Henessi Schmidt leads effort to revive Halliku village schoolhouse

Actress Henessi Schmidt is leading an effort to renovate an old schoolhouse and turn it into a village centre, ERR reported on its Ringvaade programme. Schmidt said the initiative grew out of the place diaries kept at her farm, which record the thoughts and activities of people who once lived there.

Schmidt became the leader of the Halliku rural women’s association after meeting a former head of the group while collecting water from a local spring. The woman told her that she should help ensure the old schoolhouse survived.

A development plan was later prepared for four villages, enabling the group to apply for its first renovation grant. The association also organised village days.

Association board member Rita Kivisaar said the group had begun running out of ideas, while Schmidt brought new ones. The development plan collected residents’ wishes and proposals, and Schmidt began looking for solutions to local problems.

The women also created a village map. Each farm marked its location, added a telephone number and noted what visitors could ask for there. The map listed residents who had a tractor or chickens, as well as places where chanterelle mushrooms could be found.

Some of the renovation work had to be done by the group itself because the restoration of the traditional plasterwork took more time and money than expected. Schmidt said the experience had given her enough knowledge to organise a workshop on the technique.

The schoolhouse is currently hosting an exhibition by Oskar Tõrva, a former resident of Halliku village who photographed local residents in the 1940s.

Schmidt said her interest in local history may have begun with the place diaries at her own farm. They describe the order in which people went to the sauna, what they discussed and what thoughts they wrote down. The diaries also helped her identify the varieties of apple trees growing in her garden.

She has since started keeping her own place diary in the same style. When guests visit, they sometimes read both the older and newer diaries as bedtime stories.

Schmidt said she did not want the renovated schoolhouse to stand empty and be used only once or twice a year. She is considering creating a residency there centred on slow living, including cooking on a stove and washing dishes by hand.

Kivisaar said Schmidt had a warm way of speaking about issues and involving people, appealing to both older residents and younger people through her simplicity, connection to rural life and relationship with nature.

Schmidt said she valued the opportunity to hear people’s stories about the village’s past and see them reunite. As someone who moved to the area from elsewhere, she said she recognised the importance of residents communicating and helping one another.