News and Events

Calendar of Events - 2011

Event:	Historical Society Meeting and Pot-luck Lunch
Date:	First Wednesday of every month
	2011 meeting dates: Jan 5th, Feb 2nd, Mar 2nd, Apr 6th, May 4th June 1st, Jul 6th, Aug 3rd, Sep 7th, Oct 5th, Nov 2nd, Dec 7th
Time:	11:30 a.m.
Location:	Lee/Chamber of Commerce Building located in downtown Wilson at
	1108 US Highway 70A (i.e. Main Street).

Recent Events

The Wilson Historical Society and Museum held its annual recognition dinner on Friday, November 5, 2010 at the Lee/Chamber of Commerce building in Wilson. Three individuals were honored as Volunteers of the Year. Barbara Burris was honored for serving as Secretary and for always being there when help is needed. Vivian James and Nita Segroves were honored for their continual support from the founding of the Society in terms of decorating, cooking and helping with many events held over the years.

In addition, a plaque was presented to be displayed in the Museum honoring the Founders of the Wilson Historical Society. The founders were Regina Cumpton Gandy, Nita and Orval Segroves, Anna Clark Heath, Correna Wilson-Pickens, Carl and Anna Clark Cumpton, Sonny and Vivian James, Naomi Burris, Florene Parker, Don and Joy Len Barrett Baker, Dennis and Betty Stangle, and George and Carole Gandy Pinches. To learn more about local artist Jim Miller click here.

What's Happening at the Museum

With the assistance of grants from the McCrory Foundation and the Jerome Westheimer Family Foundation, the Museum recently purchased a microfilm reader-printer. In addition, a large number of reels of microfilm—for Wilson, Ardmore and the surrounding area—have been purchased by the Museum. Having these on-site expands our research capabilities and makes better use of our volunteer’s time since they no longer have to travel to libraries in Wilson, Healdton and Ardmore.

We continue with accessioning (i.e., inventorying and recording) all of the artifacts and pictures in the Museum. This is being accomplished using the widely employed Museum archival software PastPerfect. Presently almost all of the pictures have been accessioned and a reasonable number of artifacts have been accessioned. This process with continue through 2011 and beyond.

The benefits of accessioning are to (1) record all of the artifacts in the Museum and (2) capture information about donors, individuals recorded in pictures, etc. Thus, if you want to know “What information do you have about my grandmother, Mary Smith?” we can use Past Perfect to tell you exactly what she donated to the Museum, what pictures she is in, and other information.

On-going work continues on expanding the local/area history albums and adding to our obituary collection. In addition, work continues on collecting military histories of veterans from Wilson and the surrounding area. Wilson’s Korean War Era Veterans is for sale in the Museum store; a book about World War II veterans is currently in process.