of classic flourishes — including an elderly Glenwood stove and a colorfully painted stage curtain depicting Lake Willoughby — the renovation will also add some modern conveniences, including a handicapped-accessible ramp and electricity. A major part of the renovation includes rebuilding the bell tower where the sheep prank took place, as well as the back porch.
“For the first time in its history it will have running water and some flush toilets,” Hunt said.
The space will continue to be made available as a Grange hall, as well as to local community and church groups for meals and other events.
More than $117,000 has been raised for renovations, but Peggy Day Gibson, the museum director, said more than $150,000 is still needed in grants and donations to ensure the space can become usable.
“We are going to hit every (building) code in the book,” Gibson promised.
Much like the modernization plans for the school, the oxen pull featured some assistance from gas-powered dollies.
According to members of the moving crew, the animals were handicapped by the fact that they were pulling the building up a paved road and therefore couldn’t dig in their hooves. Gibson said the slight help from machines gave the animals a psychological boost.
“You never want to make an animal try to pull something that’s not going to budge,” she said. “That is bad for their attitude.”
