The Peter Parley/West Lane Schoolhouse will be open to visitors on Sunday, July 25, from 1 to 4 p.m. The one-room school, site of education for Ridgefield children since the mid-18th Century, is now a mini-museum, overseen by the Ridgefield Historical Society. The building, owned by the Town of RIdgefield, was furnished and maintained for many years by members of the Ridgefield Garden Club who still take care of the plantings around the building.
The school is furnished as it was at the turn of the 20th Century; it closed in 1915. Exhibits tell the story of Ridgefield’s one-room schools and include some of the many books for children that were written by Peter Parley (pen name of Samuel G. Goodrich, who as a boy attended the West Lane school).