The Little Outfit Schoolhouse
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The Little Outfit Schoolhouse
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The Little Outfit Schoolhouse, sometime before its restoration in the mid-2000s.
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Location in the state of Arizona
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| Nearest city | Patagonia, Arizona |
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| Coordinates | 31°29′42.75″N 110°34′25.12″W / 31.4952083°N 110.5736444°WCoordinates: 31°29′42.75″N 110°34′25.12″W / 31.4952083°N 110.5736444°W |
| Area | less than one acre |
| Built | 1940 |
| Architect | Hutchinson, Katharine Warfield; Dustman, Otto |
| Architectural style | one-room schoolhouse |
| NRHP reference # | 08001275 |
| Added to NRHP | January 8, 2009 |
The Little Outfit Schoolhouse is a ranch school that was built in 1940 in southeastern Arizona. It is located on the Little Outfit Ranch in San Rafael Valley, about ten miles east-southeast of Patagonia, in Santa Cruz County, which borders Mexico on the south and is about 80 miles from Arizona's eastern border with New Mexico.
In the early and mid-twentieth century ranch schools became an important part of the educational system in many western states and Arizona led the nation in total number. The concept set high academic standards but also put strong emphasis on the ideals of the American Old West, rugged outdoor activities, and independence of spirit. The Little Outfit Ranch School provides an excellent example this approach to education and in 2009 the schoolhouse itself was placed on the National Register of Historic Places. The schoolhouse is managed by the Little Outfit Preservation Group, Inc.
The land the schoolhouse is on was homesteaded by Harry Fryer in 1917 and in 1940 it was bought by Buel and Katharine Hutchinson who named it The Little Outfit Ranch. They built a one-room schoolhouse and later that same year opened The Little Outfit Ranch School. The school was coed the first two years but later was all boys, usually had 20 to 25 students and covered grades 3 to 8. Academics were strong but there was a great emphasis on the ways of the West and every student was assigned a horse.
The San Rafael Valley is still very sparsely populated, the rich grasslands being used primarily as range for cattle. The nearest house even now seventy years later is still over a mile away, and in the 1940s the nearest telephone was a ten miles ride. The elevation is 5,100 feet with the mountain called Old Hutch, on the north side of the ranch, rising to nearly 6,000 feet. The entrance road to the ranch is off FR 799, Canelo Pass Road—a long, dusty, red dirt road that leads to the small town of Patagonia.
The people who founded the Little Outfit Ranch School, Katharine ("Kit") and Buel Hutchinson, moved from Chicago with their three children; Ann, Mary and Ned in 1940. Adventure was surely part of their motive for moving to such a remote area, but the move would also solve a health problem Ned had – a persistent cough that had only disappeared when he stayed several weeks on the 76 Ranch near Willcox, Arizona.
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Wikipedia