{"nrhp_refnum":"05000441","name":"Knox District School No. 5","other_names":["Ketchum Schoolhouse","Knox District Schoolhouse"],"category":"building","location":{"address":"Ketchum Rd.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Knox","county":"Albany County","state":"NY","lat":42.66053875700004,"lon":-74.04489248699997,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"2005-05-19","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Education","Architecture"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A one-room frame schoolhouse on Ketchum Road (County Route 256) in the Town of Knox, Albany County, New York, built circa 1898 on its original site within Thompson's Lake State Park. A mid-1920s wood shed stands nearby.","why_significant":"The nomination argues it typifies a late-nineteenth-century rural school in its form, materials and practical one-room design (Criterion C), and ties it to the history of education in the poor, agrarian Town of Knox (Criterion A). Of the twelve schoolhouses from the 1880s, only three remain in their original location, and this one retains the most historic fabric.","narrative":"Knox District School No. 5 is a small, unornamented one-room schoolhouse on Ketchum Road in the Town of Knox, Albany County, now within Thompson's Lake State Park. Built around 1898, the 20-by-24-foot frame building sits on a dry-laid stone foundation, with clapboard siding and a metal gable roof. Inside, an entry vestibule leads to a single open classroom with reeded trim, corner blocks and vertical wainscot. Some hand-hewn floor beams appear to have been reused from an earlier school on the site. The building served as a school until 1940, then became a brief residence and later a club meeting space before the state acquired it in 1999. It was listed because it represents the plain rural schools of the late nineteenth century and reflects the educational history of a poor farming town. Of twelve schoolhouses from the 1880s, only three remain in place, and this one keeps the most original material.","period_of_significance":"c. 1898-1940","architect_builder":null,"architectural_style":null,"criteria":["A","C"],"status_note":"Purchased by the state parks agency in 1999 and vacant since; much of the original floor has rotted and been replaced, and the windows are no longer extant.","vacant_flag":true,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:51:52.819709-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_NY/05000441.pdf"},"photo":null,"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/75316253","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knox_District_School_No._5","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q6423558"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/new-york/albany-county/knox-district-school-no-5-05000441/"}