Meet the Interns, Hannah Beach…

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Annie Get Your Gun, Bachelor of Arts, David Warther Carvings, elementary school, fascination, gift shop sales, graduating, grant coordinator, Hannah, high school, History, McKinley Presidential Library, miniature replicas, Mount Vernon Nazarene University, musical, Northeast Ohio, passion for history, remarkable history, schematics, social media platforms, spring, Sugarcreek, teachers, Together is Better, tour guide, true story

My name is Hannah Beach. In the spring, I will be graduating with my Bachelor of Arts in History from Mount Vernon Nazarene University. I grew up in a small town called Sugarcreek in northeast Ohio where I still live with my parents and my three sisters. Since I was in elementary school, history has been a fascination for me. As a kid I participated in the high school’s production of Annie Get Your Gun and after finding out the musical was based on a true story, I knew I had to know more and quickly fell in love with history. That experience paired with a series of remarkable history teachers all through school aided in my realization that history was something that I wished to pursue as a career.

For the last five years, on weekends and over breaks, I have put my love of history to use as I worked at David Warther Carvings, a non-profit museum in Sugarcreek. There I worked as a tour guide where I guided patrons through the various rooms explaining how the antique ivory carvings had been made and more importantly, told the history of the ships whose schematics had been used to make exact, miniature replicas. In those five years I learned so much. The experience inspired a growth in my passion for history and for sharing it with others. Along with serving as a tour guide, I worked in gift shop sales, created and ran the museum’s social media platforms, and served as the grant coordinator, giving me countless skills that will be useful as I head into the work field. I will forever be grateful for the time that I spent at David Warther Carvings and for the incredible tutelage of David Warther himself. As I look towards my future and my life outside of college, I am incredibly thankful for the way my past experiences have shaped me into who I am today and am very excited to be working at the McKinley Presidential Library this spring.

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Meet Briant Bowman…

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Advice, Akron, archivist, Canal Fulton, Canton, Catalog, Cleveland State University, findyourquest, findyourwhy, Genealogy, high school, History, Kent State Stark, Local, mckinleypresidentiallibrary, morethanamonument, Northwest, ohio, seekthethreads, Stark County, volunteers, welcome, William McKinley

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Name: Briant Bowman

Position: Cataloger 

Hometown: Canal Fulton

College: Kent State Stark, Cleveland State University

Major/Minor: History with museum concentration

Where did you attend school (elementary, junior high, high school/college)?

I went to Voris CLC Elementary School from kindergarten until 3rd grade. From 3rd grade, we moved to Canal Fulton and I transferred to Northwest Canal Fulton. For junior high, I went to Northwest Intermediate school and graduated from Northwest High School in 1983. 

After graduating high school, I wanted to stay local so I went to Kent State Stark and I majored in history. In the fall, I am going to Graduate School at Cleveland State University. I am majoring in history with a concentration in museums. After graduating, I want to become an archivist and work with history and records. 

How did you hear about The McKinley Presidential Library & Museum?

I had always known about the museum because I grew up in Stark County, but didn’t become a volunteer until this year. 

How/When did you become a volunteer at our library?

One day while I was visiting the museum, I decided to set up an appointment with the volunteer coordinator. I met Mark, the archivist, and visited the archives. I really liked what I saw and heard so I became a volunteer at the library in May of this year. 

What is your favorite part of being a volunteer in the library?

I really enjoy learning about local history. I go through old photographs of Stark County so I get to see various aspects of what life used to be like compared to how it is today.

Do you have any hobbies or other commitments?

I love to read. I specifically like to read about Colonial America, ranging from the 1700s to the 1800s. 

What values and/or lessons would you pass along to someone?

Find out more about history. Local, national, or anything else, history can teach us so much. 

We want to thank Briant for letting us interview him and allowing us to share his story on our social media. Our team at the McKinley Presidential Library loves being able to share stories of our volunteers with people outside of the museum and we want you to be apart of that too! 

