History lives via photographs in the hallways of buildings, and even on the walls of restaurants. We are drawn to these images of time gone by, fascinated by the views of the interiors of stores, taverns, and street scenes.
The Elisha D. Smith Menasha Public Library in Menasha, Winnebago, Wisconsin has such a wall of history in the lower level of the library. This hallway leads visitors to one of their meeting rooms, which happens to be the room in which I gave my very first genealogical presentation in 2013. This lower level is also where the Children’s Department was located when I was a summer Library Page in the early 1980s.
A friend had told me about the gallery wall, and the fact that a photograph of me was included. Curious, I recently stopped in to take a look. Heading downstairs, I was met with a collection of photographs of historical Menasha. Many appearing to date from the turn of the century. The turn of the 19th to the 20th century. And there in the middle of these images, were two old, but not that old, photographs of the Summer Reading Program of 1983. I cannot remember the name of the program, but the theme was Alice in Wonderland. And there I was, my 20-year-old self, “immortalized” on a wall of historic photos, next to another image from that summer, of the children in the trailer ready for the parade, dressed as characters from Alice.
We ended the summer with this parade. The children’s librarian, Nancy, played the part of Alice, and Amy, my partner for the summer and I, dressed as Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee. These images were caught with an old instamatic camera. Blurry, grainy, and not focused correctly..
But on the wall of the library, nestled in the midst of photographs showing the history of Menasha, hang two well focused images from 42 years ago. For some, these images are as old as those taken at the turn of the 19th century, but for me…I remember it well.
