228
S. Ridge Street 
In 1847, a white clapboard schoolhouse was built on the Huckins family property near the southeast corner of Peck and Wildcat Roads in Lexington Township, Sanilac County. The school housed eight grades of students in its one busy room for 100 years. For many years the building also doubled as a church on Sundays. At times the building was covered in brick and in 1905 a bell tower was added. It was finally closed and shuttered in 1948.
When the old schoolhouse couldn't be repurposed for the Cros-Lex school system, it was sold to the Sanilac County Historical Society for one dollar. Volunteer Rev. Paul Slivka spearheaded a fundraising drive to move the school to the museum grounds. It was relocated in 1996. Volunteer Don McGregor managed the restoration of the building. The Huckins Schoolhouse was rededicated in 2002 with several of the school's final students on hand. It remains the oldest standing school in Sanilac County.
The schoolhouse is furnished with typical school furnishings of the 1880's, including a pot-bellied stove. Every year, hundreds of Sanilac County grade school children are now able to experience what it was like to learn one's lessons in a one-room schoolhouse. The Huckins Schoolhouse is also available for rent for all manner of meetings, parties, and gatherings.
After the Great Fire of 1881, which destroyed a good portion of the remaining timber in the Thumb Area, many stalwart residents were quick to rebuild. Henry Patten and his sons, James and Elias, built this little cabin from the trees left standing on their land near the long-forgotten settlement of Banner, four miles west of Deckerville. Some of those trees exhibited charring from the inferno.
In the 1970's, the cabin was donated by Donald Medcoff and his mother, Margaret. Four generations of their family had resided in the log structure after the Patten family had moved on. A Michigan State Bicentennial Grant aided in the funding to relocate and restore the Banner log cabin. Volunteer George Lawson was the project manager.
The little building is furnished with donated antique items that would have typically been found in an 1880's-era settler's cabin.
