Revisiting History: Candy Carr Reflects on Little Hoosiers

If anyone understands the real-world importance of keeping kids engaged and interested in history, it’s Candy Carr.

Carr’s own love of history and talent for making the past palatable to youth of all ages and backgrounds is clearly woven into her DNA.

Ultimately, her passion for teaching and history culminated in the introduction of the Little Hoosiers history club in Hope nearly four decades ago.

Little Hoosiers is an organization that was once under the umbrella of the Indiana Historical Society, Carr explains, it goes way back.

The Goal: History is fun, regardless of one’s age.

“The idea is to teach young people that history is something worth exploring and that it’s not dead, dry boring,” Carr says. “I didn’t get involved until I was a ninth grader, but as a student I did architectural surveys where we learned about the different architectural styles so we could identify houses that were built in the 1800s.”

The retired teacher began her own involvement with history clubs – and subsequently Little Hoosiers – while attending Rushville High School, which is located in an area that is steeped in history.

That involvement translated to her future participation at the state level, she recalls.

“When I was in high school, I served as a cook while the other students worked on a project in Vincennes,” she says. “They were digging a trench and outlining Fort Knox, an early American fort. However, I didn’t get to do any of the digging or hauling of gravel.”

In the interim between high school graduation and entering college Carr served as a chaperone and helper on Little Hoosier field trips.

Carr brought her love for history with her when began teaching at Hope Elementary School in the early 1970s.

During the mid-1970s and early 1980s, in the absence of Xbox and TikTok, kids spent more time outdoors, engaged in sports and the old ways of just being a kid.

Back then, girls’ sports were just getting started and the youth didn’t have the distractions they do today, Carr says.

Little Hoosiers met a need for activity and leadership.

“If you can implant in a kid’s brain the idea that history is fun and important, they are going to grow up to be preservationists or care about the past and think critically about how we have done things in America and to not make the same mistakes,” Carr says. “You are feeding the future to learn from the past.”

It wasn’t too long after establishing her kindergarten classroom at Hope Elementary that she transitioned to a fifth/sixth class split in the autumn of 1976. Around that same time, the then state director of the Indiana Historical Society, Bob Montgomery, paid Carr a visit.

“He came knocking on my door and said, ‘Don’t you want to start a Little Hoosier chapter?’” Carr recalls. “I said, ‘Absolutely!’ And, so I did.”

The Hope community was very receptive to the idea of Little Hoosiers, Carr says.

When she started the Hope chapter Carr, likewise, wanted to learn about the rich history of Hope. She would often take the fourth, fifth and sixth graders on brief excursions around town to see historic homes – just as she had done when she was in the club.

Early on, Little Hoosiers boasted a membership of upwards of 60 students across three grades, Carr says.

And, of course, Hope’s Moravian history offered a cornucopia of history for the children to explore, including who the Moravians were, why they came to Hope and why the cemetery is so weird, Carr adds.

“It is kind of like when you learn there is something neat that happened in your own backyard, you kind of want to learn more about it,” Carr says. “It’s like, this is where our people come from and even as you move to Hope, like I did, I didn’t have a familial connection to Hope, it’s like this is really neat to know.”

Carr admits she is one of those people who takes the time to read captions and synopses while visiting museums and it is that voracious appetite for history that fed and continues to fuel her passion for the past, she says.

For instance, while reading about the late Private Bartan Mitchell she learned he was from Hartsville and realized she’d never heard of him.

“How did I not know this?” Carr says asked herself at the time.

After some research, Carr discovered the pivotal role the gentleman played during the Civil War, namely the Battle of Antletam, when he found Confederate General Lee’s “lost” special orders near Frederick, MD, in 1862.

Following the war, an injured but recovering Mitchell resided in Hartsville with his wife until he died at 52 years of age in 1868.

Carr also taught fourth grade – which primarily focuses on Indiana and Hoosier history – quite a bit during her tenure in Hope. And as the kids grew, so did Carr’s passion for offering more age-appropriate programing.

“I started a middle school history club and then a high school history club,” Carr says. “I had some wonderful kids who had great leadership skills who were able to do some amazing things as middle and high schoolers.”

Among the interesting fieldtrips the kids took was to an archaeological dig in Azalia, located a few miles southeast of Columbus. There were also many opportunities for historical reenactments, fieldtrips to historical sites, period dress and opportunities to discuss and learn about multiple facets of Hoosier history, Carr says.

Many of the kids who participated in Little Hoosiers back then will also likely remember peeling apples. Lots and lots of apples.

“For Heritage Days, we made apple butter,” Carr says. “I am sure none of it was up to code to today’s standards, but it was OK in the late 1970s and early 1980s.”

Each evening after school the kids would meet for a couple of hours to peel apple slices, Carr says.

“We had frozen apple slices all over Hope,” Carr says. “Whoever had room in their refrigerator had apples. People would even donate the apples – I don’t recall having to buy a single one.”

Over the course of the next few years, Carr continued to grow the Little Hoosiers to well beyond what she or anyone else had envisioned.

“When I started the club at Hope and I saw the potential in the students, it’s like, they need these leadership opportunities, too,” Carr says. “With the high school club at Hope I didn’t have to do much because the kids were so motivated and competent. Doing an elementary club is a bit more work.”

Hope’s Little Hoosiers, under Carr’s leadership, would take many adventures over the years and even at one point host the state convention at the Old Hope Gym, Carr says.

In 1983, Carr left her position at Hope to go teach in Columbus – where she started additional Little Hoosiers chapters.

The transition was made easier as Carr was able to leave the club in very capable hands as the late Barb Johnson was ready to take the reins.

“Barb took what I started and ran with it,” Carr says. “She hosted the state convention at Hauser and did many great things.”

In the years that followed, the Indiana Historical Society dropped the juniors from Little Hoosiers. Today, if anyone has a history club, it is independent, Carr says.

As for Little Hoosiers today, they continue to meet under the leadership of Ms. Hurt and Mrs. Rice once a month on Thursdays right after the day's last bell rings at Hope Elementary.

Carr eventually retired from education completely in 2018.

Since that time, she’s kept busy spending time with her husband, John, and family. She's also been working on transcription and research projects for the Bartholomew County Historical Society, including transcribing World War II letters, she says.

If given the chance to do things differently, Carr is certain she wouldn’t change a thing.

“It was a really hard decision for me to leave because Hope is where I started my teaching career,” she says. “Hope was so good to me. I started working with gifted kids in Hope and I still have very close ties to the people there.”