If you would like information on how to become a volunteer, be sure to private message our page or call the museum at: (330) 455-7043

Meet Tom Haas…

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Advice, Akron University, archivist, Canton, findyourquest, findyourwhy, Genealogy, high school, History, mckinleypresidentiallibrary, morethanamonument, ohio, Radio, Researcher, seekthethreads, St. Michaels, Stark County, Taft Middle School, The Ohio State University, volunteers, welcome, WHBC, William McKinley

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Name: Tom Haas

Position: Research volunteer 

Hometown: Canton, Ohio 

College: The Ohio State University

Major/Minor: History

Where did you attend school (elementary, junior high, high school/college)?

I went to St. Michael’s school for elementary. I used to walk to and from school while listening to my radio. I attended Taft Middle School and graduated from Glenwood High School in 1968. I went on to Akron University for a year, but then I transferred to The Ohio State University as a history major. I graduated in 1972 with my B.A. in history.

How did you hear about The McKinley Presidential Library & Museum?

I first got involved with the Stark County Historical Society, which is located in the library, when I became the Canton Bicentennial Director in 1975. 

How/When did you become a volunteer at our library?

I became a volunteer at the library in 2014. I had been researching my own family history since I retired in 2010 and spent a lot of time in the library trying to piece my own history together. One day, Mark (our archivist), asked if I would like to be a volunteer since I spent a lot of my time in the library anyway. I’ve been here ever since.

What is your favorite part of being a volunteer in the library?

I enjoy working with other researchers and volunteers. The ability to learn and grow doesn’t have a limit, we can always expand our knowledge in many ways. 

What has been one of your favorite projects to work on?

One of my favorite projects recently was when I worked on researching the oldest house in Stark County, it has been around since 1812. 

Do you have any hobbies or other commitments?

I used to do stone carvings, but I really enjoy making wood carvings lately.

What values and/or lessons would you pass along to someone?

Always have an open mind and a sense of humor. Don’t take yourself so seriously.

We want to thank Tom for letting us interview him and allowing us to share his story on our social media. Our team at the McKinley Presidential Library loves being able to share stories of our volunteers with people outside of the museum and we want you to be apart of that too! 

If you would like information on how to become a volunteer, be sure to private message our page or call the museum at: (330) 455-7043

Meet Gary Erdos…

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Akron University, archivist, Canton, Detective, Discover, findyourquest, findyourwhy, Genealogy, high school, History, Hudson, Ida McKinley, Kent State University, mckinleypresidentiallibrary, morethanamonument, National Guard, ohio, Researcher, seekthethreads, Stark County, volunteers, welcome, William McKinley

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We want to welcome our followers to get to know Gary Erdos, one of our Research volunteers at the Presidential Library!

Gary grew up in Hudson, Ohio in Summit County and moved to Canton in 1970. As a child growing up in Hudson, Gary remembers going outside as soon as the sun was out and playing until dusk with other neighborhood kids. He played football, basketball, and did a little bit of wrestling growing up.

He attended Hudson Elementary and went on to Hudson High School, where he graduated in 1964. After high school, he began working in his dad’s machine shop, Norton’s Machine Company, doing managerial work in the office. To help him gain more knowledge of running the machine shop, he started to take business classes at Akron University and Kent State University.

After he started taking college classes, he enrolled in the National Guard where he would remain for the next 6 years. After his service, he continued to attend business classes until 1980, while also running his father’s shop.

In 1998, Gary sold his business and started to work at other companies as a sales representative and later on, became a sales manager for another company.

Since retiring in 2008, he enjoys hiking with his wife and their friends. He also loves spending lots of time with his 9 grandchildren and 3 great-grandchildren.

