For the new teacher, a year of work and love

In late October, my history class for Loudoun County public school teachers was mesmerized listening to Anne Frazer speak of 1937, her initial year in Loudoun County. As an 18-year-old from Pembroke, Giles County, she taught first grade at Hamilton Elementary School and took full advantage in off hours of the singles scene, which included being courted by a persistent 26-year-old doctor.

School Superintendent Oscar Emerick had sent a recruiter down to Radford College, where Frazer had completed two years of study and had a certificate to teach. Her résumé noted that she played the piano. "But not so very well," she told the recruiter, who replied, "Better that than not at all," as Hamilton Elementary School needed a pianist for assemblies. The school also needed a first-grade teacher. For nine months of teaching, Frazer would receive a salary of $675.

She had never been north of Harrisonburg until the Greyhound bus passed the city and deposited her in Winchester. She then took another Greyhound to Hamilton and got off at the "Bank Corner," where today's St. Paul's Street meets old Route 7.

Her destination was a boardinghouse run by Bertie Clagett, and physician William Frazer, a boarder, was to pick her up. At the Clagetts', he had a first-floor office, formerly that of his predecessor, physician Joseph Clagett, Bertie's deceased husband.

Anne Frazer recalled that Labor Day of 1937 clearly. "No one was in sight but the town drunk, wrapped around the lamppost, peering at me. I thought, 'Oh my, oh my, here I am standing with this inebriated man.' " But Dr. Frazer soon drove up, tipped his hat and said, she recalls, "Are you Miss Snidow?" "I certainly am," she replied, "and I'm certainly glad to see you." He then hefted two suitcases, and they drove the scant block to Mrs. Clagett's.

In his day book, Dr. Frazer wrote of the encounter. "I went to meet the new school teacher tonight. She's a dirty blonde." Anne, who had brown hair, explained, "I had been swimming so much that summer."

Bertie Clagett told Anne that board would be $25 a month with three meals a day and sheets changed once a week. She was to room on the second floor, across the hallway from Dr. Frazer. The one bathroom was at the end of the hall. It served five people, including Mrs. Clagett and her two grown sons. Of the tight quarters, Anne said: "We never thought anything about it. We kept our doors closed."

After the next day's teachers' meeting, where she received a copy of the state "blue book," explaining how to teach the first grade, she met her class of 23. "Except for one or two," Anne Frazer said, "they were all tenant [farmer] children. A few could count to five, some to 10. They didn't know how to read. I bought them crayons and coloring books. They didn't know how to color between the lines. But they were polite, sweet and minded real well."

Frazer was the one new teacher at the stuccoed four-room Hamilton Elementary School, its enrollment about 110. Robert Myers, the principal, taught combined sixth and seventh grades, Ruth Nunnaly, combined second and third grades, Margaret Hansbarger, combined fourth and fifth grades. They all were single, said Frazer, reminiscing, "Maybe we all came to Hamilton to get married."

In mid-September, Dr. Frazer asked Anne to the old Purcellville Theatre to see Will Rogers in "State Fair." During the movie, he fell asleep. Driving home, he said to Anne, "Did I fall asleep?" She replied, "You certainly did. You missed most of the movie." He apologized and only then told Anne that he had been up all the previous night delivering a baby and then had a full day of seeing patients.

On occasion, Anne would accompany Dr. Frazer on house calls, and they talked about each other's life and dreams. At the patient's house, Anne always stayed in the car.

Jim and Tom Clagett, Bertie's sons, encouraged their fellow bachelor. Anne Frazer recalled them saying, "Doc, you want to bring Anne to Goose Creek tonight?" In the 1930s and '40s, Goose Creek Country Club, on Route 7, and Castleman's Ferry, on Route 7 and the left bank of Shenandoah River in Clarke County, were the dance and meeting spots for singles and young marrieds. They twirled to small combos.