Putterham School, built 1768, is a one room schoolhouse in Brookline, Massachusetts. Originally built at the juncture of Grove and Newton Streets, in 1966 the school was moved from its original site to its present location at Larz Anderson Park.UseThe Colonial American structure served as a schoolhouse for many generations, but the original name of the school is uncertain. There is evidence that the schoolhouse also served as a house of worship twice in the 20th century: in 1938 as a Catholic church, and sometime after World War II as a synagogue.Mrs. Dean Peabody, Sr., chairman of the Putterham School Committee of the Brookline Historical Society and alumna of Putterham School, wrote an article entitled "When I Went to School" that appeared in Proceedings of the Brookline Historical Society 1959-1963. In that article she presents the following account of her research:"The building was one room, with a huge barrel stove in the back. The iron chimney ran along under most of the length of the ceiling before turning at right angles to go through the roof. Still nearer the front of the room, a huge ventilator pierced the roof and ceiling, which must have made the temperature around the teachers desk a bit more comfortable than it had been before its installation. This school was originally built, according to school records, in 1768, although as early as 1713 permission was given to the residents of the south part of the town to build themselves a school house. In 1768, help in the building was offered and a teacher assigned. In 1839, it was enlarged. For 1854, I find this paragraph: 'The Newton street house is large enough for the very small school it now contains; but the ceiling is so low, and the building so ill ventilated, that it Is unhealthy even for that small number. Justice to that district requires that an appropriation should be voted, sufficient to defray the expense of raising the roof, and also of providing it with comfortable modern desks and chairs, in place of the uneasy plank structures on which the children now sit."