Gary began as a volunteer at the McKinley Presidential Library & Museum about 4 years ago when his neighbor asked if Gary would like to cover some shifts with him. He agreed and began as a volunteer for the train exhibit. After some time, he found himself drifting to the Presidential Library and started working as a researcher in his free time. One of his favorite pastimes throughout his life was learning and exploring the genealogy of his family, and now he gets to do what he loves as a researcher here.

His role in the McKinley Presidential Library is to handle inquires about people who want to know if they are related to William McKinley or Ida Saxton-McKinley. Since the Presidential Library is also the home of the Stark County archives, he also handles inquiries about Stark County citizens.

Currently one of his ongoing projects for the library is creating a database of Stark County residents from 1809-1850.

Gary loves being a volunteer here because he finds there is always something new happening every time he comes in. He loves working with the other volunteers because they are great people to talk to and be around. There is a shared love of genealogy and history within the library and he finds it very interesting to listen to the different stories of people researching their own lineage.

He encourages more people to become volunteers, especially if they are retired. Since he himself is retired, he finds that volunteering keeps him active, involved with people, and never becoming bored with his research requests.

Gary wants people to know that although genealogy can be hard, the rewards are life-changing. As a researcher, he says that he feels like a detective when he discovers something people didn’t know about their history. Being a part of that discovery, he loves to help people find the answers to the questions they’re looking for.

We want to thank Gary for letting us interview him and allowing us to share his story on our social media. Our team at the McKinley Presidential Library loves being able to share stories of our volunteers with people outside of the museum and we want you to be apart of that too!

If you would like information on how to become a volunteer, be sure to private message our page or call the museum at: (330) 455-7043

Meet Rebecca Davis…

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archivist, Bexley Ohio, Canton, Capital University, Digitization, findyourquest, findyourwhy, Glenoak High School, high school, History, Ida McKinley, Intern, major, mckinleypresidentiallibrary, morethanamonument, ohio, Photographs, Plain Local, Project, seekthethreads, St. Peter’s Catholic school, Stark County, volunteers, welcome, William McKinley

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We invite our followers to get to know Rebecca Davis, one of our summer interns at the McKinley Presidential Library!

Rebecca was born here in Stark County and has lived here her whole life. Originally from downtown Canton, she now resides in Plain Township with her family.

She attended St. Peter’s Catholic School for elementary and then transferred to Oakwood Middle School for junior high. After graduating Glenoak High School in 2017, she enrolled at Capital University in Bexley, Ohio as a history major. When she is not at college, she is working at Donatos in North Canton and now volunteering at our museum.

Since she has lived here her whole life, she has always known about the McKinley Presidential Library & Museum, but only attended as a visitor. Last summer, Rebecca and her mother came to our library to have some photos of old Stark County digitized. While they were here, they met our archivist, Mark Holland. Mark invited Rebecca to become a volunteer and after thinking about it, she decided to spend her summer with us as an intern, helping our team with various projects.

Currently, she is working on digitizing photographs of William McKinley and cataloging them with our software. She is a great addition to our team and we hope that she joins us again next summer. She has been here for only a couple of weeks, but she really has enjoyed her time so far  and she encourages more people to become volunteers because learning is a lifelong process. One of her favorite parts of volunteering here is that she gets to see photographs of what life used to be like and compare that information with what it is like to today.

We want to thank Rebecca for letting us interview her and allowing us to share her story on our social media. Our team at the McKinley Presidential Library loves being able to share stories of our volunteers with people outside of the museum and we want you to be a part of that!

If you would like information on how to become a volunteer, be sure to private message our page or call the museum at: (330) 455-7043

Say Hello to Sarah…

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archivist, Canton, Chick fil A, Egypt, Environment, Family, findyourquest, findyourwhy, GlenOak, Hall of Fame, high school, History, Malone University, mckinleypresidentiallibrary, morethanamonument, ohio, parade, Requests, Research, seekthethreads, Stark County, Taggarts, travel, volunteers, welcome, William McKinley

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Sarah Buchtel – Research Coordinator

We invite our followers to get to know Sarah Buchtel, our Research Coordinator volunteer at the McKinley Presidential Library!

