News and Events
Calendar of Events - 2010
| Event: | Historical Society Meeting and Pot-luck Lunch |
|---|---|
Date: |
First Wednesday of every month |
| 2010 meeting dates: Jan 6th, Feb 3rd, Mar 3rd, Apr 7th, May 5th June 2nd, Jul 7th, Aug 4th, Sep 1st, Oct 6th, Nov 3rd, Dec 1st |
|
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 Saturday, February 20, 2010 at the Assembly of God Fellowship Hall in Wilson. Four individuals were honored as Volunteers of the Year. Juanette Meirs was recognized for her long standing service of providing monthly reminder calls for Society meetings. Wilma Meyer Miller was honored for her outstanding service as the Society’s Secretary for six years. Two Society members who live in Shawnee, Kansas, Chris Hammett and Susan Pinches, were recognized for creating our comprehensive website that went online in 2009. They continue to provide its ongoing maintenance and support.
After announcing the Volunteers of the Year, the Museum recognized local resident Jim Miller for his artistic accomplishments through his bronze sculptures and paintings. The inspiration for recognizing Jim Miller came about when some of his bronze statues, which depict the heritage of Oklahoma and the southwest, were donated to the Museum. Many of Jim’s friends joined members of the Wilson Historical Society in celebrating his artistic accomplishments. The Jim Miller Artistic and Cultural Award was created in his name; this award will be awarded in the future to recognize other local individuals for their artistic and cultural contributions. Jim donated a bronze sculpture of himself which will be displayed, with some of his artwork, in the Museum. Click here to learn more about Jim's amazing career.
What's Happening at the Museum
About six months ago we started accessioning (i.e., inventorying and recording) all of the artifacts and pictures in the Museum. This process has been assisted by a grant funded through the Oklahoma Historical Records Advisory Board which enabled the Museum to purchase a laptop computer, a scanner and the widely employed Museum archival software PastPerfect. Most of the pictures in the Museum’s collection have been scanned and archived along with a reasonable number of artifacts. It is anticipated that this accessioning process will continue through at least all of 2010, and perhaps much longer.
The important benefits of this accessioning process are to (1) completely record all artifacts owned by (or loaned to) the Museum and (2) capture a wealth of information about donors, individuals recorded in pictures, etc. Thus, sometime in the future if you ask “What artifacts or information do you have about my grandmother, Mary Smith?”, we will be able to access the PastPerfect database and tell you exactly what she donated to the Museum, what pictures she is in, and other information.
During 2009 the Museum acquired a large model train set. A group of volunteers are working to completely redo the train layout and create a large number of buildings depicting downtown Wilson. Once this is completed it will depict what Wilson’s main street looked like (probably in the immediate post World War II era).
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. The book Wilson’s Korean War Era Veterans has been completed and is for sale in the Museum store; other veteran’s books will follow in time.