Meet our Summer Intern

SallieYoder, a 2001 graduate of Huntingdon Area High School and a Brady Township resident, is this year’s summer intern for the Huntingdon County Heritage Committee. Sallie is an elementary education major at Clarion University, where she begins her sophomore year later this month.

Her tasks this summer  included creating a database of information on Huntingdon County schools — both one-room rural schools and multi-room town schools. A number of area residents added their knowledge of particular schools to the data Sallie garnered from county and community histories, newspaper references, and file and archives materials at HCHS.

By July, Sallie was ready to mount the “School Days” exhibit in the HCHS gallery, which was visited and enjoyed by many county residents during its two-week run, ending August 3.

Future plans call for creating a school  “layer” for the on-going mapping project in the County planning office. 

Isett Foundation Gift 

A brass plaque has been placed on the new microfilm reader, designating it as a gift from the Melvin and Beulah Isett Family Foundation. This welcome addition to the research library is much used.

Never Too Late! 

Yes, the “School Days” exhibit is over, but we are still interested in year books, photographs (especially with people identified), graduation programs and class lists for our files. We need HAHS year books for  1962, ‘64, ‘67, ‘68, ‘70, ‘72, ‘74, ‘75, ‘81, ‘83, ‘95-present. We have only a few year books from other county high schools.

It’s Ready! — the Index to
Echoes from Warriors Mark 

When Terri Shore Davis took up the task of indexing Elizabeth Nearhoof’s Echoes from Warriors Mark, she may not have realized what a monumental job it would be. That delusion, however, can’t have lasted long, yet she persevered and eventually completed both  name and subject indexes for this lengthiest of Huntingdon County community histories.

Users of the book will be forever in her debt, since the size of the task is, of course, a measure of how great was the need for a reliable guide to the book’s contents.

The book’s strengths surely include Miss Nearhoof’s wide-ranging interest in all the detail associated with the Warriors Mark area’s people, places, events, institutions, industries, and on and on. But all that detail and all those names is what makes the book very difficult to use efficiently as a research tool.

Terri’s index will help to make Echoes more accessible to researchers who lack the time to read cover to cover. Now they will be able to turn straight to the text, photos, or maps that include the names or subjects they are searching for.

The finished product runs 175 pages and will have card-stock covers and be vello bound. (That’s the type with flat bars front and back, and multiple long teeth that hold the pages together.) Part of the reason for making this choice is that if the index is placed next to Echoes on the shelf, two spiral bindings would be likely to catch on one another.

The index alone will sell for $20.00. Combined orders for both Echoes and the index will receive a small price break at $70.00 for the two.

An order form for these books can be found on page 2 of this Newsletter. Details on shipping charges and the expected shipping date are there as well.

Supply of Africa’s History Dwindling

Only 30 sets remain of the 1999 two-volume reprint of J. Simpson Africa’s History of Huntingdon & Blair Counties. Reprinted six times since 1973, the book continues to attract buyers as new generations of researchers dig into the history of their community, their family, their church, school, or business.

The 1999 reprint is the first  edition to offer researchers the time-saving convenience of an every-name index. If you have been meaning to pick up a copy of Africa for yourself or a friend or relative, now is the time — before it is once again placed on the “Out-of-Print” list.

More Echoes 

A second order has been placed for 40 additional copies of the HCHS reprint of Echoes from Warriors Mark. Our Echoes folder holds eleven names of persons who have wanted to purchase the book since we ran out in late April. That backlog, combined with the new index, makes this a good time to reprint again.

Our cost has risen slightly, which makes it necessary to raise the price to $55.00 per copy. See the article above (and the order form on page 2) for information on a special price on the book and index together.