Sarah is a Stark County native. She grew up down the road from Taggarts and remembers going there all the time with her family. Some of her favorite memories as a kid was going to the Pro Football Hall of Fame parade. Her family would get up really early and go to Mary Ann Donuts for breakfast before setting up their seats to watch the parade. When she was about 6, her family moved to Plain Township, where she had a nice home with a big backyard to play in.

As for schooling, she went to Clarendon Elementary, moved to Frazer, and completed her elementary education at Taft Elementary school all in Canton, Ohio. She went to Glenoak High School and graduated in 2002. During high school, she worked at Chick-fil-A, and wanted to continue working there during college. She attended Malone University as a history major for a year, but found it hard to work while going to school. She worked at Chick-fil-A for 12 years and has been at her current job for the past 9 years. She works as a manager of a family owned business, Affordable Uniforms, near the Cuyahoga region.

When she is not working or volunteering, she loves to travel with her family and friends. Every 2 years, Sarah and her best friend plan a road trip to go places neither of them have visited. One of her favorite places to go when traveling is Walt Disney World Resort and she enjoys spending time riding the roller coasters and enjoying the Florida sun.

She loves to learn and enjoys reading about ancient Egyptian history. Sarah became interested in ancient Egyptian history, at a young age, and that continues to be one of her passions. Her grandmother used to read lots of books by the same author and many of the book covers included scenes or drawings of Egypt. In the future, she plans to hopefully travel with an archaeologist to Egypt and explore her passion.

Sarah started as a volunteer in the McKinley Presidential Library last September after one of her friends invited her to visit her while she was volunteering. She had always wanted to be a volunteer, but never had the time due to work constraints. After visiting her friend and seeing the Presidential Library for the first time, Sarah arranged her work schedule to make some time to volunteer.

Sarah loves how welcoming the environment in the library is. She finds learning about the other volunteers interesting because many of them have worked in different careers, but each found themselves in the same place because of their shared love of history and Stark County.

Sarah’s role in the Presidential Library is to go through all of the research requests that people submit to us using our online form. Occasionally she receives a written request through the regular mail that is difficult to answer.

She invites more people to become volunteers. The more people volunteering, the more projects can be completed and new projects can be started.

Sarah wants more people to understand how important history is and why it should be preserved. She finds it important for others to recognize the good and bad of history and how to learn from the past instead of romanticizing about how life used to be.

We want to thank Sarah for letting us interview her and allow us to share her story on our social media. Our team at the McKinley Presidential Library loves being able to share stories of our volunteers with people outside of the museum and we want you to be apart of that too!

If you would like information on how to become a volunteer, be sure to private message our page or call the museum at: (330) 455-7043

 

morethanamonument, mckinleypresidentiallibrary, William McKinley, high school, volunteers, archivist, ohio, canton, welcome, history, findyourwhy, findyourquest, seekthethreads, Malone University, Chick fil A, Stark County, Environment, Research, Requests, Egypt, travel, Taggarts, Hall of Fame, parade, family, GlenOak,

Welcome Samantha Weaver…

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Archives, Blog, education, findyourquest, findyourwhy, friends, high school, History, life, morethanamonument, ohio, school, seekthethreads, Stark State, volunteer, Walsh University, William McKinley Presidential Library & Museum

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We want to welcome our followers to get to know Samantha Weaver, an intern and now a volunteer at the Presidential Library!

Born in Canton, Ohio, Samantha has lived here in Stark County her whole life. Growing up fairly close to downtown Canton, she has many memories of going to the Stark County District Library with her family. She loved reading and writing from a young age, even having a short story she wrote to be published in a book when she was in junior high. As a young girl, she also remembers going to different museums all over Ohio, which helped inspire her when she was growing up as to what she wanted to be when she got older. Her careers growing up changed from teacher to forensic analyst to paleontologist and now to her current goal of pursuing a career in records management/archives in the museum field.

