Museum offers look at yesteryear

By WARREN SCOTT

Staff writer

WELLSBURG -- Ruby Greathouse, the late curator of the Brooke County Museum and Cultural Center, often called it a "life museum" because its many displays reflect various aspects of the lives of Brooke County through the years.

Bobbie Elliott, who worked beside Greathouse for many years, said it's a good description because visitors there will find among its many displays, recreations of dining rooms from various eras and the interior of a one-room schoolhouse as well as products manufactured by local glass factories or sold by the former "five and dime" store in which it is housed.

Located at 704 Charles St., the museum recently resumed regular hours of 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. Thursday, Friday and Sunday.

It has been normal for the museum to take a winter hiatus, but this will mark its first full season since the pandemic, noted Vickey Gallagher, president of the museum's volunteer board.

While the museum was reopened for the return of the Wellsburg Applefest last year, she and other board members are looking forward to keeping regular hours through the warmer months.

Gallagher said as before, visits during other hours also can be arranged by calling (304) 737-4060.

The museum is housed in a former G.C. Murphy Store, the 14th to be operated by a company that also owned many such stores in Pennsylvania, said Elliott.

She said it's not been determined when the store opened, but the discovery of a photo of a 1924 fire at a neighboring structure revealed it was in business at that time.

The store closed in 1992 and later became the office of a telemarketing firm. Volunteers on the board removed some of the cubicles there but kept many, using them to create common scenes of bygone days.

The approach allows many related items to be displayed together. For example, a replica of a 1920s kitchen includes an electric stove, "ice box" refrigerator and other appliances and cooking utensils commonly used then.

Another display incorporates elements of holding cells used by the Brooke County Sheriff's Department, including the wooden door with barred window from a jail used from 1793 to 1893 and a bed, toilet, sink and shackles used in two later cells.

The "jail cell's" walls are covered with wallpaper that at first glance appears to be stone brick. It's among many chosen by Mary Greathouse, Ruby's sister-in-law, from a variety of modern wallpaper to match each exhibit's period or theme.

With the help of her daughter, Tammy Withers, Mary also created photo guides identifying various objects found in the displays for visitors' reference.

Elliott said she and others have found most visitors prefer to explore the museum on their own, though she and others are happy to field any questions they have.

Elliott noted birth, marriage, death and burial records collected by the Brooke County Genealogy Society are stored upstairs and can be viewed on-site by those researching their family roots. They are encouraged to call in advance.

While perusing the various displays, JoAnn Williams, a visitor from Brilliant, said, "I'm impressed. They have quite a lot of things."

A recent addition to the museum's glass room, which contains dishes and other glass pieces produced by many of 38 local glass factories that once operated in the city, is a chandelier that hung in the Wellsburg home of John and Kathryn Chernenko when John, then chairman of the Brooke County Democratic Party; and his wife entertained presidential hopeful John F. Kennedy and his wife, Jackie, in 1959.

Elliott noted prior to her death, Ruby cleaned the teardrop shaped bulbs that hang from it while Gary Stephen, another board member, installed it.

Stephen also was busy during the pandemic installing LED bulbs said to be more economical and less damaging to more fragile artifacts and renovating the museum's meeting room.

Elliott said through the efforts of Stephen and others, the room's wide window has been walled in to conserve heat and a new counter with wood cabinets added using materials recycled from the former store's storage area upstairs.

Beneath the counter's glass top are many different colored and patterned glass knobs produced for automobile gear shifts by the Crescent Glass Co., which operated from 1912 to 1983 at the future site of the Brooke Glass factory.

They are among many discarded knobs that were found buried at the property during its rehabilitation by the Business Development Corp. of the Northern Panhandle. In addition to displaying many, the board is selling the knobs for $20 each.

The museum board welcomes groups interested in using the meeting room and has no present plans to charge for its use. There also is no admission to the museum, though donations are welcome.

The museum also received a boost from Elliott's grandson, Logan Williams. As a student at Brooke High School, Williams spent many hours cleaning and organizing the storage area and painting other areas of the building for his senior honors project.

Gallagher said the museum suffered a major loss with the deaths of both Greathouse and her brother, Phil, who each spent many hours working there.

But she said in recent months, the board has seen some new additions.

"We have a lot of active new people on our board. We're very happy about that," said Gallagher, who added there's still one more vacant seat.

She said in addition to returning to regular hours, the board hopes to offer several special programs, including a talk on the Cliftonville mine riots, which occurred 100 years ago this year.

(Scott can be contacted at wscott@heraldstaronline.com.)