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Pat Crisp, Like A Moth To The Flame

We’d like to announce the upcoming release of Pat Crisp, Like A Moth To The Flame by local author, Kate Clay Bodeen.

Imaging Specialists assisted Kay with photos for her story about her grandfather’s political career in Watauga and Caldwell counties. The 198 page book is 5.5″ x 8.5″, softcover.

J.A. “Pat” Crisp was a merchant and state legislator in the NC House of Representatives, representing Watauga County in 1889 and Caldwell in 1905. The story begins with his election in 1889 and ends with his death in 1906. He was never able to recover from the financial setbacks of the “Panic of ’93,” and he suffered the deaths of his first wife Fannie and two of their six children.  Pat was an effective, but somewhat controversial political figure, sometimes crossing party lines for causes in which he believed.  At the end, Bright’s Disease cut short what might have been a happy time for him and his second wife Ella and their seven children.  He loved his family and his 13 children were often a source of joy.

Kay wrote her grandfather’s story from family stories and facts found in newspapers and histories of the period. During the course of the project, she was able to learn more about her ancestors and even met some “new” cousins.

It’s a great book and we’re happy to have had a chance to work on it with Kay. Pat Crisp, Like A Moth To The Flame will be available at The Sparta Store and online at spartastore.com.

Pre-order your copy, today.

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New Alleghany Methodist Conference Records on Disk

We’ve just completed a great collection of Alleghany Methodist Episcopal Church Quarterly Conference Records. The records span the years from 1883 to 1940 and were originally compiled by Thelma Davis from Sparta United Methodist Church. Duane Davis brought the records to us to archive and format so that they could be easily accessed by researchers.

ISI's new data DVD of Alleghany Methodist Church Conference Records from 1883 through 1940
ISI's new disk of Alleghany Methodist Conference records from 1883 through 1940

ISI’s intern, Beth Triplett, scanned the pages, and saved each as a separate file. We then grouped the files by year, built “books” in Adobe InDesign and exported them as PDFs. The PDFs are named for each year, so a user can easily navigate the collection. We chose to make the files PDFs, (Portable Document Format) a format originally developed for the printing industry that embeds fonts and images so that the document will print consistently on any system or printer configuration.

At the beginning, the set includes data from Mt. Zion, Bethany, Coxes School House (crossed out) Coxes Chapel, Shilo (sic) Sparta and Antioch and by 1940: Sparta, Shiloh, Piney Creek, Cox’s Chapel, Potato Creek, Gentry Chapel, Edwards Crossroads, Mouth of Wilson and Stratford Churches.

We appreciate being able to help with this important resource. Thank you Thelma and Duane for a project that is sure to aid historians for years to come.

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Support Alleghany Community Television

If you’ve not yet watched Alleghany Community Television, don’t feel bad, a lot of local folks haven’t even heard of it, yet. But you should know our little school-system sponsored station is now in around 3000 homes in the region. ACTV is, at present, in 437 Surry County homes, 800 in Wilkes County and 1675 in the Skyline and Alleghany Cablevision viewing area. Those numbers are growing (daily) as Skyline and other systems bring customers online to new fiber-optic delivery systems in the mountain region.

Imaging Specialists has been working with ACTV by donating hosting and maintenance for the station’s web site www.alleghanycommunitytelevision.com (which was originally a Senior Project by a student that participated in the program.) Their live schedule is online now, and we hope to eventually stream station content, which will showcase Alleghany County in a way never before possible. After that happens, viewership will potentially include anyone in the world with a computer and an Internet connection.

ACTV is a relatively new organization that originated in the Alleghany County School System and the A. Anderson Huber Cyber Campus. Station Manager, Charlie Scott and Cyber Campus Manager, Travis Sturgill have been working with Alleghany High students for several years to build a modern, viable TV Station.

With their oversight, the students have been doing the lion’s share of the work, learning and performing jobs like videography, programming, announcing, sales, makeup and every other job associated with operating a TV station. Their newest project, soon to be broadcast, is an Alleghany News program. It will join the many locally produced shows including school academic and sports events, Senior projects, Sparta Town Council meetings and area church services.

Other counties all over North Carolina, have been watching ACTV closely, hoping to replicate our success. There are plans to bring in students from the UNC School of the Arts in Winston-Salem, to intern and help train Alleghany students.

ACTV is the best unknown resource in Alleghany County (and possibly Northwest North Carolina) and you should be a part of it.

If you don’t know much about the station and would like to learn more, contact Charlie Scott at 657-0825. Since it is a non-profit enterprise, overt advertising isn’t allowed, but sponsorship is welcome, either of individual shows, series or at station level. Gifts to the station will (very) soon be tax deductible after it achieves full 501(c)(3) status.

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We are gearing up for Christmas!

Choose and Cut day is this Saturday the 4th. The Sparta Store is having a sale, in conjunction with many other events in the County.

We’ll be giving 15% off all of our selection of things to celebrate with, like Christmas Cards and Ornaments, and for gifts, our ceramic tiles. Our prints, which also make great gifts, are 25% off.

In addition to our sale, our new neighbor, the Alleghany Historical Museum, is celebrating its grand opening, Saturday. They will be open from 10am till 5pm with a ribbon cutting at 2pm. There will be a reception at the Alleghany Jubilee afterward.

While you’re in town for the museum and our sale, be sure to stop by all the other shops on Main Street to see what goodies everyone else has, too. And don’t forget to come back to the Jubilee that night!

Also on this action packed Saturday, there will be a craft fair at the Emerson Black Building at the Justice Carlisle Higgins Fairgrounds from 9am-4:30pm, and in addition to the show at the Jubilee, The Vision Band will be playing at Silver Dollar Music Park at 8pm.

Then you can go home and relax. It’ll be a busy day.

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Searching for Opti-Copy info?

Opti-Copy's trademark for many years.
Opti-Copy Trademark for many years.

If you’re looking for information on Opti-Copy, Ron Halsey, or Jeff Halsey,  contact us.

We both worked at Opti-Copy for years in the 1970’s and 80’s. Dad was the sixth person hired and I was the sixteenth. We started out in North Kansas City, Missouri and later moved the plant to Lenexa, Kansas. It was a great place for a young (or older) kid to learn. Everything from film, chemistry, physics, photography, lens theory, mechanics- you name it!- was available from some darn fine model-makers and engineers. There were also one or two good camera technicians around.

Joe Wally, Sam Wilson, Jack Wally, Paul Brown, Louie Friedly, BB Young and George Martin were only some of the folks around there to learn from. We built what was then state-of-the-art prepress equipment, with reps from Kodak, Du Pont, Agfa, Fuji stopping by every few days to “test something out.”

We shipped and installed our step-and-repeat projection systems all over the US and Canada and later Europe, Australia and South Africa. Before long, Opti had even sold more than a few systems to Japanese companies.

So… if you have a comment or a question about our days at Opti, give us a call. We might even remember the answer!