At the request of Mr. Edwards the colored people in the vicinity, after repairing the roof and windows, cleaned, scrubbed and whitewashed the inside of this old log house, and thus prepared it for its new and noble era of usefulness.
The Girls' Hall, 1889-1910.
FEBRUARY 14, 1886
On Sabbath, February 14, 1886, one week after the arrival of Miss Hartford, her first meeting was held and a Sunday school was organized under her leadership. At its close a prayer-meeting was held in which she read the scriptures, the hymns and a sermon.
The Old Farm House.
The Pioneer Home of a Choctaw Chief, Leflore, and of the Oak Hill School.
On Tuesday, February 16, 1886, the school was opened with seven pupils. The opening exercises consisted in the reading of a chapter by the new teacher, the singing of a hymn and prayer by elder Henry Crittenden. The latter was profoundly impressed with the fact that, in the auspicious opening of the school that morning, the colored people of that section were realizing the answer to their oft repeated prayers, the fulfilment of their long delayed hopes.
The new teacher had never heard such a prayer in any school she ever attended. He thanked Our Heavenly Father, "That the prayers of his people were answered. In their bondage they had cried unto Him and He had heard their cry. In their ignorance and darkness they had asked for light and the light had come." He prayed for the teacher that "God would give her wisdom and enable her to be faithful." He prayed for the children and their parents that, "they might be able to see and appreciate what God had done for them," and for the school, "that it might abide with them and become an uplifting power to them and their children."