Lower Shell Creek School | Carter County, Tennessee | c. 1911
In 1911, the community of Shell Creek built this schoolhouse to replace a one-room school built around 1900. The large school building was completed in 1912, the first year it welcomed students from the surrounding valley as back then, each valley had its own school. The massive wooden structure had 2 large rooms downstairs that were subdivided into smaller learning spaces and the second floor was used by the Junior Order of Masons.
Students used outhouses that were located in the back of the school, separated for boys and girls. Rooms were heated with a pot belly stove that one student would be responsible for lighting early each morning before classes began. Each school room had its own bucket and dipper and older boys were responsible for refilling the water buckets from the well in front of the schoolhouse. But problems arose from this system whenever a sick student would use the communal dipper, the illness would spread throughout the classroom.
By 1916, the community of Shell Creek reportedly had 11 houses, one school, 2 churches, a post office, 3 general stores, and a depot for the Tweetsie railroad.
The school was initially built as an elementary school that served grades 1-8 but was later expanded to include grades 1-12. In 1930, a new high school called Cloudland was opened nearby and many students enrolled there, causing the Shell Creek School to downsize to elementary-aged students again. That same year, the depot for the railroad was torn down.
Shell Creek School continued to operate as an elementary school until the 1950s when it was replaced with a newer cinderblock building that was erected a half mile away. In 1955, the community post office closed as well.
