National Park Service In the early years, regardless of the
particular camp town, few children finished school beyond the
eighth grade. Some only went until they were old enough to leave
school to work or marry, most seeing little use for education.
The company encouraged education by seeing that there was a
school in most camps, or one near enough to travel to. Children
living out on the "Ridges" went to these camp schools
too—whether or not their parents worked for the company. For
some, going out of Blue Heron to go to high school in Whitley
took from five in the morning to five in the evening, leaving
little time for after school activities or what we have come to
know as "normal" adolescence. For many years there was no
transportation but the train, though buses came in when the road
was built. Though the teachers were paid by the state for the
first seven months worked, the coal company paid for two more,
bringing the school year to a nine month session in the coal
camps before other schools in the regi