Janet McAdam Waning - A Teaching Career 1893-1910

I believe the above photograph of our Great-grandmother, Janet McAdam Waning was taken round 1900-1910.  I know from the photography studio that she was still living in Minnesota and that her sister Ella had moved to North Dakota to teach.  I like this photograph as I think this is the age / face that taught school in Minnesota and Montana.

According to notes written by Janet, she began her teaching career in 1893 when she was just eighteen.  Years earlier her parents, Matthew and Mary McAdam donated the land to build a school - so School District #64 resided on McAdam property.  It is most probably where the McAdam children all attended school, and it is where our Great-grandmother began to teach.

  

    

    

I love this school year souvenir from 1897. It is worth noting that Janet's father, Matthew McAdam, was still involved in education and acted as the treasurer for the school district.  Looking at the class list, Janet taught her sister, Ella Florence McAdam, and her brother, Robert McAdam.  Also attending school was Albert Ingvalson - a future brother-in-law (he married Agnes McAdam).

Sometime a bit later Janet McAdam furthered her education at Southern Minnesota Normal College.  The school was located about sixteen miles to the south of Blooming Prairie so she did not have far to travel.  She was in residence at Harpman Hall in the fall of 1898. 

Here are a couple of the autographs she collected from school mates.  The college was regional in nature - she has autographs from young men and women who lived in Wisconsin, Illinois, Minnesota, and Iowa. Being a frugal Scot, Janet's autograph book is a stationary sampler from G. Schleuder of Austin Minnesota.  In reading the sentiments left below there may have been a romance which went awry.

Janet outlines her teaching career as follows, "Began to teach when 18 - year 1893 - Taught 6 1/2 yrs in Dist. 64 - Taught 1 year in E.E. Dennis District - 1 year in Noble and Geo. Dennis Dist. - and two years in Mont. = 10 yrs.

   

In 1900 census Janet McAdam is enumerated twice.  Once with her family in Westfield Township, Dodge County, MN.  Note the spelling of her name - it reflects the Scottish pronunciation "Jenett".

The other enumeration places her as Nettie McAdams, a teacher boarding with the Elmer Dennis family in Redolpho Township Mower County, Minnesota. Note the Ingvalson family lurking below on the same page!

By 1909 Janet McAdam has moved to Montana.  Here is a postcard from March 1910 requesting that she again teach in Big Timber, Montana.

The end of April finds her at School District #43 in Sweet Grass County, Montana.  

Janet McAdam was an industrious woman.  While in Montana she attended Abbot's Business College in Billings and received qualifications to teach in Yellowstone and Park Counties.

I really do not know much about how or when she met Willard Lowe Waning, her future husband.  The only story I ever heard was that she could play the piano well enough to "chord" at community dances.  Perhaps that is where they met.  They married in February of 1911 and her professional teaching career ended.   

One last story to share.  Gramps (James W. Waning) told me that his mother kept a blackboard in the kitchen of their home in Wilsal, Montana.  Living on a sheep ranch as a young child, Gramps drew what he knew best - the ranch, the out-buildings, the sheep in the fields and pens.  One afternoon upon returning from school he discovered that his mother had taken the chalk and opened the gates of the pens - and the sheep were all running amuck! 

That is where that sly Waning humor comes from!