This was like being a museum procurer,church librarian, preservationist. She traveled with some nuns who were attending national conferences on archives for Victory Noll, the convent in our county. Her archives were like a large closet in the church headquarters building.
When Huntington College -now Huntingon U.--built their new library, the church archives were installed in the library's beautiful walk-out basement and she became the college archivist as well. I think she was then an employee of the college, not sure. She says yes. She thinks she was the college librarian; she was not that.
But she used a computer, and rotated displays of historical items, and helped to choose and design a large and appropriate facility with appropriate cabinets and humidity level controls for preserving old documents. She catalogued and organized the place according to the latest archival standards.
Among those documents are letters from the Wright brothers and their father, who was a bishop in the UB Church. An excellent and most interesting book for young people and adults is The Bishop's Boys: A Life of Wilbur and Orville Wrightby Tom D. Crouch - 1990.
The museum/archives also includes old church and college publications --including those published by my great grandfather, Emmet Mason, church publisher. Mom has an excellent large photo of him and his family dated 1894 --handsome people! Great Grandma wrote on the back the colors and prices of her then 2 children's outfits --bright blue for little Harry, $4 (he became college president) --and red for his sister Ilah, $2.
Mom did this until she was 80, after Rob had arrived there for college, which was 1997.
One day, she turned in the exit doorway to go back and retrieve her glasses, which she had forgotten, and fell and broke her hip. Fortunately, though it was after hours and no one was there to help her, she had a cell phone that was inexplicably charged --inexplicably since she never used it--and she was able to call 911 and say "Help, I've fallen and I Can't Get Up!" (Just like the famous commercial!) She says she retired the next day. Rob moved out of dorm to stay and help her in her recovery. She had excellent hospital re-hab and some handicap bars installed so she could help herself.
A few years later, she had double knee replacement and Rob went back to help her then, also. She got around with her new knees much better than for 2 or 3 decades previous.
About Dad, Wendell D. Mason, he was a quality control chemist for Huntington Laboratories and also a part time chem teacher at IU-PU extension in Ft. Wayne. And great fun, filled with affection and kindness for his family. Always and ever a gentleman --with the common touch, well-liked by all who knew him, including those who worked at the plant where he worked in the lab.
Together, they were a disciplined couple, faithful in church and parenting, who provided a happy home for me and my brother and passed the baton of faith in God and His Son. They taught us principles of tithing, modesty, generosity, kindness, frugality, and the ability to make friends at all social levels. Our family was not wealthy at all --but practical and frugal, without vices --and they borrowed at low interest (gov't loans) and sent us to college --where I married an ambitious, successful guy. After some lean economic times at the beginning of our marriages, my brother and I have never known want --and have been able to afford things our parents never did. They also passed on to us the value of staying married --and parenting faithfully.
"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible
