Students salute Duffy school’s long history

Florence elementary students spend last days in old building.

By: Stephanie Prokop
   FLORENCE — Fourth- and fifth-grade students from the Marcella Duffy Elementary School will attend a newly renovated upper elementary school on Front Street in the fall, in a move that secretary and "mom away from home" Bernadette McAneney describes as "bittersweet."
   "We were a small school, and our staff was about 40 teachers, so everyone knew one another pretty well," she said.
   The new school, recently named Florence Township Riverfront School, will serve students in grades four through eight, and the actual moving process will begin shortly, explained Ms. McAneney.
   On June 14, commemorating both Flag Day and the school closing, the school held a flag ceremony that commemorated its history and looked forward to the Riverfront school’s future.
   The students took plaques off of the walls and brought them up to the new school when they formed a procession from the old school on West Second to the renovated building a few blocks away on East Front Street on June 14, said Principal Donna Collimore.
   "Today is both a happy and sad day," said Ms. Collimore in a speech she drafted for the ceremony, "We celebrate a building which has been part of the community and education of this district for over 100 years," she added.
   The Duffy building was built in either the late 1870s or the early 1880s, and the original structure consisted of four rooms, with heating provided by pot-bellied stoves that that were fueled by wood that students would bring in.
   Over the years, the school grew, and soon township-wide growth enabled more classrooms to be added.
   There were separate outhouses and playgrounds for the boys and girls. Early grading at the Marcella Duffy School consisted of three "levels" in each room. Designated "A, B, and C," a child would progress from level C (being the lowest) to level A (being the highest).
   Subject matter that was taught consisted of arithmetic, reading, copying (otherwise known as penmanship) and physiology (health).
   "We look forward to the future — a new building, new spaces to explore, new friends and faces, new lessons to learn, new memories to make — an exciting time, a new beginning, and a new home, the Riverfront School," Ms. Collimore said in her speech.
   Ms. McAneney said one of the fifth-grade teachers, Bert Eggly, said that when he took the job to begin teaching at the Marcella Duffy School a little over 40 years ago he was confident in the fact that any day there would be construction starting for a new elementary school.
   "You can imagine that he was pretty happy when he learned that he was actually moving to the new school next fall," she said.
   Ms. Collimore said that even though the school doesn’t have an official move date set yet, she noted that everything is packed up in boxes.
   The name for the renovated school building was picked by a contest that the Board of Education held in the late winter.
   The Riverfront buildings once housed the township’s high school and middle school, but last fall the district opened a new high school on Cedar Lane and closed the old one for renovations.
   The school board received input for the name via e-mails, letters, phone calls, and on the school district Web site.
   The board members chose the names that they thought would suit the building the best, and eventually narrowed the choices down to two: Florence Township Intermediate School and Florence Township Riverfront School.
   The former high school portion of the complex is currently getting a complete overhaul, with work under way on the floor, windows and lockers.
   The Duffy building will be sold to help refinance the renovations.