ABOUT the AD White Research Center

PURPOSES OF THE A.D. WHITE CENTER

 

·         To promote interest in regional and family history.

 

·         To create and sponsor publications and activities, such as Newsletters, Leaves of History Leaflets, tours, lectures, fairs, etc. to encourage this interest.

 

·         To inspire individuals to put into writing the genealogy of the families from which they descend, as well as the human interest stories of the dangers and hardships endured by these ancestors.

 

·         To provide a permanent home for these writings with public access to them.

 

·         To make a constant endeavor to search out any and all materials pertinent to regional and family history of the area and to secure them as part of the holdings of the Center.

 

·         To encourage sister genealogical and historical organizations and individuals to accomplish their own goals through the dissemination of information by the A.D. White Society of their planned activities, books and pamphlets which they offer for sale, and of other services in which they specialize.

 

·         To provide access to the many holdings of the Society, in particular to the life works of the late A.D. White, and the collections of the late William Buchanan, M.D.

 

·         To provide family genealogies, census records, cemetery listings, obituaries, etc. that will give researchers these aids at their fingertips at a one-stop session at the Center.

 

·         To serve as a Hub for the activities involving on-going operations of collecting, writing, and publishing data, stories and pictures of the people and of the land targeted, thus acting as a continual expansion of the work begun by A.D. White.

SPECIAL SERVICES

 

The Society will copy, without charge, appropriate documents such as records of churches, funeral directors, cemeteries, etc., held by private individuals, providing one copy to the owner and one to be placed in the holdings of the Society at the Center. Originals will be returned to owners. In all cases, the Archives Committee will determine if the records offered are appropriate for copying.

 

SAMPLES OF HOLDINGS AT THE CENTER

 

·         Dozens of Family Genealogies

·         Hundreds of Newspaper Clippings

·         Church Histories

·         Thousands of Obituaries

·         Several Hundred Cemetery Listings

·         County Histories

·         Some Township Histories

·         Files & Pictures of Bridges, Railroads, Mines, Disasters, Homesteads, Mills, Old Buildings, and others.

·         Many, many census records 1800 - 1880 for:

           Brooke, Hancock, Marshall, and Ohio 

               Counties in West Virginia

           Ten Townships in Allegheny County,

                Pennsylvania

           Twelve Townships in Beaver County, 

                Pennsylvania

           Several in Greene County, Pennsylvania

           Belmont, Columbiana, and Jefferson  

                Counties, Ohio

           At least 15 Townships in Washington

               County, Pennsylvania

 

ONGOING ACTIVITIES

 

·         Publications of Historical Literature

·         Local Historical Tours

·         Local Genealogical and Historical Fairs

·         Periodical Cultural & Historical Lectures

·         Interviews of Senior Members of the area to collect data and information for family stories.

·         Selection each year of a local historic site for marking.

 

 

CULTURAL LECTURE SERIES

 

An ongoing activity to be sponsored by the Society will be a series of cultural lectures by competent speakers of the greater A.D. White area. These lectures will be scheduled as the opportunity for them arises and as interest in the topics covered dictates. This special feature of the Society's program will be known as the Anthony Valenti Cultural Lecture Symposium. It is established in memory of Mr. Valenti who was one of the strongest supporters of the Society in its infancy and who generously provided the first location for a physical home in which to begin its work. Anthony Valenti, a long time member of the Board of Directors, was a brilliant historian and lecturer in his own right, his most outstanding characteristic being his inner essence of a man of vision. These lectures will be planned with the goal in mind of perpetuating Tony's appreciation of the finer things in the world and his determination to raise the quality of life around him by what he did and by what he was.

 

COMING ATTRACTIONS!

 

Plans are underway for the creation of a cozy nook in the A.D. White Center which will bear the title, "Voices from the Past." Several hundred audio tapes of interviews with elderly citizens and recordings of historical gatherings from the last several decades will be transferred to CD discs, catalogued, and made available to the public for private listening. Among the many voices on record are at least 60 tapes made of interviews with Mr. White himself in which he discussed the history of the surrounding areas and the families involved. Interviews with many other well known historians are also among this one-of-a-kind collection which will be made available as soon as the logistics of the project are completed.

 

HOURS OF OPERATION

 

Regular operating hours are yet to be determined. For special requests, please leave a phone message to arrange for an appointment.