Meramec Valley Historical Society

Public Notice posted in accordance Date/Time Posted: Friday, October 6, 2023 RSMo.610 as amended 4:30 p.m. by: Kimberly Barfield, City Clerk Meramec Valley Historical Society City of Pacific Pacific Government Center 300 Hoven Drive Pacific, MO 63069 https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9dxzhHQWbPuIQJC1N6TSig Wednesday, October 11th, 2023 5:00 PM 1. Call to Order 2. Roll Call 3. Approval of Minutes 4. Public Participation 5. New Business a. Genealogy Center update b. Guest Speakers/Programs at Red Cedar c. Facebook Page d. Tablecloth/Banner e. Storage tubs f. Meeting location g. Meramec Valley Historical Society Committee Members volunteer hours 6. Old Business a. Interview Project b. Plaques c. Volunteers 7. Reports a. Genealogy i. Research b. Museum i. Items donated c. Director of Tourism d. Alderman 8. Miscellaneous 9. Adjournment  CITY OF PACIFIC Meramec Valley Historical Society Meeting 300 Hoven Dr Pacific, MO 63069 August 9, 2023 at 5:00p.m. Call to order: The regular meeting was called to order at 5:00 pm by Acting Chairman Oliver. Present for the Meramec Valley Historical Society: Donna Graham, Wayne Winchester, Bonnie Post, Dennis Oliver. Absent: Jeff Titter City Staff: Tourism Director O’Malley, Community Development Clerk Wilson, Aldermen Scott Lesh Approval of Minutes Motion by Donna Graham, seconded by Wayne Winchester to approve the minutes from June 14, 2023. A voice vote was taken with an affirmative result. Public Participation No public participation New Business A. Grand Opening of Red Cedar Inn Tourism Director O’Malley states the Grand Opening for Red Cedar Inn will be on August 26 at 10:00am. There will be a few speakers and a ribbon cutting. They will have a few activities outside and a few food trucks. The genealogy center will be open on that as well. She is looking for a volunteer to help run that for the day. Part of the parking lot is going to be blocked off and the genealogy parking lot will be used for handicap parking. All other parking will be at ADB parking lot and a shuttle will run people back and forth starting at 9:30am. The shuttle will run until 4:00pm. Most of the activities will stop around 3:30, but the doors will stay open until 4:00pm. People can come and go as they please. Dennis Oliver asked if a sign would be down at ADB alerting people. Tourism Director O’Malley said they are working on a flyer right now because they just got the shuttle and parking lot confirmed today. They are going to get some flyers out into the community to start making people aware. She’s asked Robert Brueggemann if they could use the message board to try and slow down traffic as they east go over the hill. There will be people trying to make that left and people won’t be used to seeing so many cars or traffic over there. Bonnie Post asks where the Grand Opening was put on media wise. Tourism Director O’Malley states that is was on Facebook, the city “Big Screen”, the City website, the Chamber newsletter, and she will be putting an ad in the Missourian. She says they are working on trying to get Tim Ezell out here. She is not sure if that will happen or not. They have also informed the Route 66 association and they are passing it out to everybody. 10:00am will start the ceremony with three speakers, Mayor Filley, Jeff Titter, and Ginger. After the speakers the ribbon cutting will happen and then the doors will open. Dennis Olivers asks if there is anything she needs from the committee. Tourism Director O’Malley says yes. She needs people to come and help, especially up in the genealogy room. If people could come help the week before they are going to try to be focusing on genealogy. She says there is just so much stuff and Donna has been coming every Wednesday and helping out. They have had volunteers that come on Mondays and Tuesdays plus one of her team members is totally devoted to obituaries and genealogy right now. Every time we think we’ve made big strides we find more stuff. They have a ton of yearbooks that need organized by date and school. There are tubs of them. It’s fantastic, we just need some more help. 1 Old Business A. Interview Project Tourism Director O’Malley states they have been interviewing a lot of folks. They have been telling some great stories. Most of them will be used in the interactives, not their full story, but bits and pieces about different parts of history. She is planning on having a YouTube channel where you will be able to listen to everyone’s full stories. If anyone listening, or you know of anyone who has good stories about Pacific we would love to get that on video and keep it into our history collection. B. Plaques Dennis Oliver states they are waiting on the list. Bonnie Post asks if they will still be getting the money from the budget. Aldermen Lesh states they have been talking about having a meeting to review the budget, but at this point the answer is yes. There hasn’t been an amended budget. C. Volunteers Tourism Director O’Malley states she needs all the help she can get in genealogy. She has plenty of jobs for people. Even if they could just give two hours of their day they will have a job for them. The good news is, it’s getting organized and it will all be put on a Google Drive so when information is requested it’s all logged. They are almost done with the S’s. That was their largest group. Dennis Oliver wonders if now that school is getting back in session if there is a class that could maybe come and help for a few hours a week or something. They will have to reach out and see. Reports A. Genealogy/Research Donna Graham states that someone from the O’Connell family called up to City Hall and wanted information about their family from Pacific. The city asked Sue Reed to check on it. She found out that the O’Connell family had relatives that actually lived in the house that was torn down at the corner of First and Osage. Sue was going to contact Steve Myers and see if he had any pictures of the