McLEAN COUNTY HISTORY & GENEALOGY NEWS
By Euleen Rickard
The Island Wooden Bridge Festival was a trip down memory lane for many Island and former Island residents. Memories began for me when I spotted a shiny Model-T among the cars going south on Highway 431 near Browns Valley. The travelers, a man driving and woman passenger with her blond hair blowing in the breeze were rolling along at a speed of about forty miles per hour. They obviously were enjoying their ride and waved as I passed. After passing, just ahead, there was another old Ford equally as polished. For some distance I drove between the cars seeing one in my rear view mirror and the other just ahead. My mind went back to the days of riding in my dad’s old Model-T. In those days riding in an open car was not a pleasant thing, most of the roads were gravel and in the summertime riders were covered with dust and in the wintertime could be spattered with mud. Some cars had isinglass curtains that were put up to protect the passengers. In Island 1st street was lined with old cars of many makes.
The opening ceremony, with the presentation of the colors and singing of the national anthem was beautiful and afterward with music in the air the area was filled with activity.
I joined longtime friends, John and Marilyn Kirtley for lunch that included fried green tomatoes, then visited with Imogene Jarvis McElwain. Imogene and I once were neighbors and both were avid readers so exchanged many books. We talked of the residents we had known when we were young and in a notebook listed them and the streets where they lived. We recalled events and stories, some tragic and sad, some funny, just the happenings of the town in the era of our youth. Still a dear and generous friend, as we left she gave us a jar of cucumber relish that she had made from her grandmother’s recipe.
Our musuem member Audra Conrad has always been interested in Island history and again this year donated one of her hand painted gourds. It depicted Island’s old buildings and the wooden bridge, a prize to be treasured by the lucky bidder
In the history room many were looking for pictures and other memories of their kin and were exchanging stories of old times. Linda Cox Nutt of Columbia, Tennessee told of her father’s coming from Butler County during the boom days of coal mining in Island. Later, he worked for the Livermore Chair Company in Livermore. When she graduated from college the owner of the chair factory, Mr. Render, had her father bring her to the chair factory to pick any chair that she wanted as a graduation gift. She picked a rocking chair that she has treasured through the years.
Neville and Joanne Crawford of Madisonville found pictures of his sister and brother among old school pictures. Neville, like me, had lived in Buttonsberry and Island and had been named for Neville Fitzhugh, the son of one of Island’s beloved doctors. They are the newest members of our museum.
Donations to the museum are pictures of the WPA Indian excavations on the Ward farm in 1937-1938 and a copy of Ken Ward’s article on the Island American Legion from Donnie Sonners and a World War II interview with M. H. Collings from Belinda Collings Thomas.
Visitors to the museum this week were Mildred Iglehart’s sister Laura Tanner, from Virginia, Austin Riley of Sacramento and Ralph and Sue Riley, Medina, Ohio.
The next membership meeting of the museum will be Friday, September 26th 1:30PM at Smith house on Main Street. On Friday, October 3th and Saturday October 4th there will be a Trash and Treasure sale in the building next door to the Smith house.