Saturday, July 14, 2012

Books On Wellsville History Available At River Museum


From time to time someone mentions the late Edgar Davidson’s book entitled “Before Memory Fades”.  Davidson was the first President of the Wellsville Historical Society and in his later years, before his memory started to fade, he wrote his book on Wellsville history.  His factual book covers Wellsville from its beginning until roughly 1950. 

Another interesting book on Wellsville history is one entitled “Life And Times In Wellsville”.  It was written by the late Nathan J Morrison and published in 1987.  Mr. Morrison and the title page of his book is shown here.   That was Mr. Morrison, as he looked in 1928, when he graduated from WHS.

Morrison was born in Beaver, PA, and moved to Wellsville with his family at the age of 12.  When they first settled in town they lived on Commerce St.  Later they moved to 1015 Riverside.  At the time the Morrisons moved here the population of Wellsville was close to 8,000.  In the beginning of the book Morrison wrote that “It can be said that Wellsville was a mill town, a railroad town, a commercial town, a residential town, a white-collar town and a blue-collar town.”

N J Morrison
Morrison’s book is similar to that of Ron Price in that he recalls the Wellsville he remembers.  It is a very interesting book naming quite a few of the business establishments that some of us have heard of but can’t remember. Still there are many still with us that can recall a lot of them.  Mr. Morrison was 20 years older than Ron Price.  Although similar in style he covers a period a little earlier in Wellsville history.

Both the Morrison and the Davidson book are available at the Wellsville River Museum.  They thought they were out of stock on the Morrison book and nearly out of the Davidson book when they found some cases stashed away in a cubby hole.  The Historical Society is out of the Ron Price “Growing Up in Wellsville”.  They are waiting for a reprint for that one. 

The other two books are priced at $20 each, plus $5 each shipping and handling if they have to be mailed.  Books can be picked up at the River Museum any Sunday afternoon between the hours of 1 to 4:30 PM.  If you would like to order by mail it can be done by sending your check or money order to The Wellsville Historical Society, P.O. Box 13, Wellsville, OH 43968.    


ole nib

3 comments:

BEVERLY said...

The Morrison book "Life and times in Wellsville" should be in every home in Wellsville. I was born here here in 1953 but never grew up in Wellsville. My parents relocated to California after my father got laid off from the mill one to many times. When I visited Wellsville at age 16 I met my big Italian family and fell in love with the village. I moved back to Wellsville 4 1/2 years ago. While reading this book, I gained a bird's eye view of what life was like for my father growing up in Wellsville. The book is well written with so much history. I must say that this is my favorite book!

buckeyeelo said...

"The Historical Society is out of the Ron Price “Growing Up in Wellsville”. They are waiting for a reprint for that one."

If a deal could be worked out with whoever holds the copyright on the book the book could be digitized and put on CD. That is what the EL Historical Society did with the book The city of Hills and kilns and that has worked out real well for them, the Museum of Ceramics etc.

It would be a inexpensive and fast way to produce it again.

************* said...

We believe the WHS Class of '49 holds the copyright. It was said the proceeds from the book was to support their annual scholarship given to a Wellsville senior each Class Day. Author Ron Price made a kind deal with allowing the Wellsville Historical Society sell some of the initial printing.

It proved to be a very popular seller but we have to wait on them. Last we heard they want to wait until the next 5-Year Reunion to do another printing.

nib