Category Archives: Archiving Wheeling

Ohio County Public Library Archives Private Collector

More Baseball & Soda Pop

Seán Duffy April 11, 2016 9 Comments 16800 Views

Featured Image: Wheeling Soda Pop and Bottlers

Spring Time in Wheeling, Continued…

Nothing says spring quite so clearly as an April day at the old ballpark, with the sun shining warmly on your face and tiny, cool bubbles bursting on the tip of your nose as you raise an ice cold bottle of sweet soda pop to your lips for a refreshing drink. Well, that’s our theory anyway, as we celebrate spring with a new exhibit of baseball artifacts combined with Thad Podratsky’s amazing collection of early Wheeling pop bottles — on display now at the Ohio County Public Library. As a complement to this display, we present a two-part post on the history of baseball and pop bottling in old Wheeling.
▶ Read Part 1: “A Social Game of Ball”

Part 2: The Pop-Post

An assortment of Painted Pops. Thad Podratsky Collection.

“I do Sierra Mist commercials not because they pay me a lot of money or because it only takes a couple of days. I do it because I have a respect for all sodas and I like to communicate that. Some people say soda, some people say pop. Where I’m from in Indiana they called it breakfast.”
-Comedian Jim Gaffigan

“Let us have wine and women, mirth and laughter, sermons and soda water the day after.”
-Lord Byron

Local History Author

Advertising with Style

Ohio County Public Library Archives January 30, 2016February 19, 2016 1 Comment 4518 Views

Victorian Trade Cards of Wheeling

In the late Victorian Era, businesses advertised goods and services with unapologetic flair.

Trade cards, which originated with 18th century French and English tradesmen, were particularly stylish. And the advent of lithography in the 1870s made it possible to mass-produce them in color, ushering a golden age — from 1876 to the early 1900s. Designed to appeal to those expected to do the shopping, the cards were either handed out personally to customers or placed on store counters.

Local History Researcher

The Wheeling Renaissance

Allen Dieterich-Ward January 9, 2016January 12, 2016 1 Comment 6124 Views

An Archiving Wheeling partnership with Weelunk.com.

“As Great a City as its Citizens Want it to Be”

If you had tuned into Wheeling’s WTRF television station fifty years ago, you may have caught an on-air announcement for “The Rebirth of Wheeling,” a series of ten articles reprinted from the News-Register that told a “factual story of a great city’s comeback.”

Slide used by WTRF for the "rebirth of Wheeling" on-the-air announcements. Hamm Collection, OCPL Archives. — Slide used by WTRF for the “rebirth of Wheeling” on-the-air announcements. Hamm Collection, OCPL Archives.

Archiving Wheeling

Our Top Five of 2015!

Archiving Wheeling January 1, 2016January 1, 2016 1 Comment 3565 Views

Featured Image: Archiving Wheeling's 2015 Year in Review

Archiving Wheeling’s Year in Review

Archiving Wheeling Logo Officially launched in December of 2014, 2015 was Archiving Wheeling’s first full year, and it was a indeed good year for our fledgling community experiment to bridge collections, tell stories, and preserve Wheeling’s history.

What made last year such a great year?

To start, there were the partnerships with Weelunk, Wheeling National Heritage Area Corporation, Friends of Wheeling, The California University of Pennsylvania and Heinz History Center Affiliates Program, West Virginia Northern Community College and Alumni Association; the collections showcased from Heritage Partners The Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston Archives, private collector Thaddeus Podrastsky, an Ohio Valley Hollywood Star (double), and of course, our very own Ohio County Public Library Archives; and then there were the guest authors Kate Quinn, Margaret Brennan, Bill Hogan, John Bowman, Jon Kniesner, and Wheeling Jesuit History Major, Becca Rodgers, a 2015 OCPL Archives intern. Not to mention the nearly 35,000 blog post views by visitors from over 70 countries!

Yep, a good year indeed.

And now, without further ado, here our top five posts from 2015: Read More

Local History Researcher

A Witness to History

Margaret Brennan November 11, 2015November 24, 2015 Leave a Comment 3971 Views

Featured Image: Benwood Boy at Yalta Conference

Stalin, Roosevelt, Churchill, and a Boy from Benwood

Andrew "Pepper" Kramer, Military Police, U.S. Army, 1943. — Andrew “Pepper” Kramer, Military Police, U.S. Army, 1943.

In observance of Veterans Day, November 11, 2015, we remember the amazing World War II experiences of a local man, Andrew “Pepper” Kramer, the brother of Dr. Mike Medovic’s mother. The family was from Benwood, and Andrew’s two brothers also served in Second World War, one at Omaha Beach and another with the Air Force in the South Pacific.

