Oberhaching – The old school building in Oberhaching is 150 years old. – District of Munich

It’s the smell. Old buildings carry it with them, for decades or even centuries, and bring back memories. The beams, the wood paneling and the massive staircase also exude history and stories in the light yellow building on the Oberhachinger Kirchplatz and let Stefan Schelle mentally travel back to the year 1970 whenever the heavy wooden door slams behind him and he is in the hallway of the old schoolhouse stands. It is a feel-good smell for him, it has something to do with home and of course with childhood memories. Because this is where Oberhaching’s town hall chief himself went to school half a century ago. Every year, the mayor comes to the primary school in Oberhaching to enroll the new first graders. On Saturday, however, he hopes to meet many former classmates here. The reason for the big public student meeting of all years is the stately age of the school building: At 150 years, it is the oldest in the entire district of Munich in which teaching is still taking place.

Mayor Stefan Schelle (CSU) during a school visit in 2018 in his former classroom.

(Photo: Claus Schunk)

Many people in Oberhaching are like Schelle, says Rector Claudia Besson. Generations of students have learned the multiplication tables here and written their first sentences. And as parents or grandparents, they want their children and grandchildren to go to school here too. “It’s a cozy atmosphere,” says Besson. The enthusiasm also has to do with the clarity. A six-year-old quickly finds his way around, Schelle explains: “There are only classrooms on the bottom right, bottom left, top right and top left.” Because the old schoolhouse from 1872 is just one of four buildings that the primary school has grown into over the years. In 1911, the opposite school building was built, in the 1950s the extension to the right and in 2016 the new building for the lunchtime care.

Anniversary: ​​The second school building was added in 1911, an extension in the 1950s and lunchtime supervision in 2016.

In 1911 the second school building was added, in the 1950s an extension and in 2016 the midday care.

(Photo: Sebastian Gabriel)

Anniversary: ​​Class photo from 1911: These eighth graders attended the Oberhaching elementary school.  In 1986 the secondary school was opened on the Kyberg, since then there has only been one primary school on the church square.

Class photo from 1911: These eighth graders attended the Oberhaching elementary school. In 1986 the secondary school was opened on the Kyberg, since then there has only been one primary school on the church square.

(Photo: Sebastian Gabriel)

Even before the Thirty Years’ War, “School was held” in Oberhaching, as Karl Hobmair writes in the “Hachinger Heimatbuch”. According to old church accounts, a teacher was employed as early as 1653. However, for a long time the schoolmasters were only responsible for teaching the children on a part-time basis and sometimes canceled school or “sent an incompetent apprentice or journeyman so that the children only learned to be exuberant”, as Hobmair writes about the master weaver Georg Daisenberger, who in 1756 took over the school service. Attending the parish school was voluntary and cost money.

Compulsory schooling was introduced in 1802. The lessons initially took place in the dance hall of the Forstner inn on the church square. But the interest in the school is said not to have been particularly great among the population. Even 20 years later nothing had changed. Pastor Josef Göschl, as “local school inspector”, called for the construction of a school building at the time, but the municipal council initially showed little interest, which annoyed the pastor greatly. He wrote angrily in his school report at the time: “They have their work on workdays and on Sundays they usually hold their high council, where there’s a lot of shouting, but all the less clever things are made out.” In 1830 a school was finally built, which was replaced in 1872 by the existing building.

Anniversary: ​​Not much may be changed in the old school building, it is a listed building.

Not much may be changed in the old school building, it is a listed building.

(Photo: Sebastian Gabriel)

Anniversary: ​​Dirt can easily be wiped off the yellow painted walls, says the rector.

Dirt is easy to wipe off the yellow painted walls, says the principal.

(Photo: Sebastian Gabriel)

The 150-year-old building is a listed building. This also applies to some school buildings in other communities, but they are often used for other purposes there. In Oberhaching, the location and the house were kept. Only during the Second World War did the Wehrmacht move into the building, give it a green camouflage finish and send the children to a barracks on Ludwig-Thoma-Straße for lessons. In 1945 they returned to the church square and in 1952 the facade regained its light color.

The anniversary will be celebrated with a barbecue and an alumni get-together

The stairwells of the elementary school are now light yellow instead of grey. “It’s friendlier, and it’s also a coat of paint that dirt can be washed off,” says Headmistress Besson. The children recently tried out how well this works for themselves when they cleaned the walls together for the big school anniversary with the May Day festival this Friday and the open day with alumni meetings and a barbecue on Saturday (starting at 11 a.m.). “Looks like new,” says Besson, who makes sure that the children take care of the old school.

On Saturday, visitors will be able to see what the old school building looked like back then and what a classroom is like today in two opposite rooms. To do this, Besson and her colleagues will fetch the old wooden school desks with the holes for the ink from the attic. Projectors, laptops and iPads are on the other side and make the visit a little journey through time down the hall. You are not allowed to change much in a listed building. The fire protection, however, had to be upgraded a few years ago, and the school is now also connected to geothermal energy.

Anniversary: ​​Old school utensils and furniture are in the attic of the old school building.

Old school utensils and furniture are on the attic in the old school building.

(Photo: Sebastian Gabriel)

Anniversary: ​​Even the door sign is now old.  It is to be renewed for the anniversary.

The sign on the door is also old now. It is to be renewed for the anniversary.

(Photo: Sebastian Gabriel)

Mayor Schelle clearly sees the reason why Oberhaching has never thought of building a new elementary school in a different location over the years, “that it is ideal at this location”, it works great there on the church square, and it also works it’s about identity, about home. The community in Deisenhofen has long since had a second elementary school, which opened in 1966 but has now had to be renovated and partially rebuilt. Many buildings from the 1960s and 1970s suffered this fate. “Back then people built more sloppily than a hundred years ago,” Schelle notes, referring to the new building materials that later proved to be less sustainable or even harmful to health. The more than 100-year-old house, on the other hand, is “the best thing you can do in terms of building biology,” says Schelle, enthusing about the windows on both sides, “the climate in the classrooms is good.”

source site