Not many people are aware that Hamilton Township once had a school known as the "Friendship School." It was located atop the western side of Cedar Lane hill, near the site of the Korzilius Monument company, and the prison cemetery. This transcription from an 1895 "Daily State Gazette" tells of the demise of one of Hamilton's original schoolhouses. It is interesting to note the frugality exhibited by the school board of those years gone by. Rather than purchase new furniture, it was decided to divide the old furniture from the closed school and divide it among the new facilities.
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The old Friendship schoolhouse and grounds on Cedar street, just beyond the Eleventh ward, which has been the source of much controversy and some litigation in Hamilton township for the last year, are to be disposed of at public sale on the 30th inst.* (August, 1895) This was decided upon yesterday by a unanimous vote, at a special election of the voters of Hamilton township school district, held at the schoolhouse in question. It was also decided that the proceeds of the sale should be devoted to purchasing furniture and other supplies for the new Hutchinson school and the new Rusling school, which are to be built upon the Homedell tract and at Broad Street Park, respectively, to take the place of the Franklin street school, which was not only too small but so dilapidated that its condemnation has been more than once threatened.
Before the passage of the township school law of 1894, the voters of the Franklin school district decided to build a new schoolhouse on the site the old one, but General James F. Rusling, who was interested in having a schoolhouse at Broad Street Park, which was in the district, certioraried the matter to the Supreme Court. When the township school law was passed and the district became absorbed in the Hamilton township district and it was found that the Friendship schoolhouse was too small, an annex was established in rented rooms on the Homedell Tract. Since then, Symmes B. Hutchinson, representing the Homedell Land Association, agreed to build a schoolhouse upon the Homedell tract if the township school authorities would rent the same, and General Rusling offered to build another at Broad Street Park on like conditions Both of these propositions have been accepted, so that when the school year opens in September the Franklin school will be a thing of the past, and instead there will two schools: one at Broad Street Park, and one on the Homedell tract. The former will be known as the Rusling school, and the latter as the Hutchinson School. In addition to devoting the proceeds of the sale of the Franklin School to the purchase of furniture and other supplies for the new schools, the old furniture will also be equally divided between the two new schools.
The teachers of the new schools will be those who taught at the Franklin school, and the Franklin school annex. Miss Clara Morgan of Hamilton Square has been assigned to the Hutchinson school, and Miss Margaret B. Hunt, of Groveville, to the Rusling school.
*"inst." was commonly used by journalists to designate a day. eg:
March 16th would be written as the "16th inst."
