Edwall, Washington — Schoolhouse Found a Second Career

Edwall began the way many Big Bend communities did: the railroad arrived, wheat moved toward the tracks, and a small commercial center grew around the exchange.

The Great Northern reached the district in the 1890s. Farm families needed stores, churches, schools and a place to handle the ordinary business of rural life. Edwall supplied those things while grain moved toward larger markets.

Twentieth-century agriculture became more efficient and less populous. Farms consolidated, roads improved and many errands migrated to larger towns. Edwall's commercial footprint contracted.

One surviving institution tells the story without turning it into an obituary. The old one-room schoolhouse became a volunteer library.

A building created when rural children needed a nearby school now serves a community whose residents can travel farther but still want a place that belongs to Edwall. The town became smaller. The schoolhouse simply changed jobs.