A Special Setting for Jo

This old schoolhouse sitting in the middle of a hayfield in southeastern Oregon was recently moved ten miles west to its new home in Jordan Valley, a small town on the Oregon/Idaho border that serves as the setting for my second historical novel, Jo.

Thanks to the Herculean efforts of my first cousin, David Skinner, the schoolhouse is now sitting proudly on a field adjacent to the Rock House where I lived with my family during the early 1950s, and my grandparents’ original two-story ranch house, both built in the late 1800s. That’s all to say, this family ranch is laden with memories. It’s totally fitting, then, that this place serves as the principal setting for Jo, named after the main character in my novel. See my “Prologue to Jo” on this website for a short account of the character’s history in Jo’s voice.

This front-page article published last November in the Argus Observer garnered a lot of local attention. The newspaper said it was the most popular article of the month, noting “Everyone loves the schoolhouse.” My extended family take special pride in having this one-room schoolhouse moved to the ranch because our grandmother, Violet Skinner, taught school there for many years. I have fond memories of her taking me, then a first grader, with her one day and allowing me to ring the school bell at the start of classes. 

This old photo of the Thomas and Violet Skinner ranch across from Pharmacy Butte provides a great overview of the original rock house built in 1877 and the white two-story ranch house built some twenty years later. My grandparents first lived in the Rock House before moving with their four young children into the larger house next door where they remained until 1981 when my grandmother died. Both houses as well as many of the ranch outbuildings, including the old barn behind the main house, have been beautifully restored by my cousin, David Skinner, with some loving help along the way from his four brothers and my brothers.

On the left is the “TL brand” used by my grandfather, Thomas Lewis Skinner, on the family ranch in the first half of the 1900s. My brother, Tim Skinner, added the horseshoe to create a wall plaque for an old storage building my grandfather used for his saddles and other horse tack. The right is an imagined variation of the brand that could be used in some form on the cover of my book, Jo, when it is published. The manuscript is currently being copyedited in preparation for publication.