The Community Council of Bay Village has awarded its 2022 “Project of the Year Award” to the Bay Village Historical Society for its revitalization project.

The pandemic has had an effect on all of our lives. Individuals, businesses and organizations have had to adjust. COVID had a major influence on the Bay Village Historical Society, what we were able to accomplish, and how we reached the public.

Fortunately, thanks to our volunteers in the community, we managed to turn a negative situation into an enriching and rewarding experience. In 2020 we began the daunting project of doing a complete inventory of Rose Hill.

This led to the discovery of buried treasures and reorganization of the museum. As a result, the Bay Village Historical Society’s revitalization project, “Shining a New Light on the Past,” is the recipient of this year’s Bay Village Project of the Year award, given by the Community Council.

When Rose Hill Museum was mandated to close, historical society volunteers got to work, logging in more than 110 hours every week during 2021. Individuals stepped in where they felt comfortable. Some zeroed in on one aspect, others worked on a regular basis.

A variety of projects were able to be completed at home. When on-site, generally only two people worked at a time, social distancing and masked. The inventory for the historical society continued so that by the end of 2021 volunteers had entered over 7,000 items into the archival database that were all appropriately stored.

This included over 11,000 images of those items. All items were entered into the PastPerfect program which is recognized as a significant cataloguing system by museums. Items were numbered, described, photographed or scanned, measured, condition described and more.

The “Early Family Papers Project” which contains some of the society’s earliest papers, continued and over 1,000 documents were entered into the PastPerfect. Posters depicting the lineage of the Cahoon, Osborn, Saddler, Aldrich and Wischmeyer families were installed. Objects once owned by the families accompany the display.

Pedestal signs were installed in Rose Hill with background information of various displays and a QR code directing visitors to our website with more historical information.

The life-size cutouts of the Cahoon sisters that were fading with age after 20 years were copied onto plywood and painted in color.

The Cahoon Cabin in the creek valley reopened to the public after being cleaned, inventoried and reorganized.

The historical society’s latest endeavor is a twice-monthly blog post highlighting an artifact from the collection. “Glimpse of the Past” can be viewed at www.bayhistorical.com/blog-entries.

Visit Rose Hill Museum when it reopens in April, on Sundays from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m., to see a slice of Bay Village history in person. Tours are also available by appointment. Phone (216) 319-4634.