She attended Hope Academy from 1st grade to 5th grade, transferring to Dueber Elementary for 6th grade, and then Lehman Middle School from 7th to 8th grades. She then got accepted to Timken Early College High School, which she went to for all of high school. While in high school, she was also in the Upward Bound Math-Science program at Stark State for all 4 years, where she found her love for museums once again after visiting the Field Museum in Chicago. She then found out about Walsh University’s Museum Studies program and from then, it was set for her. In 2017, Samantha graduated with an Associate of Arts degree from Stark State College and a high school diploma from McKinley Senior High School. She began attending Walsh University in fall of 2017 with a Museum Studies major and Art History minor.

In her free time, she likes to read about art history, write on her blog, learn about different museums and to visit them as well. She likes to draw and keep herself occupied by reading biographies, non-fiction, and mystery books.

Samantha began as an intern at the McKinley Presidential Library & Museum in August 2018 and is now staying on after her internship as a volunteer in the library. She chose this museum for her internship because it is close to where she lives, but it is also her favorite local museum and she has many fond memories from over the years. She loves being a part of a team and talking to the other volunteers because they are so knowledgeable and easy to talk to. Samantha feels like she has finally found a place where she belongs and can be creative in this positive environment. After being here, her love for the archives has grown and she sees herself continuing a career in this field.

Samantha would like to end with one of her favorite quotes:

“Be the change you wish to see in the world.” – Gandhi

We want to thank Samantha for letting us interview her and allow us to share her story on our social media. Our team at the McKinley Presidential Library loves being able to share stories of our volunteers with people outside of the museum and we want you to be apart of that too!

If you would like information on how to become a volunteer, be sure to private message our page or call the museum at: (330) 455-7043

 

Putting Timken Senior High School on the National Historic Registry…

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archivist, Canton, Columbus, event, findyourquest, findyourwhy, high school, historic building, History, mckinleypresidentiallibrary, morethanamonument, NationalHistoricRegistry, nomination, ohio, presentation, preservation, seekthethreads, submission, Timken, TimkenSeniorHighSchool, volunteers, Washington D.C., welcome, William McKinley

Podcast

 

Our team and a few special guests want to take you on a behind the scenes interview of how Timken Senior High School (TSHS) became one of buildings on the National Historic Registry (NHR). We want to give you an example of a building in Canton, Ohio that was placed on the NHR, and how Stark County citizens with the help of people and resources accomplished their preservation goals. Our Intern Samantha, Research Volunteer Tom Haas, and Archivist Mark Holland spoke with Nancy George, part of the Timken Alumni Association, and Jeff Brown, Historic Preservation Administrator and former Canton Preservation office employee of the Ohio Historical Society (now the Ohio History Connection OHC in Columbus, Ohio).

 

Nancy George spoke to us about her personal journey and process of how TSHS was placed on the NHR. Her connection to the high school comes from her father, who attended Timken as a student, was then a teacher there for 30+ years and was also on the Board of Education. Working with the Timken Alumni Association, she gathered some of her close friends to act as her support committee and help with the process. Now is where the fun starts and they actually go to the Ohio History Connection website to fill out the questionnaire (Preliminary Application). This is quite a lengthy process and you have to figure out the significance of your building and why it is important to the community. There are many options to choose from and that can be a process in itself because it can be a hard decision to choose what your property qualifies as:

1. Importance/role in history, B. Development of community, C. Architecture/art/construction, D. Prehistoric

In the end, Nancy choose options A and C to submit the Timken building as in her preliminary questionnaire. She also had to submit the criteria that made Timken eligible for the NHR:

• Site designated for education by Bezaleel Wells—5th school on site—present building continuous use as a school for 80 years (longest time for a building on this site)
• Art Deco architecture—by Charles Firestone
• Art Deco art by Frank Marchione, Timken student, immigrant from Italy
• Philanthropy of H. H. Timken and family
• One of first vocational schools in the nation
• Site of training for adults for jobs during World War II and for veterans after the war.
• Open 24 hours 7 days a week to train 5,000 workers for national defense. After WWII, trained 2,500 veterans from 3 counties for new jobs.

