WOOD SMOKE teases your nostrils. Buttery yellow, bright orange, and cranberry leaves rain down from the mature trees overhead. Rays of golden sunlight dance on Thompson Creek, beckoning you to spend the day fishing instead of being squeezed into your school desk, studying your McGuffey Reader, or working figures in arithmetic.
At the bend in Smith Chapel Road, you spy the two-room schoolhouse adorned with white clapboard siding. The teacher called this hamlet deep within the Raus community “No Man’s Land.” Her words from a previous history lesson echo in your mind: “Before 1790,” she’d said, “Tennessee didn’t exist. We belonged to North Carolina. This ‘Territory of the United States south of the River Ohio’ was named Tennessee when we became the 16th state to enter the Union.”
As the new government awarded land deeds, it ensured that 4-acre tracts nicknamed “No Man’s Land” — because no one officially owned them — were set aside for schools, post offices, and churches.
“But where did the name Raus — we say it like Ross — come from?” I’d sheepishly asked. “That came about in 1892 when Fred Raus, who ran the post office and general store, moved to Oklahoma, and his surname remained,” the teacher had replied.
Our schoolhouse has operated since before 1890. The high schoolers attend Shelbyville Central, so the “little” room is for younger students, and the “big” room is for junior high. Close to 100 pupils attend. Though the county pays for most of the upkeep and our teachers’ salaries, our parents pay “subscriptions.” A few barter chores to pay their portions, but everyone in Raus pitches in to do their part. The teacher said that’s the definition of community.
The Raus Community Improvement Club was formed in the 1930s. World War II halted the expansion of electrical lines by Duck River Electric, but electric poles sprang up quickly when the war ended. By the early 1950s, Bedford County pushed for the closure of rural schools, but the community fought the school board, which granted two more terms. In 1953, the bell perched high above the two-room schoolhouse went silent.
The Board of Education intended to sell the hollow building. But the Raus community united. “No Man’s Land,” though owned by no one, was, in fact, owned by everyone. The Raus Community Improvement Club assumed responsibility. To provide for the upkeep, they planned their first ice cream supper. As a 501(c) (3) nonprofit, their mission is to “provide a community meeting place where members and visitors can touch and feel the history of early education while benefiting from the beauty in rural Tennessee.”
Rebecca Parker said, “Our annual ice cream supper began 70 years ago when the community began making homemade ice cream on the second Saturday in June to collect funds that maintain the schoolhouse during the year. That tradition lives on today. We typically serve 200 to 300 people with grilled burgers, homemade desserts, and ice cream. Without this fundraiser, and without renting the schoolhouse for events, we wouldn’t be able to maintain the building.”
Though listed on the National Register of Historic Places, by 2017, the wooden floors sagged. Locals raised $100,000 to restore the foundation; install a kitchen; replace windows, doors, and the roof; update electrical wiring; and repair the exterior. As the electricians shimmied through a scuttle hole in the ceiling, they discovered the original wrought-iron desks in the attic. A local woodworker, Paul Credle, volunteered to restore them.
While contractors rushed to safety in December 2021, a tornado burst through the “little” room and exited through the front. Linda Yockey, a lifelong resident and heir to the original settlers, said, “One-third of the restoration was completed when the twister hit. When I saw it, I was physically sick. Miraculously, the building survived.”
Following that day, the community raised $130,000. Parker, who helps with ongoing fundraising, said, “The entire community responded to our request for help. None of this would’ve been possible without donations. It has been amazing to see the outpouring of love the community has for this old schoolhouse. Everyone who comes here says it’s like stepping back in time. What we have here is a treasure.”
Carol Roberts, Bedford County historian and owner of one of the five Century Farms in the community, said, “Raus and Thompson Creek have a special history that began with Native Americans through current events like the tornado. Our history reflects how much we’ve helped one another.”
Yockey added, “My passion is the preservation of families — like the Bomars, Brinkleys, Harrisons, Smiths, Glascoes, Parkers, Princes, Roberts, Holts, and others — who came before us. They built this community through hard work, values, and their treatment of others. To preserve their memory, we must have a place to house relics, or they get lost. This schoolhouse represents that place, and it allows us to come together in an old-timey fashion.”
The Raus community is a nod to “bygone days” where neighbors love neighbors, and the winds of change blow slowly. GN
Go to www.raustn.org for more information, to book the schoolhouse, read more about its history, or donate to ongoing preservation efforts. You can also follow the Raus community Facebook page.
