Tuesday, October 13, 2009: In Search of the "wild" RIPPELs!

In the morning Kathy continued her genealogy research in Rogers Public Library, County Administration Archives and the Rogers Historical Museum. The original plan was to find the marriage of Chris' grandmother, Bonnie Gene Black Rippel to her second husband, Albert Moody. We knew they had lived in this area while Chris' dad, John Rippel, attended high school at Rogers High School.

Unfortunately, we couldn't find a marriage record in Benton County. The search will have to continue elsewhere. (the county archivist suggests they may have married in Fayetteville; I know they lived there in 1943).

Because of the failure to find the Moodys in the marriages, taxes, voter registrations, and a list of eighth grade graduates, the research focus switched to trying to verify when they lived in Rogers and John's school attendance.

We checked city directories at both the Public Library and the Museum. Unfortunately, between the two they still did not have all of the late 1930s-early 1940s volumes. The only success was in the 1939 Polk Directory for Rogers. Mrs. Jean Ripple is listed. So that helps with pinpointing the marriage date, at least.

We were also disappointed looking for John's school yearbook. Between the two facilities they only had a couple and they were probably too recent. We did not find him in either. All in all, it was a disappointing day for family research. At least we found one thing!

The Rogers Library contains great signage as flags. A librarian named Leslie hand writes "shelf talkers" using ShelfWizes. Chris and Leslie agreed to start a Website for posting shelf talkers for librarians all over the country to print out and use to promote authors in their libraries.

Walmart has purchased a supercenter-sized children's room in the Rogers' library with lots of fancy sets and other stuff.

We also met a library employee, Mary Koch (pronounced "cook"), who grew up in Great Bend and even worked in the old library building! What a small world...

In the Rogers Historical Museum, Chris learned that Will Rogers was married a Rogers, Arkansas girl, Betty Blake: Informal quaint bio, Formal bio with picture.

When we left the museum we drove a few blocks to find where Chris' paternal grandmother had lived on the wrong side of the railroad tracks on Arkansas Street. The lot seems to be occupied by a laundromat now. The location was interesting though, because they are right next to the train depot and the downtown is right there and convenient.

We stopped briefly in the Roger Library's used bookstore in an old bank building on 2nd street. This is the first time I have seen a Friend's bookstore outside the library. It was large and one of the best used bookstores I have ever seen. It contained numerous large signs hanging from the ceiling. Libraries should have such good signage.

On the way out of town, we called the companies that produce the salsa and bread that we purchased at the Bentonville Public Library. We learned that we could purchase Shaggy's Salsa at one location in Rogers (White Oak Station), but the bread was not available in Rogers. So we drove back to the Library in Bentonville just to purchase a few loaves. We also stocked up on the salsa at both locations. Obviously, we like these products!