C.H. Campbell third-graders walk through history

Photo

Neighbors | Abby Slanker.Hilltop Elementary School third-grade students in Alexis Novotny’s class had a brown bag lunch on the green in between visiting local historical sites during the school’s Canfield History Walking Tour May 31.

Photo

Neighbors | Abby Slanker.Suzie Merz (right), a volunteer at the Mahoning Dispatch Museum, explained the old newspaper printing process to Hilltop Elementary third-grade students in Amanda Thacker’s class during their visit to the museum during the school’s Canfield History Walking Tour May 31.

Photo

Neighbors | Abby Slanker.Hilltop Elementary third-graders visited the Canfield Historical Society’s Bond House during the Canfield History Walking Tour May 31. Their teacher, Jenny Beil (back right) is one of the originators of the historical walking tour.

Photo

Neighbors | Abby Slanker.Laura Zeh (far left), Canfield Historical Society curator, spoke to Hilltop Elementary School third-grade students in Karen Pavlov’s class at the Bond House during their Canfield History Walking Tour May 31.

By ABBY SLANKER

neighbors @vindy.com

C.H. Campbell Elementary School third-grade students received a lesson in local Canfield history during their day-long Canfield History Walking Tour June 5. This is the third year the third-grade classes have visited several historical sites and buildings on the village green and surrounding areas.

Stops on the tour included the Ruggles-Coope House, Old Courthouse, Christian Church, Odd Fellows Hall, Methodist Church, the Green and bandstand, Farmers National Bank, Mahoning Dispatch, Township Hall, War Vets Museum, Canfield Historical Society’s Bond House, Presbyterian Church, Village Cemetery, Canfield Village Middle School, Old Turner School, WPA Building and the Old Texaco Station.

With the exception of the Mahoning Dispatch and Canfield Historical Society’s Bond House, the third-grade teachers relayed the history of the locations to the students, highlighting the Ohio Historical Markers at the sites. The students received tours of the Mahoning Dispatch and Bond House, and presentations from volunteers at those buildings.

While the students visited the Mahoning Dispatch, volunteer Suzanne McCabe, president of the Canfield Historical Society, gave the students a tour of the old newspaper presses and machines in the museum. McCabe also gave the students a lesson on the Dispatch’s history.

“The Mahoning Dispatch was started in 1877. The main office took care of the advertisers, which included Farmers National Bank, which is what actually paid for the newspapers,” McCable said.

McCabe showed the students the flat bed press and a smaller press, which she actually turned on, in the back room of the building.

“The smaller presses only printed as fast as the paper was put in, so the press operator had to be pretty fast,” McCabe told the students.

To refuel about half-way through their tour, the students enjoyed a brown bag lunch on the green. Each class was assigned a color of T-shirt to wear, so teachers and accompanying parent volunteers could keep track of each class while taking the tour.

This year marked the third year of the tour, which was originally created by C.H. Campbell third-grade teachers Marian Bailey and Heidi Snyder and Hilltop Elementary School third-grade teacher Jenny Beil. The teachers researched the historical stops to correlate with third-grade content standards, which includes learning about your community.