We are fortunate to have many artifacts from the early days of Deer Park Schools. The oldest two are incorporated into the tower found in the Amity foyer. The 1871 datestone is the district’s oldest relic. This was the year a larger brick schoolhouse was built replacing the smaller school. This two room building was the third bearing the name Amity. The stone was placed above the exterior door of the school. When the structure was demolished in the early 1970s, the datestone was returned to the school district.

The centerpiece of the foyer tower is the school bell which was cast in 1874 by the Buckey Bell Foundry of Cincinnati. A belfry was added to the two room schoolhouse where the bell then hung until 1907 when a larger school was built on the current Amity site. The bell was moved to this new four room Amity where it continued its duty of calling the local children to school.

During renovations in 1926, the bell was removed from the school and was sold. It eventually made its way back to the school district and over the next few decades was used as an air raid warning during WW II, was displayed in the high school foyer, rang out celebrations for football victories and was then put into storage and forgotten. In the early 2000s, two Deer Park residents volunteered to take on separate projects to repair and restore the bell so it could once again be displayed and used. Their work likely saved the bell. When Amity was expanded and renovated in 2018, the bell was given a prominent space in the foyer to honor its role in the district’s history.

This piece of oak furniture is one of the desks used by Amity teachers. Yearbook photos, help establish the time period this type of desk was used in the school as the 1930s and 40s.

This card catalog was in the Amity library from probably the 1950s until 2018. Before computers were used to help locate books, every library book had a card in this wooden cabinet. Students would find the book’s card in the drawers, and use the call number on the card to locate the book on the shelves. It was a little more complicated than using a computer to search for books.

The swivel stand on the top of the card catalog was designed to hold a large reference book such as this 1987 dictionary. The wooden steps beside the card catalog came from the high school. Librarians or students could move it around the library to reach books on higher shelves.

At one time, every classroom at Amity had framed portraits of George Washington and Abraham Lincoln hanging in the front of the room. It is likely these two portraits were first hung in the 1930s and remained hanging in a classroom for many decades.

The old Amity gym stood approximately in the area the kindergarten classrooms and parking lot is today. At the top of the gym, there was a projection booth from which high school students shined a spotlight on actors, singers and musicians during plays and productions such as Parkers. This spotlight was still in the projection booth until the gym was demolished in 2017.

The oak bookcase is likely from the 1930s and was probably used in a principal’s or superintendent’s office.

This model of the sun, earth and moon is called a Tellurion. Turning the gears causes the Earth to rotate and revolve around the sun demonstrating day and night, seasons and years. In the 1950s or 60s, an elementary class collected trading stamps and redeemed them to purchase this model for the school. Their gift helped many decades of Amity students understand the workings of the solar system.

The science kit, test tube rack and other science tools are a small sample of the types of equipment students may have used in the science labs at Amity over the decades.

From 1936 to 1952, Amity wasn’t only an elementary school. It was also the high school. High school girls could take Home Economics class where they learned about cooking, sewing and managing a home. This oak framed mirror is from the Home Ec classroom which was located where the teacher lunchroom is today. It was likely used to help students in creating and sewing clothing.

Amity School was once a Civil Defense Fall Out Shelter. A yellow and black Fall Out Shelter sign was posted outside the front doors of the building. During the Cold War in the 1950s and 60s, communities identified buildings thought to be safe places to seek shelter during a possible nuclear emergency. The very thick walls of Amity’s basement were thought to provide a safe haven. The basement’s bookroom was stocked with numerous Civil Defense buckets filled with various emergency supplies. This bucket is stocked with bandages dated 1953 and 1954.

This Honor Roll was hung in the main hallway when the high school was located in this building. It once had a hinged cover that when closed, made the plaque look like a book. Unfortunately, that cover was removed at some point and lost. From yearbook photos, we know the inscription on the cover said, “Herein are inscribed the names of the men and women of this school who served their country in the Second World War.”

Some of these individuals would have been students who left high school at a young age to answer the call to duty. There are 272 names inscribed with 8 stars denoting young men who were lost in the service. The plaque was erected by the PTA and hung in the building from the mid 1940s until the 2018 renovation.

The dedication plaque was placed in commemoration of the 1936 addition to Amity School. At this time, the community voted to enlarge the Amity building to include a high school so students wanting to continue their education beyond 8th grade could stay in Deer Park. Before this time, local students would need to go to neighboring high schools such as Norwood or Sycamore. During this construction, the west wing was added to the original 1907 structure adding at least 13 classrooms for high school students. The building was now known as the Deer Park Village School, having temporarily lost the name of Amity.

Classrooms typically had at least one map hanging in the front of the room to assist in learning social studies, geography or history. U.S. maps, world maps and state maps were the most common. This colorful 1952 geographical map focuses on landforms.

During the early 1900s every classroom had a heavy iron stand in the front of the classroom in which the American Flag stood. At the time this stand was likely used at Amity, there would’ve only been 48 stars on the US flag.

This oak table was most likely used as a typing table. It may have been used by the school secretary, or based on yearbook photos, may be one of the tables used in typing class during the 1930s and 40s.

These chairs were used in the School Board Room which was located at Holmes Elementary. They likely date to the opening of Holmes in 1958.

The graphic on the wall is part of a logo used for the 100th Birthday Celebration of the 1907 Amity School. That four room schoolhouse has been enlarged six times to become the Amity we now know. The original four rooms of that building are still used as classrooms today. They are in the center of the building facing Galbraith Road.

Just as local pioneers supported the building of a school for their children in 1826, today’s Deer Park residents feel that same duty for the education of the local youth. In 2016, they voted in favor of a major expansion and renovation of the Amity building. The result was a beautiful school designed and equipped to meet the needs of Deer Park students today and well into the 21st century. This is something Daniel Schenck and his fellow neighbors could not have imagined when they laid the logs of that first small schoolhouse 200 years ago.