Hornby School

Listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the Hornby School is a one-room schoolhouse in Greenfield Township (town of North East), Pennsylvania. The school was one of the ten similar schools constructed in Greenfield Township, and is one of only two one-room schoolhouses remaining in Erie County that are not heavily altered. The schoolhouse was constructed in 1875 and was originally called Shadduck School. Hornby School stayed in continuous operation as a school until 1956. It was restored and opened as the Hornby School Museum in 1984.

The first school to be established in Greenfield Township was at Colt Station in 1820. Shadduck School was originally a log cabin built in 1850; the building was replaced in 1865 with another log cabin. After the passage of the Free Schools Acts of 1834 by the Pennsylvania General Assembly, state funding allowed Greenfield Township to build ten, frame, one-room schoolhouses that either replaced older schools or established new ones. On December 23, 1873, the Greenfield Township School Board authorized the construction of two new schoolhouses—replacing the older Shadduck School and another schoolhouse. The school board decided on a location for the building on June 12, 1875, and the school was completed by October 27.

The school was known as Shadduck School until 1900, when it was changed to reflect the name of the nearest post office, Hornby.The school's belfry was also erected in 1900. Hornby School was closed in 1956 after the township became a part of the Wattsburg Area School District and the Greenfield Elementary School was completed. The property, including the building and its contents, were subsequently auctioned off.

The Hornby School Restoration Society was formed and the school, along with a one-half acre of land, was donated to the organization in 1973; an additional half acre was donated in 1991. Hornby School was reopened on August 26, 1984, and now functions as a museum. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on August 13, 2008.

The Hornby School is a working one-room schoolhouse and replicates the operation of the school from the 1870s to the early 1900s. Of the ten constructed in Greenfield Township and the six that survived to the 1940s, it is the only one that was not modified: one is an automotive parts store, three are residential homes, and another burned down in a fire. All of the "chalkboards, desks and other teaching implements" were original to Hornby School or were from one of the other schoolhouses in the township. The only other one-room schoolhouse in the county is located on the campus of Northwestern High School in Albion, PA.

"Ex-schoolhouse offers trip to yesteryear". Erie Times-News. January 29, 2005. p. 2A. Booth, Jim (August 12, 2000).