The Old Stone Schoolhouse on Coppermine Road is open to visitors in the warm months on Sundays from 2 to 4 p.m.

Old Stone Schoolhouse sign

Old Stone Schoolhouse, Coppermine Road

Dozens of children, parents and grandparents enjoyed the festival this past October on the lawn of the 1790 schoolhouse. In the Scarecrow Contest, awards were presented for the scariest, most stylish, rottenest and happiest. Movie tickets and Friendly's gift certificates were awarded to each scarecrow creator.

Peg Yung of the historical society guided children in creating ghost dolls and paper jack-o'-lanterns. Children also received pumpkins donated by the Eaton, Grouten, and Hein family farms. And in a variation on the Halloween game of bobbing for apples, children bobbed for miniature Freihofer doughnuts strung on lines. Youngsters also learned how to construct Colonial-style lanterns from sheets of tins provided by Orca, Inc. Others enjoyed Colonial-era games using wooden hoops and bean bags.

The skeletal remains of the first schoolmaster, Calvin Hatch, made an appearance, and Wanda the Witch, aka Kathy Lescoe of the Barney Library, read from "Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark." Kathy said about fifty children and parents crowded around her in the small schoolroom to sing Christmas carols with Halloween lyrics and play "Pass the Witch's Broomstick."

There was lots to eat, including homemade desserts, cider and buttered popcorn made from home-grown Tunxis Plantation kernels.