Sometimes we are in the right place in the right time, often through no action of our own, and we find ourselves in the middle of something much bigger than we could ever imagine. That was probably the case for Andrew, who took some very special pictures of three of the giants of modern history. Read More

Local History Researcher

Stogie Town

John Bowman September 25, 2015January 5, 2017 Leave a Comment 9431 Views

Only a Stogie from Wheeling Can Be a Wheeling Stogie

A variety of cigar boxes featuring "Wheeling Stogies" labels. From the collections of Thaddeus Podratsky. — Only stogies manufactured in Wheeling were able to sport the “Wheeling Stogies” label. From the collections of Thaddeus Podratsky.

No, this headline is not meant to be a tribute to the late great Yogi Berra, though it sounds like something he might have said. In fact, this is federal law.

Indeed, by federal law, for a stogie to be called a “Wheeling Stogie” it must be made in Wheeling.

Boston, July 6, 1899, in the United States Circuit Court, Judge Colt handed down a decision holding that, “stogies bearing the name of ‘Wheeling’ or ‘Wheeling Stogies’, could not be manufactured in Boston or elsewhere other than Wheeling and sold as ‘Wheeling Stogies’.”

Archiving Wheeling Local History Researcher

Avalon on the Ohio

Kate Quinn September 18, 2015September 18, 2015 3 Comments 19591 Views

Wheeling’s Short-Lived Coney Island Amusement Park

by Kate Quinn and Seán Duffy

An Archiving Wheeling Partnership with Weelunk.
For more great Wheeling stories visit www.weelunk.com.

“Avalon will always be there for all men to find if they can seek the way thither, throughout all the ages past the ages. If they cannot find the way to Avalon, it is a sign, perhaps, that they are not ready.”― Marion Zimmer Bradley, The Mists of Avalon

No buildings are visible in this early 20th century view of the Sisters Islands from Martins Ferry.

What if I told you that you could see camels, ride a roller coaster, visit a German beer garden, fly to the North Pole in an airship, roller skate, dance, travel to Damascus, and take in Vaudeville shows all in the middle of the Ohio River near Warwood? Would you believe me? Well, during a long ago summer, you could do all of those things and more, on a magical little island dubbed “Coney.”

Archiving Wheeling

Glass Elephants, Revolvers, and Bulldogs

Seán Duffy August 30, 2015August 31, 2015 3 Comments 7777 Views

The Whimsical World of North Wheeling Glass

A historically important glass manufacturing center, around the turn of the 20th century, Wheeling and the surrounding Ohio Valley was teeming with active firms like Central Glass Works in East Wheeling, Northwood Glass in South Wheeling, Crystal Glass Company in Bridgeport, Imperial Glass in Bellaire, Fostoria in Moundsville, and Riverside Glass Works in Wellsburg, just to name a few.

But perhaps the most unusual glass manufacturer of the period was the lesser-known North Wheeling Glass Company. Read More

Local History Researcher

He Didn’t Give Up the Ship

John Kniesner August 14, 2015 Leave a Comment 5688 Views

Wheeling’s Little Known Hero of Lake Erie

Perry Leaves the Lawrence by artist Dean Mosher. John Yarnall is shown with wound to his head. — Perry Leaves the Lawrence by artist Dean Mosher. John Yarnall is shown with a wound to his head.

For a small city, Wheeling can boast a veritable pantheon of legendary figures, from frontier folk like Betty Zane and Samuel McColloch, to modern notables like Eleanor Steber and Walter Reuther. But there was a man from Wheeling whose name and deeds, while deserving of similar legendary status, remain relatively obscure and unknown.

That man’s name was John Joliffe Yarnall (1786-1815), and his heroic deeds helped win the Battle of Lake Erie during the War of 1812. Read More

Local History Researcher

Wheeling: Birthplace of the American Steamboat

John Bowman July 19, 2015July 20, 2015 5 Comments 8604 Views

The Steamboat "Washington" marker — The Steamboat “Washington” marker located on the north bank of Wheeling Creek near WesBanco Arena, west of Main Street. The Flat Iron Building can be seen in the background.

OUR CITY HAS A NEW HISTORICAL HIGHWAY MARKER

Riverboat historians consider Wheeling the “Birthplace of the American Steamboat”, and this new West Virginia Historical Highway Marker recently installed at Sixteenth and Main Streets commemorates that fact. The marker is provided by John Bowman with support from the Wheeling National Heritage Area Corporation. Read More