
DATE: Saturday, October 18, 1997            TAG: 9710180329

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B4   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY LEWIS KRAUSKOPF, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: CHESAPEAKE                        LENGTH:   74 lines

EIGHTH-GRADERS GET A TASTE OF PIONEERS' LIFE

Times were hard for Ryan Carley out on the rolling plains of Hickory Middle School.

After panning for gold with pie tins in baby pools, the 13-year-old found he wouldn't be able to live off the land.

``I thought I had a lot of money. But I just had $5.60,'' said Ryan, who hoped he had enough for some beans or a peppermint stick or two at the general store.

Luckily for Ryan, he wasn't really in the western wilderness. He was smack in the middle of ``Frontier Day,'' a three-hour event Friday at Hickory Middle.

About 120 eighth-graders spent the afternoon celebrating the Wild West, a culmination of their studies on the subject.

They ate pioneer food for lunch - cornbread, beans, cider. They played pioneer games - tug o' war, three-legged race and Drop the Hanky, a tag game. They even heard an electronic version of ``Home on the Range.''

Some of the children wore pioneer outfits, including elaborate dresses and bonnets. Many simply put on flannel shirts or overalls.

Lauren Boyer, 13, ate lunch in such a dress - her ``Laura Ingalls'' dress, she called it, referring to the books and TV series ``Little House on the Prairie.'' But she was thankful pioneer wear is no longer in vogue.

``It's hard to walk in, and it's uncomfortable,'' Lauren said.

The pioneer era from 1865 to 1900 had been a study theme for these students, not only in English and history, but also in their math and science classes.

For example, Kathy Mead's math students learned about scale by building houses out of ``sod'' (clay, really).

``I think it made it click for them,'' said Mead, who ran the general store Friday.

The morning rain had given way to dark clouds by midday, so the teachers didn't have to worry about moving their frontier into the gym. Instead, the students roamed the back yard, where they saw rabbits and horses.

At one tent, the teens came face to face with the fastest weavers in the East. Debbie Rogers and Linda Fraile - four-time ``Sheep-to-Shawl'' champions at the State Fair - demonstrated loom and spinning wheel techniques.

Although there wouldn't be any shearing, the women brought along their sheep, Oliver.

Mike Nixon, however, was a bit sheepish about petting the woolen beast.

``I don't play with animals,'' the 14-year-old said.

But Mike was in the spirit of the day, wearing his dad's black cowboy hat, a white handkerchief and a button-down shirt bearing polo players on horseback.

At another tent, Shirley Sellers of the Norfolk Story League was weaving a pioneer tale of a frontier girl's discovery of music. Sellers, a retired kindergarten teacher, had worried that the eighth-grade audience might be out of her league.

``This is old for me,'' she said.

But the teens were well-behaved, listening to Sellers speak from her rocking chair.

Maybe that's because they were tuckered out by the previous activity - frontier recreation.

And there was a watermelon-seed spitting contest. Joey Greenwood spat the farthest in his group. He would advance to the ``spit off'' later that afternoon.

All told, Lauren was happy not to be living in the pioneer era.

``They didn't have radios or any technology,'' she said. ILLUSTRATION: D. KEVIN ELLIOTT photos\the Virginian-Pilot

Ashley Danley, left, and Kimberly Bradshaw, both 13, pet a horse

during Frontier Day on Friday at Hickory Middle School in

Chesapeake. Some students wore elaborate pioneer outfits. Many

simply put on flannel shirts or overalls.

Tristin Cuffee, 13, competes in the watermelon-seed spitting

contest. The celebration of the Wild West was the capstone of a

study by eighth-graders of the pioneer era.