NE Ga History Ctr looking for mementos

GAINESVILLE - Check your attics, chests of drawers, cabinets and picture albums - you might have something the new Northeast Georgia History Center is looking for.

History center workers are filling exhibit areas with hundreds of items that have already been collected, creating a historical record of what life around here was like years ago. But, they are looking for more.

For example, they say they have a collection of World War II memorabilia from the various armed services. However, northeast Georgia also supported the war with a naval training station at the Gainesville airport. Camp Toccoa provided basic parachute training to the Army's 101" Airborne Division. The history center is looking for pictures of activities at these locations plus actual products or photos of the small
parachutes manufactured by the Owen-Osborne Mill in Gainesville, and gauze for bandages that came from the Johnson & Johnson plant in Chicopee.

The history center already has a collection of photos showing the destruction caused by the 1936 Gainesville tornado, and now is seeking "a variety of symbolic home and business items" that "one can imagine flying through the air at the height of the tornado's fury."

The early decades of the 20th Century were the times of the "circuit riders" - preachers who served more than one congregation. The history center would like to include pictures that churches may have in their archives and perhaps someone has theatre posters of the movie titled "I'd Climb the Highest Mountain" which was filmed in this area around 1950.

Other items needed are: Olympic boating memorabilia; aerial views of the forming of Lake Lanier; actual household appliances from the 1920s, '30s, and '40s; World War I items; a cottonfield photo; a grist mill photo or sketch; a likeness of General Longstreet and Civil War artifacts; a map of the 1819 Land Lottery; and anything connected with the Georgia Gold Rush
Period.

For more information or to discuss what you have please call:
Bob Winebarger, History Center Director, 770-297-5901. Items can be donated or loaned. Photos can be copied.

Exhibits at the history center, which is located on Academy Street in Gainesville, are expected to open in this spring.