Lower Parker School Site: Cultural Landscapes Inventory, Ozark National Scenic Riverways
Regions 3, 4, & 5 Park Cultural Landscapes Program. 2018. Lower Parker School Site: Cultural Landscapes Inventory, Ozark National Scenic Riverways. Cultural Landscapes Inventory Report. 500628. U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service. NPS Midwest Regional Office, Omaha, Nebraska / CRIS-CL Database
Inventory Unit Description: The Lower Parker School Site is a two-acre cultural landscape located within Ozark National Scenic Riverways in Dent County, Missouri. The site is accessible via County Road 652, which runs south-southeast from State Highway YY, roughly bisects the Lower Parker School landscape, and continues down to the diverging points of a Parker Branch (fed by Schafer Spring) crossing and Current River access area. The entrance drive to the nearby Susie Nichols Farm is on the east side of the spring branch. The Lower Parker School Site is situated along the crest of a narrow, densely wooded ridge that descends into Parker Hollow. The one-room school is in a small, grassy clearing on the east side of the road. Two associated concrete privy foundations are in the woods on the west slope. The school was constructed between 1905 and 1906, and was open by 1907 at the latest. It served southwestern Current Township, operating continuously until Dent County consolidated its schools in 1955. Like other remotely located Ozark schools of that time, Lower Parker School not only offered a public education, but also provided a community center for the surrounding families. The property was listed in the National Register of Historic Places on May 31, 1991. It is locally significant under Criterion A, with a period of significance that corresponds to the years of operation, from 1906 to 1956.
- Type
- Published Report
- Authors
- Regions 3, 4, & 5 Park Cultural Landscapes Program
- Date of Issue
- 2018-07-03
- Publisher
- U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service
- Units
- MWR , OZAR
- Keywords
- community center, education, foundations, Missouri, privy, public education, rural school, school, schoolhouse, social history, Susie Nichols Farm