First female teacher

Windham began to be settled in the early 1700s, and as the population grew, schools began to be built in areas where there were a lot of children. Parents and residents would get together, decide where the school would be kept (sometimes in private homes) and petition the selectmen to identify a “district” school.

Toward the end of the 1700s, a district was set near the first settled area and was called Canada Hill – District 12. It was later called “Hardy,” after the name of a neighbor. This schoolhouse was so small it was sometimes called the Bandbox School, and by the late 1800s it had been abandoned because of its poor condition.

Hardy or Hardy Road school was taught by the first female teacher hired in Windham. Mary (or Molly) LeGarde was born in 1772. It is said she came from Boston and some sources say she was born in Windham. The students called her Marme Garde.

In 1790 she married Reuben Hill of Gray and moved there. She died in 1848. She and her husband are buried in Gray. They had two children.

To date, no photograph is known of this old school that was located at the Anderson Road end of the Hardy Road.

The Reuben Hill monument at a Gray cemetery lists his wife, Mary, Windham’s first female teacher.