house before it was torn down. She was able to find information about the family like the death certificate and will for Kathy O’Connell. She provided them with resources on where they could go to get more information. Janet Daniels gave Ryan some photos of the Pacific 1930 graduating class. B. Museum Tourism Director O’Malley states it is coming along. Monday they will be programming and coding all of the interactives. All of the computers are up and working. They have the Route 66 interactive up and working already. There are some audio issues they are trying to get worked out. Iron Spike has been wonderful partnering with us. They’ve been helping us find some train history and loaned us a train table which is great to have as a visual. They donated a train table for the kids museum area. The kids area is pretty much finished up. She did some training on the POS system and has a few more classes to get through so they can start getting everything for the gift shop into the system. She is waiting for Ziglin Sign for the Red Cedar Inn restaurant sign. They are fixing the broken neon on it and then that will go up inside. The Red Cedar wall panels will be here Friday and then will be put up. Then all we’ll need is to put out the displays. Dennis Oliver asked if anything was being done with the bar side. Tourism Director O’Malley said no, but that the Tourism Commission voted to recommend to the Board of Aldermen the grant be filled out to do the soda shop on that side. If the board agrees to let them go for the grant and they get it that would not open until May 2024. Right now the bar area is cleaned up and empty. Kay LeClaire is donating some donuts and other items for the 2 Grand Opening, so we figured we would just put those over there. Bonnie Post asked what the update is on the sign outside over the mural. She asked if there was a metal shield that goes over it. Tourism Director O’Malley states the shield is already on there. The electric is not to it yet, but the electric will be hooked up when they come back to install the other sign inside. She has already had visitors from Michigan, North Carolina, and Scotland. People brought their old cars up to take pictures with the mural. C. Director Of Tourism Tourism Director O’Malley says they have an account set up at Kaleidoscope Consignment for the Historical Society. She says that if you know anybody who is wanting to consign as a donation to the Historical Society to let them know. She says they have talked about putting a little sign up in the Red Cedar when you walk in letting people know that it is a historical society museum. She wants to confirm what verbiage they would like on the sign. It will be framed on a stand. Motion by Donna Graham, seconded by Wayne Winchester to approve the verbiage of Meramec Valley Historical Society. A voice vote was taken with an affirmative result. Tourism Director O’Malley states that as they continue to go through genealogy, they do not have enough bookshelves and would like to purchase more. She needs permission to purchase four more shelves in the amount of $716 from their account. Dennis Oliver states that Jeff Titter had texted him about this and said that the money would be coming from their unrestricted account in which they have plenty of funds. Donna Graham states that they definitely need the shelves. Bonnie Post said that maybe once the Red Cedar is open, they can once again look at fundraising to put the funds back in the account. Motion by Donna Graham, seconded by Wayne Winchester to approve purchasing four new shelving units in the amount of $716 for Genealogy. A voice vote was taken with an affirmative result. Aldermen Lesh asks how much the book shelves were going to cost and Tourism Director O’Malley states $716 for four. He then asks how much was in their unrestricted account. Dennis Oliver states that Jeff Titter told him around $10,000 and Tourism Director O’Malley agrees with that amount. Dennis Oliver states that Jeff had told him that at some point the flooring was going to need to be replaced at the Genealogy building. Dennis states that we can’t do it before the Grand Opening, but for the committee to keep it in mind for the future. Tourism Director O’Malley said that that would be nice. D. Aldermen Aldermen Scott Lesh said that he’s been tossing around the idea about increasing this committee’s size and wanted to know their thoughts on that idea. Dennis Oliver states that they had a bigger committee and had a very hard time reaching a consensus and getting everyone to attend. That is why they reduced the size of the committee. Donna Graham states that after they get the museum open maybe there would be some more people interested in volunteering for this committee. She believes that they do need more. Bonnie Post says that she would be open to more. Dennis Oliver asks how many Aldermen Lesh is thinking. Aldermen Lesh says that going back to seven is the talk they’ve had so far. Dennis Oliver states he would be leery of going to many more than that. Miscellaneous Bonnie Post asks if the family research software that was supposed to be put on the lap was on there. Tourism Director O’Malley state that they no longer have any connection to get it for free. Bonnie Post states that she thought it was just a matter of loading it. Tourism Director O’Malley says no. It was happening through Robert Daniels church. They were going to attach it to us. 3 Next meeting date is set for September 13, 2023 at 5pm. Adjournment Motion made by Bonnie Post, seconded by Wayne Winchester. A voice vote was taken with an affirmative result. Meeting adjourned at 5:24 p.m. 4 Type Name of Donator/Loaner Date of Accession Item Name Item Description Akron fire nozzle, 1951 fire extinguisher. 