Author: Sam

In 1917, President Woodrow Wilson, directed the organization of the Council of National Defense as a way of more or less inventorying the nation’s assets in preparation for our entry into World War I. An extension of the program was the Woman’s Committee which was administered on the state level.

The Woman’s Committee had several areas of emphasis: Americanization, Child Welfare, Educational Propaganda, Food Administration, Food Production, Foreign and Allied Relief, Health and Recreation, Registration, Women in Industry and Maintenance of Existing Social Agencies. Their work included registration of women in the state, assisting with Liberty Loan Bonds and with the November, 1917 food pledge. The Woman’s Committee struggled with establishing its authority over this work because of lack of clear direction from the federal government.

Regardless of its success, women from our county and the surrounding area were registered out of Marion and the Williamson County Historical Society is in possession of over 1,800 of these 5 X 8 registration cards that were filled out over the time period of November 1917 through May 1918. (more…)

A Christmas Lunch was held at the Asian Star restaurant in Marion on Wednesday, December 12^th, 2018. The lunch was held as a thank you to repay 2018 active volunteers and board members of the Williamson County Historical Society for their dedication and service. The historical society maintains a county museum in Marion at 105 S Van Buren Street which also houses an extensive genealogical and history research library. Those in attendance were Ursula Richey, Colleen Norman, Dolores Thetford, Gloria & Mike Spinks, Andrew & Lisa McRoy, Helen Lind, Sharon Vansaghi, Betty Millard and Sam & Debbie Lattuca.

Special recognition was given to Colleen Norman, Ursula Richey, Betty Millard & Sharon Vansaghi for their exceptional dedicated service throughout the year to the society and work at the Williamson County Museum. The museum is currently operating under its winter hours of operation of Saturday only, from 9:30 to 3 PM until March 1^st.

355 obituaries have been added to our Master Obituaries Index that range predominately from the 1940’s to the 1990’s. 

Mortality schedules were taken alongside the 1850, 1860, 1870, and 1880 U.S. Federal censuses. Mortality schedules list people who died during the previous 12 months. These schedules include persons who died between June 1st through May 31st in the year prior to the federal census. A typical mortality schedule will list the dead person’s name, age, sex, color (white, black, or mulatto), married or widowed, birthplace, month of death, occupation, and cause of death. Though part of the federal censuses, mortality schedules are separate from the population schedules.

In most cases, volunteers have matched these people into township and range within the county.

Indexes to the 1850, 1860, 1870 and 1880 mortality schedules covering Williamson County have been added to our Master “Misc. County Records” Index on our website. The records can be found within the books of our society library. As always, inquiries can be made at the society or be emailing us at wchsmail@yahoo.com.

We have a surplus of Marion High School yearbooks and Marion city directories for sale at the museum. The yearbooks range from 1918 through 1996 and are mostly all in good condition. Some have inscriptions and some do not. We also have a number of Marion Junior High school yearbooks and city directories. All of these surplus books are available for $5 each. Check with us at wchsmail@yahoo.com.

Beginning in the 1980’s the historical society started clipping obituaries from newspapers and saving them in a card catalog. Over the years the collection has grown to about 24,000 obits and funeral cards including quite a few from the turn of the century forward. In addition, due to the fact that newspapers started charging for obit space in the paper, it was noted that a number of families may choose not to publish a loved ones obit. The decision was made, starting in January 2015, to begin collecting obits directly from the funeral homes in Williamson County who publish them. This task was taken on by WCHS volunteer Betty Millard who has since that date collected over 2,500 obits. All of these obits have been currently indexed and are now available in a new index category called “Obituaries” and can be found on our websites “Library Resource Indexes page”.

Since many people carry the same or similar names, every attempt was made to include as much familial information such as maiden names, parents and spouses where listed to avoid similarities. Keep in mind that many obits are not always listed by proper names but rather familiar names. An example would be Robert and William often go by Bob and Bill so just keep that in mind.

Since a new “Obituaries” category was created we have moved two Obituary books that were previously filed in the “Newspaper” category into the “Obituaries” category in order to keep them together. The new file will now reflect app. 35,000 obit references.

As always, if an obit of interest is found, let us know at wchsmail@yahoo.com and we can email them to you.

The Williamson County Historical Society held their October membership meeting on Sunday, October 21^st, 2018. Society projects completed and planned were discussed and new additional artifacts recently donated to the museum were presented to the membership. Carterville resident, business owner and author, Steve Schlager was the guest speaker describing his recently published book entitled, “The Train that Vanished.” Schlager likes to create fictional stories woven around local historical events.

Member Violet Grisham presented the museum library with her newly printed books related to the history of the Third Baptist Church in Marion.

The membership approved new board members for the year 2019 that include Sam Lattuca, Peggy Coriasco, Helen Sutt Lind, Ursula Richey, Michael Spinks, George Mavigiano, Bob Jackson and Andrew McRoy.

The Williamson County Historical Society Honor Roll plaque was inscribed with a new name and presented to President Sam Lattuca by Helen Sutt Lind. Lattuca was cited for his dedication to improvements at the county museum building and his efforts to improve genealogical records available at the museum’s library and online over the last several years.

After a lot of hard work earlier in the year, the Williamson County Historical Society has completed the remodeling of our Native American room at the museum.  All of the artifact display cases were reworked with lighting added and a number of informational displays were added to showcase the presence of natives in our county for the past several thousand years.

The museum has been gifted a couple of large artifact collections over the years and the new displays highlight the significance of these historic items and the Native American connection to the natural world. A multimedia display has been added to illustrate local native history and their daily lifestyles, tools, food, weapons and shelter.

The museum will remain open six days a week from Monday through Saturday from 9:30 till 3 PM until Thanksgiving after which the museum will reduce its hours over the winter to Saturdays only. The public is always welcome to drop by the museum at 105 S. Van Buren Street in Marion and take a walk through local history.

We will be holding a membership meeting at the museum on Sunday, October 21^st, 2018, at 2:00 P.M.  We will be discussing society business as well as completed, ongoing and future projects. If you have a show & tell item, feel free to bring it. Elections for 2019 board members will be held. Nominations for new board members may be made up to and including the day of the meeting.

The program will be presented by Steve Schlager, a Carterville business owner and author who enjoys weaving fiction around local history to create tales that could have been true. His program will be based on a fictional train robbery that occurred in the 1920’s.

We look forward to seeing you at the meeting.