or did she?

This building is located in Sudbury, Ma
The plaque in front of the building reads....


IN HONOR OF THE CHILDREN’S CLASSIC
“MARY HAD A LITTLE LAMB”
and of
MARY ELIZABETH SAWYER 1806-1889 THE MARY OF THE POEM
REBECCA KIMBALL, THE TEACHER
JOHN ROULSTONE, AUTHOR OF THE FIRST TWELVE LINES
SARAH JOSEPH HALE. WHOSE GENIUS COMPLETED THE POEM
IN IT’S PRESENT FORM.

THIS BUILDING INCORPORATES THE ORIGINAL “REDSTONE” SCHOOL HOUSE SCENE OF THE POEM WHICH STOOD IN THE SECOND SCHOOL DISTRICT OF STERLING, MASSACHUSETTS. IT WAS IN USE FROM 1798 TO 1856 AND WAS REMOVED TO THIS SPOT FOR its PRESERVATION BY
MR. & MRS. HENRY FORD JANUARY 1927

On the Wayside Inn website where the schoolhouse is located I found this.


The one-room schoolhouse now functions as a museum. It was used for educating young students up until 1951, but its main attraction is its association with the nursery rhyme "Mary Had a Little Lamb." Ford used the Redstone School in Sterling, Mass., to create the current structure. The Redstone School was once thought to be the setting of the rhyme because a schoolteacher remembered a similar incident with a lamb and a man writing a poem about it. The author of the children's rhyme, however, denied that the story was based upon any real event.