Year-End-Review

Holy cow. I haven't updated this since July. I hope that shows everyone how busy we have been around the OHC in the last 6 months.

Let's see - how about a year-end-review?

WHAT A YEAR! 2010 might have been the fastest year of my life. Its nice to know I've done everything we normally do in a year here at least once now. Since July we had our annual Gala at the end of October. The first ever Moonshiner's Ball was a big success and a fun time to boot. We had a great turn out, wonderful live music, and raised almost $7,000 for the OHC via sponsorships, silent and live auctions, tickets to the event, and even some of those moonshine samples :) I look forward to doing something similar again next year.



The highlight of the Gala had to be the unveiling of the mostly complete Heritage Park. Those memorial bricks that had been sitting in the museum for 5 years are now the beginning of what will hopefully be an ongoing walkway through the heirloom vegetable garden and native plant garden that surrounds our 2 outdoor artifacts - the Manly Mobile Jail (aka "The Cage") and the Hardy Tines steam engine. THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU to our wonderful volunteer and friend Jon Fritz (Zone 7) for making the park happen. I can't wait until spring when it really starts to show its true colors and brightens up our little corner of Brown's Square.

Unfortunately, due to the proximity of Gala to Halloween we were unable to throw the OHC Heritage Haunt again in 2010. It was a huge success in 2009 and we hope to have it again in 2011.

Also - on Labor Day weekend the OHC's "classroom"/meeting space received a wonderful facelift thanks to Christopher Johnson and crew for his Eagle Scout project. He added new paint, chair railing, and crown moulding to a room that really needed some finishing touches. We are thrille with the results and thanks to his own fundraising the cost was very affordable! JOB WELL DONE CHRISTOPHER!

(photo - Christopher Johnson and crew make improvements to the OHC classroom/meeting space)

November was full of project work days - 3 saturdays in a row, in fact, at our General Store Museum in Westminster and Center Church in Oakway. We got a lot cleaned up and prepped for continued renovations. The store shelving for the General Store Museum is nearing completion and should be installed very soon. The period light fixtures have all been sponsored and purchased and are ready to hang. Before we know it the General Store Museum will be open for business. Likewise, today brought good news about Center Church. Pioneer Water District has generously agreed to install a water tap at the site free of charge! That is a HUGE savings that we can credit the people of Oakway with. We look forward to continue progress at that site and hopefully maybe an Easter event out there.

(photo - Jerry and Ernie prep General Store Museum walls for paint)

We started a new tradition this Christmas season by raising money for a Christmas party for the boys of the Tamassee DAR Missouri Cottage. We raised nearly $800 for 9 boys between the ages of 8 and 16 and had a blast of a pizza party at the OHC. We played some hilarious Minute to Win It Christmas games and managed to give them some great Christmas gifts - both needs and wants. I was very thrilled by the generosity of our supporters to pull together for a good cause like this.


(Christmas boys play Minute to Win It game - trying to get a cookie from forehead to mouth without using their hands)
For 2011 we have some wonderful movies planned for Movie Night at the Museum. Please check our web site/facebook for those.

We are also still very optimistic about a decision from the US Forest Service regarding the Southern Appalachian Farmstead.

We also plan to make some headway on a new project to get some of Oconee's historic cemeteries signed - a project that we could use lots of help on as many of these cemeteries are difficult to find and a priority list will have to be made to decide which need signs first.

Progress is coming along on the Reading and Research Room slowly but surely. We are also very optimistic about some plans arou

Publish Post

nd Walhalla regarding a possible reconstruction of the old Biemann's Hotel....*crossing our fingers*.

I want to say what a pleasure it has been working here for over a year now. I have met so many wonderful people here who make my job even more enriching. I think we have a lot to look forward to in 2011.