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Roselle Slaughter a first-grade teacher at Wathena Elementary School, has been teaching for 60 years. Ms. Slaughter started teaching at the age of 19.

WATHENA, Kan. — If it’s possible to rule with a relaxed fist, then Roselle Slaughter has mastered the technique.

Ms. Slaughter, who reached her 60th anniversary of teaching this year, commands the attention of a room of first-graders. With a gentle voice that spurs the students to action, her voice says sit in their seat or read from a book.

She starts each day by giving the students an opportunity to tell her what they have on their minds before quizzing them on numbers, days of the week and spelling.

“To see the kids advance, this is where they start to read, and by the end of the year you see you have some excellent readers,” Ms. Slaughter said. “It kind of makes you happy that you’ve helped them get that far.”

At a celebration for Ms. Slaughter on Wednesday evening, Wathena School District Superintendent Mike Newman said that after talking with the state department, he could find no other teacher with as a career as long as hers.

“There probably has not been a person who has touched as many lives (in Wathena) as Mrs. Slaughter,” he said.

About 70 people attended the festivities, including former students, co-workers, parents of students and family members.

When she first began teaching in 1948, it was at the country school located east of Wathena. She moved to the Wathena School District in 1966, where she went from teaching all eight grades to teaching just sixth grade.

She made the move to first grade three years ago, and recognizes that the profession has changed since her country school days.

“You could meet the parents every day, they would always come to school — we had so many activities,” Ms. Slaughter said. “Every year is different, every day is different.”

Teaching second generations of former students isn’t uncommon for Ms. Slaughter, and many students and parents request her to stay one more year to ensure that it will happen in their family.

“That makes you feel good,” she said. “You kind of know that you’re doing your job pretty well.”

Before hitting the 60-year milestone, even a broken hip (which she said healed speedily thanks to her doctor, a former student) couldn’t keep her from returning to her students last fall.

Now that Ms. Slaughter has hit that mark — which is a goal that has been in her mind for some time — she isn’t sure how much longer she’ll teach.

“Now you’re to the point where what do you do if you quit?” she said. “You have to have something to do to keep you going. Probably the only thing that’s really kept me healthy is just being around the kids.”

Preschool teacher Erin Jackson, who still remembers being in Ms. Slaughter’s sixth-grade class, now works across the hall from her former teacher and shakes her head when she thinks that Ms. Slaughter also could have taught her dad if she had been at the right country school.

“She’s just really relaxed with (the children) and lets them hang on to her and love her,” Ms. Jackson said.

Leslie Rull, who also works with Ms. Slaughter and whose children were in her class, said seeing the teacher and her students in the hallway reminds her of a hen and chickens.

She said Ms. Slaughter is remarkable because she adapts to change as well as or better than other teachers, and even works on the computer with her students.

In Wathena’s other first-grade classroom, Barbara Laipple has even more connections, which include a husband and three children taught by Ms. Slaughter.

“I don’t know of any others in my experience teaching that have taught that long,” she said. “... Usually you see more 25 to 40 years, but 60 — that’s quite a record.”

Wathena resident Judy Studer remembered when her daughter, now 37, was a student of Ms. Slaughter’s.

She said her daughter and her friends stayed after school every day just to be around their teacher for a little longer.

“(Ms. Slaughter) had to tell them it’s time to go home,” Ms. Studer said.