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Towanda Area Historical
Society
In the Beginning:
In early 2005 a
local group of individuals led by Jack Jenkins, former Mayor and library
board president, organized the Towanda Area Historical Society to update
our 1976 Towanda area history book. The Society formed in response to the departure
of original residents from the area and the development of
rural properties into business and residential areas for nearby
Bloomington and Normal.
An appeal went out
to former and current residents to find the items their families had
stored, perhaps in old, deteriorating scrapbooks, in dusty attics, in
moldy basements, or crammed into closets and to loan, or donate, them to
the Society. The memories lingering in the minds of our senior citizens
were solicited and written to include in the collection. Over 9,000
images were scanned and saved to disks and the work began to sort and
select the items to include in our updated history book.
The Project:
Then in the spring
of 2006, the Society partnered with the Towanda District Library to
obtain a digital imaging grant from the Illinois State Library entitled
“Capturing Towanda’s Past for Eternity”. The time had come for the
materials that had been gathered to be made available to a larger
audience through the Internet. The Library Science and Technology Act (LSTA)
grant has allowed this to happen.
In the months since
the grant was awarded a large number of dedicated volunteers have
stepped up to the awesome challenge of writing descriptions for
artifacts, entering the data, proofreading, researching, and so many
other necessary tasks. The enthusiasm and excitement these people
have about the accumulation and documentation of our history has
encouraged an even larger number of people to contribute to our
collection.
Below are links to
documents that are being used to publicize the grant project and the
websites:
Ø Bookmark
Ø
Poster
Ø
Brochure
Below are links to the grant project status reports that have been sent to the Illinois State Library:
Ø
May 19, 2006 Grant
Application
Ø
December 31, 2006 Grant
Report
Ø
March 31, 2007 Grant Report
Ø
June 30, 2007
Grant Report
Ø
September 28, 2007 Final LSTA Report
Project Photo
Album
The Future:
The Society still
plans to complete the history book and accompanying CDs to document in another way the
area’s rich past before it is no longer obtainable. We continue our
efforts to accumulate history of the Towanda area which includes Barnes, Merna, Towanda; Indian Creek and Lamplighter subdivisions, and farms and
homes in Money Creek and Towanda Townships. Additionally, this Towanda
History website will continue to grow as we gather materials.
Currently we are developing
a collection of Veterans' histories. These will be written stories,
audio and/or video interviews. A
Veteran's Information
Form is available on our website and at the Library for those who
have not yet added their name, or their family member's information, to
our contact list.
Click
HERE
for more information.
How YOU can help:
This is an on-going
project – and we invite you to be involved in helping to preserve our
history.
In preparing
materials for inclusion in the Towanda area history collection, from our
experiences with this work, it would be best if you would:
Ø
Identify the
people, location and time period/date of any photographs you have;
Ø
when
writing stories about memories, traditions, genealogy, save the
documents
to a disk and send us the file;
Ø
describe
your artifacts as completely as possible (used for what, when, how,
where, by whom...); and
Ø
let us
know whether you prefer to loan, or are willing to donate, the item to the
Historical Society;
We have a standard
Description Form that you can use in preparing the materials for
the collection, and a
Permission-to-Use form that needs to be completed and signed for
us to keep on file. Click on the hyperlinks to see these forms.
You may email or
mail us these forms and a copy of your photograph, newspaper article,
and/or written memories:
Towanda Area Historical Society
email:
tahs@towandahistory.org.
PO Box 217
Towanda, IL 61776
Fax:
309-728-2187
Meetings:
The Towanda Area
Historical Society meets regularly on the 4th Tuesday of each month at
the Towanda Community Building,
on Jefferson St, (across the street from the park) Towanda at 7:00 p.m.
The public is warmly invited to attend. But beware, the history bug is
catching....
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