b'Preserving Columbia High Schools PastThe volunteers who work its archivesBY HARRIET SIGERMANPHOTOGRAPHY BY CARLOS SANCHEZThe Columbia High School archivists L to R: Anne Wessel Dwyer, Hannah Edelman, Carol Moran Petrallia and Kate McMorrow Brown.T he Columbia High School Archives isactivity, a welcoming portal to Columbias past. commencement brochures and musical programs. ameticulouslyorganizedtwo-roomItwasnotalwaysthisway.In1995,CarolPetrallia and Edelman recruited students from work space in the new Media CenterMoranPetrallia,anEnglishanddebateteacherthe student council to help them go through the at Columbia. With its neatly labeledat Columbia, received a call about some boxes ofmaterial. But they quickly realized that the work file cabinets and shelves full of booksold papers pertaining to Columbia housed in thecould not be done in blocks of 45 minutes, as by Columbia graduates, the archivesroom where she met with her debate class. She andPetrallia says. exudes an atmosphere of purposefulanother teacher soon realized there was a wealth ofEdelman describes the chaos they encountered: material about Columbias history.I dont think anyone fully understood what was Little did Petrallia know that she was embark- thereandwhatwereallyhad.Whenshefirst ingonadecades-longjourneytoorganizeandjoined the effort, she almost fainted. They faced catalog those items into an archives as she joineda monumental task of organizing and inventory-forceswithretiredteachervolunteersRoseanning the collection.Sharo,Dr.CarolCollinsandMaryBissinger.Early on, at the suggestion of Susan Newberry, These days, her team includes Hannah Edelman,Maplewoods very knowledgeable town historian, Anne Wessel Dwyer and Kate McMorrow Brown.Petrallia and Edelman attended a program at the Together, they have overcome several obstacles, in- Morristown Advisory Board about how to orga-cluding a pandemic that stopped all work, severalnize the archives. Out of almost 100 attendees, hectic moves to different work spaces and a floodtheyweretheonlyrepresentativesfromahigh that nearly destroyed much of the collection. school, and they received a wealth of information.The boxes of documents were first housed in aWhen Petrallia retired in 2006 and Edelman room that several previous librarians and a formershortly after, they and other volunteers really dug Standing seven feet tall, Cougar Joe was created byprincipal had outfitted with shelving and cabinets.into organizing the archives. It was just a revela-Charles Scattergood and Louis Bernstein, CHS classThe contents were ostensibly library reports go- tion to find the range of materials, Petrallia says. of 1946, for their 30 thyear class reunion. For manying back to 1895, butPetrallia and fellow EnglishBesides the library reports, they found: years, he proudly served as mascot for teacher Meg Wasties English classes. teacher Edelman discovered other items, such asBound volumes of the Columbian, the schools 26/ matters magazine / school 2025'