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Mary Miller Wood retired this year after almost half a century of teaching Rappahannock ybungsters. She’s seen the changes in the county reflected in her classroom as Rappahannock has outgrown its image as a sleepy, rural community.
But Miss Wood has remained constant. For 42 years, she’s taught reading, writing and arithmetic while instilling the old fashioned values of respect and courtesy in hundreds of children.
“She’s a most dedicated lady—one that the younger teachers could look up to and emulate,” said Lynne Baines, elementary teacher who worked with Miss Wood for seven years. “She was the kind of teacher who sat with her kids during lunch rather than sitting at the teachers’ table. Everything was for the kids as far as she was concerned.”
In 1937, Miss Wood began her career in the Sycamore School in Old Hollow where she taught first, second, third and fourth grades—all in one room. Her lack of a car that first year brought her into closer contact with her school community as she boarded in Miss Mamie Johnson’s house in the hollow during the week.
Sycamore closed after Miss Wood had taught there for two years. She followed the shift from the hollows to the towns and began teaching a combination third-fourth grade in the Sperryville School. Miss Wood stayed there until the new consolidated elementary school opened with time away for a year in Flint Hill helping out during the World War II teacher shortage and a year in a Canadian classroom as part of a teacher exchange program. ‘‘The school in Canada was larger but the children were much the same as I had in Rappahannock," she recalled.
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