1970 fog nozzle, photo book, thermal imaging Loan Pacific Fire Department Aug-23 Fire Department Collection camera, and a fire chief uniform Two stone hoes, one stone blade, one stone thomahawk, and one stone hammer head; all Loan Steve Myers 17-Aug-23 Native American Tools found on former Myers farm at U.S. Silica Series of family photos that were taken in or Returned loan Cynthia Baker 23-Aug-23 till 20-Sep-23 Photo Collection around Red Cedar; all have been digitized Sesquincenntenial bowtie, coin, and button; Royal Theater framed ad, Citizen's bank booklet Donation Audrey Myers Aug-23 Assorted Items and bank bag A glass bottle from the Pacific Bottle Works Donation Christina Nevious-Borcherding Sep-23 Pacific Bottle Works Bottle Bottle A series of photos of Pacific; all have been Donation Bill Wiest Sep-23 Old Pacific Photos digitized A box containing a series of miniature trains and rails; wishes item to be returned if we Donation Susan Riemann Sep-23 Toy Train Collections decide to no longer house it Pacific High School patch with medals and pins, Donation Paul Becker Sep-23 Pacific High School Items MVR-III patch, and Pacific pride mug A black t-shirt from the Coral Court Donation Lisa Otte Sep-23 Coral Court T-shirt Preservation Society Tourism Director Report Meramec Valley Historical Society Mee�ng Wednesday, October 11, 2023 Good A�ernoon! We have had a wonderful opening of Red Cedar. If you heard the Board of Aldermen mee�ng, then you have the numbers of the first month being opened. I have updated the numbers below to reflect opening through the end of September. Atendance: 2,568 Revenue: $7,877.23 Dona�ons: $250 The team and myself have met a lot of wonderful travelers. The farthest has been from New Zealand. There are many that travel Route 66 and are stopping because of iconic building. There are people that said they passed us and turned around and came back. Others said they recently saw online that we were opened and were excited to see the building. We are working on reaching out to many different websites to make sure that we show open. A strong focus is on all of the Route 66 apps. We have had visitors from around the globe. We have also met a lot of local people and people from surrounding towns. Since we have been open, we have had a booth at Jimmy Smooth’s Rat Rod show, hosted a stop and lunch for the Route 66 Associa�on Motor Tour, and had a booth at the Rodeo. Each of these events we have adver�sed about Red Cedar and Tourism in Pacific. We were also able to pull in some revenue at each event. Upcoming events include walking the homecoming parade route prior to the parade to hand out flyers on Red Cedar and events, a booth at Witches and Warlocks on October 20th, a Fall Fes�val at Red Cedar on October 21st and 22nd, and the Franklin County History Fair in Union, MO on Sunday, October 29th. The Genealogy Center has had 6 visitors since opening. 5 on Grand Opening and 1 while we were open. We have received no calls about Genealogy. 1 person said that we did not have the family they were looking for, the other 5 said they would be coming back when they had more �me to sit and read. We do have a list of those who have donated and given loans since we have opened. We have had pictures dropped off. We do scan those and give them back as soon as possible (usually within a week). Jeff had men�oned that we should get a Historical Society Tablecloth for when we go to events such as the Historical Fair. The price of the tablecloth would be around $90. If you approve, we can purchase it this week. The other item we are reques�ng that the Historical Society would recommend using the Historical Society funding would be some new tubs/storage containers to store and organize. As we con�nue to go through items and organize them, many of the tubs are damaged, and one volunteer was even cut with broken plas�c. We would like to be consistent in the sizes and ensure they are stackable. The tubs are recommending/reques�ng are the He�y 72 Qt. Clear Storage Bin with Blue HI-RISE Lid - Walmart.com. We need 32 of them for now at $11 each. The other size storage containers we are recommending/requesting are Sterilite® ClearView Latch™ 60 Quart Wheeled Underbed Tote with Latching Lid. We need 42 of them at $17.99 each. Once we get everything organized, Ryan L. and I will start entering items into PastPerfect. We do not want to start that project until we get everything organized. Each team member is able to help out in all areas, but each has a focused area. Ryan N. has a focus on media, events, and upkeep in the gift shop. Ryan L.’s focus is on the museum, being a curator, exhibits, organizing current items, video interviews, and will help oversee PastPerfect entries. Vicky’s focus is Route 66 and Genealogy. Each of these team members has a passion for their focus area. We are still looking for volunteers who would be able to work at Red Cedar. Duties may include greeting guests, talking to them about Pacific and Route 66, running the register, and light cleaning. Volunteers that would be interested in working the Genealogy Center, we have research that can be done, binders that need organized, and other books and binders that need to be gone through and organized into an easy to research and read manner. Someone on our team would train you on what you need to know/how things are being organized. As traveling slows down in the winter, we plan to get video interviews started again and start to work on the next rotating exhibit for summer of 2024. I will be working on the website with Tiffany this winter to get more in-depth information about Red Cedar available via the web. Ryan L. is willing to help make occasional posts on the Meramec Valley Facebook page. He is unable to commit to doing it multiple times a week, but as he is going through the items we have, he will post something he thinks people would find interesting and want to know more about the history. We have been busy, and will continue to be busy, as there is a lot of wonderful history here in Pacific. I would love to have each member of this Historical Society committee volunteer at least once a month at Red Cedar or Genealogy. We could use your knowledge, your passion, and your help. Thanks, Kelly O’Malley