COALPORT – At the Coalport Area Museum Commission meeting, held at the meeting room of “The Wild Hare” Florist Shop on Oct. 22, the board nominated and voted in three new members: Bill Morrison, Anne Wylie and Stephanie Rife.
Due to the new regulations of applying to be a 501.c.3. non-profit corporation, and the urgency of the current instability of the Coalport Borough and the community building, it was important to stabilize the commission with a larger board—whose next task is to have a slate of officers ready to go by the January 2025 meeting.
Consultant John S. Walker gave the board a presentation on the importance of having a contingency plan ready to adopt due to that instability of the local governing council and potential problems with the current building.
This plan will begin with the formation of a committee whose task it will be to search all data collection of inventories, lease agreements with council, building deeds, potential sites for museum (if needed), disbursement of holdings (if necessary), etc.
With a new high-resolution scanner donated to the coal museum by Indiana University of PA professor Mark Piwinsky, Ph.D., the commission decided to hold a “Community Scanning Day” at the museum on Sunday, Nov. 10, 2024, from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. – with a goal of increasing the museum’s collection of historic photos and news articles of the area.
Local individuals are urged to bring in their personal albums with any pictures of the ‘Glendale Valley’ villages, buildings, postcards, obituaries, family bibles, wedding announcements, local organizations, etc.
This allows the coal museum to be stewards of local cultural history as it organizes, titles and stores this digital data to periodically add to a comprehensive compendium.
In other news, the board:
- agreed to the purchase of liability insurance coverage from Goodville Mutual Casualty Company for the commission board members—along with limited property coverage.
- approved the purchase of the new book on “Curry Run” by author Jim Bennett.
- learned secretary Rita Hahn recently completed filing the 1023EZ form for the Museum Commission application as a tax-exempt organization under the IRS’s Section 501.c.3.
- wished to remind the public that the museum is closing for the season on Sunday, Nov. 24, 2024—with a plan to reopen.
The next meeting of the Coalport Area Museum Commission is scheduled for Tuesday, Jan. 28, 2025 beginning at 7 p.m., at a site to be determined.
Anyone interested in the early handloading days of bituminous coal mining or researching local family history is invited to attend.