From the desk of Alison Gibson, Director
While not Ohio River flood season, we thought these from a newly discovered cache of flood pictures were worth sharing. Couldn’t find a memorable flood in 1942, but…one started at the very end of 1942 and then crested in early January 1943, so we’ll go with the 1942 notation until proven otherwise. The Ripley Bee said it crested at 60.6 feet. Do our readers recognize anyone? Or peg exactly where the pictures were taken? We suspect some of these buildings are gone now. The other flood photographs (1937) in the new stash were clearly Ripley, and we will post periodically The storefront where the Coca-Cola sign hangs also sold cigars and cigarettes.
We saw the Google Street Map car going through Ripley on Monday, and have to wish that there was such a tool for years gone by—it would have answered lots of building questions….
It was brought to our attention that the tombstone of Adam Lowry Rankin out in Petaluma, California was recently honored. Adam was Rev. John Rankin’s first son and fortunately for researchers, he wrote an autobiography late in life when he was living in Petaluma. His autobiography is lengthier and has more details than Rev. John’s own autobiography, and is an important ‘hands on’ view of the abolitionist movement. The original manuscript is in California on about 700 pages of fragile paper and not easy to read. Fortunately, Belle Rankin, a granddaughter, transcribed the manuscript years ago, and we have photocopies of that in our collection, including one that can be checked out. Stay tuned for the release of a new biography on Rev. John Rankin–always happy to have something new to expand visibility of Ripley’s heroes.
Happy fair week to all. We will have regular hours during the fair week, and look forward to our patrons having more time to read ‘after the fair’.
