Category: WCHS

The museum was recently gifted a Grand Army of the Republic Charter for the Carterville Post 237. The charter was hanging on the walls at the Haven at Crab Orchard Lake for years and was donated to the museum for future safekeeping. Apparently the original charter for the Carterville post was lost in a fire long ago and this citation is a replacement for the original.

This charter is dated April 25, 1907 and the charter members listed were:

The GAR was a fraternal organization created in Decatur, Illinois in 1866 for Union soldiers and sailors. Linking men through their experience of the war, the G.A.R. became among the first organized advocacy groups in American politics, supporting voting rights for black veterans, promoting patriotic education, helping to make Memorial Day a national holiday, lobbying the United States Congress to establish regular veterans’ pensions, and supporting Republican political candidates. Its peak membership, at more than 490,000, was in 1890, a high point of various Civil War commemorative and monument dedication ceremonies.

At least one or more of the charter members of this particular post were captured by the confederacy and served time at Andersonville Prison. Colleen Norman is working up biographies on each member and will publish her results in the next members quarterly of our society.

The museum has only a picture of this medal but would really like to have an original medal as part of our collection. If anyone has one they would consider parting with, we would sincerely appreciate it.

It was a Defenders of Liberty medal given to WWI soldiers by the county as a token of thanks for serving.

The Williamson County Historical Society held its annual membership meeting on Sunday, October 25, 2015 at the county museum. The event was attended by 35 people. The meeting was held to review the previous year’s activity, outline future goals and elect the board of directors for the year 2016.

President, Sam Lattuca, reviewed the activities of the previous couple of years and outlined the future pressing needs of the museum. The new board of directors elected for 2016 were as follows: Sam Lattuca, President; Colleen Norman, 1^st Vice President; Helen Lind, 2^nd Vice President; Dolores Thetford, Treasurer; Ursula Richey, Secretary; George Mavigliano, Director till 2018 and Andrew McRoy, Director in 2016. Bob Jackson already maintained a seat as Director until 2017.

A number of previous board members were forced to resign this year due to illness and death requiring three new positions to be filled.

A program followed the meeting, conducted by Colleen Norman about basic genealogy and the use of our museum’s resources.

We recently rediscovered about 60 + early land grants at the museum. Some are on paper and others are on sheep skin. Due to a lack of space, the property description wasn’t included here but can be discovered by using the Contact Us tab or calling the museum. When the land was awarded to a veteran of the Revolutionary War, War of 1812 or one of the incident Indian wars as a bounty, they are listed as Patentees. If the land was just purchased outright from the government, no patentee will be listed. Bounty land grants were often sold by the patentee.

The Land Grant Records can be accessed on the Records Tab, then Land Grants.

SOCIETY LOOSES ONE OF ITS OWN

We lost one of our dedicated society members today, October 8th, 2015. Clyde Bailey of Herrin passed away this morning. Clyde was a seriously dedicated worker who could always be counted on. He was a joy to be around and always had a joke to lighten the mood. He was a veteran of the Korean War and spent about 22 years in the Air Force. He will be desperately missed. We love you Clyde.

Clyde’s visitation will be held at Meredith-Waddell in Herrin on Tuesday the 13th from 9 to 11 AM with military graveside service to follow. Link to Obit

Years ago the museum was gifted a miniature loom used for demonstrating loom operation, but it never was functional. However, thanks to the skills and work of WCHS member George Mavigiano and his wife Renee we now have a fully operational miniature loom for demonstration purposes. The Mavigliano’s got the unit outfitted with missing pieces and set it up for operation. This will be extremely helpful since we actually have a fully functional barn loom almost exactly like it downstairs in the museum that was built in the 1850’s before the Civil War.

George Mavigliano joined the society this year and has proved to be an asset to the museum. He and his wife live in Carterville and operate a small book store and gallery called the Side Door Store at 100 E. Illinois in Carterville which is open Tues-Saturday from 10 AM till 5 PM.

Museum curator Sharon Vansaghi has created a very nice military veterans display in the parlor of the museum. It was created to coincide with the veterans parade on Saturday 9/12/2015 but will be on view until Veterans Day in mid November. Everyone should be sure to stop by and see the display at the museum. A reminder to all of us that freedom comes at a cost.