HomeMy WebLinkAbout04 PH Progress Report 04.30.2006 PROJECT HOLD
PROGRESS REPORT
Anne Boykin
Heritage Coordinator
Neighborhood Services
City of College Station
April 1— April 30, 2006
• Acquisitions — 69 files resulting in 436 pages scanned
• From Vonn (Surovik) Casares, Asst. City Secretary - .A City Hall scrapbook with an
assortment of photographs of early City events. Very few of the photos have any
identification on them. Some of the photos were used in the Deborah Lynn Balliew
"College Station, Texas 1938 - 1988" book which helped in the identification process.
Also among the photos is one of what may be a portion of Lincoln School before the fire.
Early Lincoln School photos are rare.
• From Russell Kennedy, Public Works Intern — An early map showing the property
purchased for the B'Nai B'rith Hillel Foundation on Jersey. Also, a 1958 contour map of
the Schwartz Tract south of Timber and Park Place. Russell was also able to identify
some of the road construction photos from the City Hall scrapbook. Russell has a few
more maps to share with us in the future.
• From assorted files around the office — A photocopy of a legal document concerning
the Millican Riot of 1868.
Brides of the Brazos Exhibit
• Still up and running!.
Brochures
• I have completed the Project HOLD and EXPLORE brochures for 2006. The Historic
Marker brochure will be completed by the May HPC meeting.
Connections
• Larry Holt, son of former Mayor O.M. Holt, has expressed an interest in helping us to
create a list of oral history candidates. Larry will be a great resource for Project HOLD.
Larry contacted me some time ago looking for photographs of his dad as Mayor. He was
especially interested in one that appeared in the Balliew book. That particular photo as
well as many others appeared in the City Hall scrapbook that Vonn brought to us. I
burned a CD for Larry with all of the photos of his dad. He was most appreciative.
Historic Preservation Committee (HPC)
• Heritage Hunt is still in the works for May 20` Ernie will need some help arranging
for volunteers. The list of events has been scaled down to a manageable four locations
plus the Project HOLD Open House. The prizes to be given to each child are already
here. We ordered marbles, ball and jack sets, yo -yos and paddle balls. Project HOLD
bookmarks will be here soon.
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• I attended the East Gate Street Lighting with Katie in March and designed a souvenir
flyer to hand out to the guests. Photographs of the evening event and the brochure can be
viewed on Project HOLD in the Domestic /Residential files.
Laserfiche
• "Ask and ye shall receive." I casually mentioned to Sven Griffin, Mapping
Coordinator, that we were way behind on our scanning because we were short one
desktop scanner. He magically reappeared in a few minutes with a nice HP scanner that
Colleen has been able to put to very good use in the last couple of weeks. Thank you,
Sven!
• Colleen and I are considering some for of index that would be easier for the public to
use on the Project HOLD website. Issues with the LF Search have led us to this path.
Conversations with Casey Skelton, MIS tech, revealed that a new upgrade for LF will be
installed in the coming weeks. The upgrade should help to resolve the search issues and
the general website issues. If this new version does not allow for an index, Casey thinks
that MIS might be able to program an indexing system that would make it easier for users
to search the Project HOLD files.
Oral History Interviews
• Anne Triche -Steen is still working on the transcriptions for the oral history interviews.
Typing the transcriptions is a long and tedious process. Anne is to be commended for
tackling this process. I am still hoping to find a more efficient and productive way of
recording the interviews.
Project HOLD Moment in History
• The once sporadic and now monthly email has received wonderful feedback from the
community. The April email topic concerned the 37 Birthday of the Second City Hall,
April 26 The purpose of these emails is to not only educate the community about our
local history but to draw attention to the ever increasing files on Project HOLD. So far, it
seems to be a very successful tool.
Texas in WWII
• Recently, I sent an update to the WWII database concerning an episode of the History
Channel's "War Stories," with Oliver North. The segment featured the grueling battles of
Germany's Huertgen Forest. The latter portion of the segment focused on Lt. Turney
Leonard, an Aggie, who was posthumously awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor
for his actions there. His Aggie ring, lost since the battle, was discovered by the father -in-
law of a young German soldier in 1946. After all those years, the ring was returned to Lt.
Leonard's family at a touching ceremony at A &M.
• Becky Nugent, Communications Director, requested that we submit our "Texas in
WWII" event for yet another award program sponsored by the Texas Municipal League.
A few days were spent rewriting and reassembling three copies of the presentation
notebook to suit the specifications. No word yet on the winners.
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• Oakwood Middle School Teacher Sarah Hughes invited me to present a "Show and
Tell" of WWII memorabilia to her two history classes. HPC volunteer Jim Boone spoke
to the classes on Veterans Day. The students have been using Project HOLD as a research
tool for reports in the class.
• I am saddened at having to report that two of our veterans who participated in the
Texas in WWII event have passed away recently: Joe L. Hedrick and Emilio Salazar.
Volunteers
• The Points of Light Foundation Presidential Service Awards arrived about an hour
after the April Explore Luncheon. I will be presenting these awards at the May Explore
Luncheon, instead.
• Ruth Bramson continues to work on clipping articles out of the local newspapers for
scanning in to Project HOLD. She also keeps up with thank you notes to our speakers and
PH contributors.
• Ruth is also currently working on a transcription of the 1868 Millican not document.
The document is written in an old Spenserian hand and is very difficult to read. In
conversations with Bill Page, there does not seem to be a readily available transcription
of the document.
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