Thankfully, Nancy and her team received their nomination to continue the process in September, but it wasn’t easy. They then received a Dropbox link where they began to look through a very long PDF compiled of all the strict procedures along with examples and considerations. By looking through the PDF, they were able to think of new aspects of the building that they hadn’t thought of before. So they began to research and type out their first draft of their application to submit. The process of figuring out what information is correct and what was incorrect be tricky, but they were lucky to have various research locations in Stark County, like our Presidential Library and the Genealogy Department at the Stark County District Library. After submitting their first rough draft in March, Nancy and her team were assigned someone that would help them edit their submission so that it was coherent and followed the strict format the board is looking for. Their editor on the staff of the OHC helped them out greatly by making sure that there was enough information in each section and correcting grammar, research, and other errors. They made the final edits in June and then the final submission was sent to Columbus in September. There is a waiting period where the officials have to notify the state representatives, local officials and the property owner (which can be waived if needed). After the submission is sent out, the board received hard copies of the photographs of the building and digital copies of the submission.

Now, it comes down to the meeting in Columbus with the Ohio Historic Site Preservation Advisory Board. Their editor creates a presentation for the board to listen to and make their decisions based upon, along with providing hard criticism because not every building can be submitted officially into the NHR.  Before Nancy’s presentation, the board was very intense and hard on the other nominations. When Nancy’s nomination was reviewed, the board fell silent and their reaction was quite positive compared to the other presentations. It was a big shock to Nancy after watching the board criticize every presentation before hers. The board approved her nomination and now it is in the process of going to Washington, D.C. for the U.S. Department of the Interior officials to approve it once and for all.

It was a very hard and lengthy process for Nancy and her team to go through, but in the end, it was well worth it. If you are looking to place a local building on the NHR, Nancy has some advice for people:

1. Save everything: everything you research and keep a running bibliography so you know where to look
2. Use your local resources! Museums and libraries are great sources of information
3. Follow the format to the end, it is so important that everything is in the specific format required
4. Use Word!—Ohio History will email you with your application marked up in Review mode (shared editing). You are expected to reply to and provide additional information right in the document. If you have not done this before, you can get some training.
5. Maps- You will need to show the board where your building is and any other locations that they want. The editing that you will do to a Google map doesn’t transmit digitally as a Word document. You may need to print/scan your maps or you can upload your photo to Google Drive, open up Google Drawing by right-clicking on the screen, and then you can upload your photo to the app and add any arrows or lines you might need to make. Then save it and when you upload it into Word, your arrows won’t move because they are a part of the actual photograph.
6. Photos—Required pixels. You might have some photos that don’t meet the requirements for pixel size. Rather than going back to your property and taking more pictures, you can increase the photo by: opening your photograph in Paint, go to resize—pixels—put in desired pixels as required (2000 or whatever is required). It will automatically increase the other pixel accordingly. Then save your photograph.
7. Keep track of where you took pics, angles/views. Historic Registry will require certain pictures of each side of the building. Make a note of direction because you must put this on each picture, in a log, and create a map of the property with photos numbered and arrows pointing from where you took the pic to the photo area.
8. You want to save your photographs as TIFFs, not as JPEGs—Save copy of photo as TIFF also when you have the correct pixels. Open with Paint. Under Save AS—scroll down to TIFF. Make sure each photo is saved in JPEG and TIFF.
9. You have to order your own plaques for the building (the Timken Alumni Association funded their own plaques)

 

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We encourage our followers to visit Timken Senior High School on May 5, 2019 for the official National Registry of Historic Places placement event from 2:30 pm to 4:30 pm.