Over the dung heap to the church: School and Kaplanhaus

This old Walser house was built at the bidding of the first chaplain, Johann Walch, from Schröcken. One of his numerous conditions before beginning his service was that the congregation would have to provide him with his own chaplain’s house. In April, 1711 he was cordially received, and he was temporarily given accomodations in a farmhouse.

In 1714 the chaplain’s house was finished, as recorded in an inscription on the gable. There was also a garden which belonged to the house. “However, there was a stable on the west side which blocked the view, forcing the clergyman to climb over the pile of manure on his way to the church,” as reported in the chronicle.  The first church was located at a different site.

Already in the year 1770 the children in Baad received school instruction, primarily from a clergyman. In 1795 Baad got its own teacher, who in the beginning lived in house number 5 and taught lessions in various private homes. The wood for the doorframe in the stone-wall cellar under the chambers is dated 1800. Around this time, a so-called barrel vault was added in the already existing cellar (with its wooden ceiling). In 1814 a school room was built onto the part of the building facing the mountainside. It was necessary to enlarge the classroom after 22 years, and it was decided in 1836 to carry out the required construction measures. The construction wood was taken from a community forest plot, and the newly adapted classroom was used for the first time on November 11th of the same year.

Since 1879 the chaplain’s position in Baad has remained vacant due to a lack of  priests. The one-room school, with its 17 pupils and the teacher Wilfried Dörler, was closed, after the road to Baad was completed in the autumn of 1968. Since then the children from Baad have been attending the primary school in Mittelberg, and the middle school in Riezlern.