Old Rock School, Temple Field

The Old Rock School was built in 1922 in downtown Valdese, NC and is a unique meeting facility. When the Waldensian colony settled in the area that would become Valdese in 1893, they brought with them a strong cultural passion for education. Children first attended a one-room county school about a mile south of town, then a colony-run school in the Community House. The 1905 county-built wooden schoolhouse was too small by 1917, and citizens voted to approve funding over the next few years. The County School Board acquired four acres of heavily wooded land, and Quince Edward Herman from Hickory was chosen as architect for the new school.