The Bath School reunion was held Saturday, Aug. 5 at LaRosa’s in Oxford, where a lively crowd of more than 40 gathered to reminisce and reconnect. After a social hour of appetizers, attendees were seated around large tables as Janet Baudendistel Hastings offered a beautiful invocation and blessing for the meal. Two of the evening’s leaders and committee members, Becky Harvey Hannebaum and Curt Sizemore, then encouraged guests to go through the dinner buffet line in order of age. After some good natured ribbing,  Marlene Gesell Sloneker and Jim Rosenberger were first and second in line.

It would be impoirtant to note that both of them were teachers throughout their lives, a high compliment to the schooling that raised them both.  Sloneker had vivid memories of her time at Bath School, a time when her teacher Mr. Roy Alley would say “Get your work done, kids, so we can go ice skating.” The class would scurry to finish school work then follow Mr. Alley to what they called the Harvey Swamp, a frozen stretch of standing water on attendee Roy (Jr.) Harvey’s property. Such memories of the mid to late 1940s are representative of a different era, to be sure, but the friendly atmosphere in the banquet room at LaRosa’s on Saturday was proof that some things transcend time and space. Having closed in 1958, Bath School was only a short part of some of these men and women’s childhoods, but the bonds that were formed from this shared experience have lasted a lifetime. 

The history of the school goes back to the early 1900s.  In 1867, there were five one-room schools in Bath Township. By 1908 a tworoom brick school was built along Bath Road on a twoacre lot of James Howell’s farm, under the direction of township trustee John N. Smith.  Grades 1-8 and two years of high school were offered here.  In 1923 the high school was eliminated, sending students to Union School in College Corner or McGuffey and Stewart in Oxford. In June of 1956, McGuffey High School closed, consolidating with Stewart and Hanover schools to form Talawanda High School in Oxford (Ohio).  That fall, all Bath Township high school students attended Talawanda HS.  In ‘57, Bath School’s seventh and eighth grade students were sent to College Corner along with all high school students, except those finishing their final year at Talawanda.  In early 1958, Bath School was permanently closed.  Four reunions have been held since:  in 2010, 2013, 2018, and 2023. 

With their years of attendance scattered across the 1940s and ‘50s, many of Saturday's attendees can recall being in school during WWII.  Jim Rosenberger, who attended from 1941-48, had a brother in the war and remembers the War Mothers’ meetings and family events held during that time.  An educator himself, Jim remembers multiple grades being housed in one room, with 4th-6th grades in Mrs. Harvey’s class. Some families made up a good deal of those classes. Elsie Baker Pelkey noted that of the 12 children in her family, seven attended bath School.   Mark Rosenberger standing nearby concurs, as one of 11 kids.   Bill Dunaway, their bus driver in those years, would pick up half his load at the Baker house, they joked, and the rest over at the Rosenbergers’.  Diane Estep Keeler recalls a childhood where her father worked the coal mines, which she was able to tell her class about when they studied about coal.  It was her first foray into public speaking, she laughed, and “now they can’t get me to shut up!”  There was laughter and chatter throughout the room all evening, and a buffet of Italian food kept everyone well fed.  Many thanks are owed to the good people who keep this group together, and keep its history alive:  Becky Harvey Hannebaum (Committee Chair), Edie Bruns McDonough, Elaine Gesell Smith, Marlene Gesell Sloneker, Curt Sizemore, and Vernon Bruns.  With special thanks to Curt Sizemore for the time and effort he takes in the preservation and publicity of such events.