Weston County Senior Center gets new class composites

KateLynn Slaamot
NLJ Correspondent
 
Newcastle High School class composites from 1923 to recent years have been hanging on the walls of the Weston County Senior Center for many years, giving interested persons an opportunity to take a step back in time and see pictures from past graduating classes. Some of those composites, however, were recently damaged by water and returned to the Anna Miller Museum. Those composites are now being replaced.
When the Weston County Senior Services board learned that it wouldn’t be getting the class composites back, it decided to replace them and bring an important part of the senior center back to its walls, said Carolyn Shields, the center’s executive director. 
The board reached out to Zannie Rich of 4R Graphic Designs, who made the senior posters for last year’s graduating class, to see if she would be willing to create replacement class composites.
To pay for this endeavor, the board is reaching out to alumni, and other interested persons, to help by sponsoring a class composite for $45. While many of the composites are already created and hung, not all the classes have been sponsored and more funds are needed. Chris French, a senior services board member, said that because some classes don’t have living representatives, they still need people to donate to cover those costs, as well as additional costs to pay for such things as plaques to give recognition to donors. 
“We’ve had good response so far,” Shields said. 
A great deal of effort was needed to track down all the pictures. Shields received some original class photos from the high school, while French got in touch with some of the photographers to get original pictures from them. They are still missing photos from the graduating classes of 1990-2012 and 1924-1928. They are working to get those so they can create the composites. The rest have been created and hung on the walls of the center. 
Rich is doing a full-color print of the composites on corrugated plastic, and they are weather proof, waterproof, scratch resistant and more, Rich said. 
“They will hold up good,” she said. 
Replacing these pieces of NHS legacy was important, French said, especially with the All-School Reunion coming up later this year. Being able to walk the halls of the senior center and look at the pictures of past graduating classes is something that the people of Newcastle appreciate. 
With funds still needed, the community is encouraged to donate. Just call the senior center at (307) 746-4903 for more information and to make a donation. 
“We invite them (donors) to come to the senior center to look at what they purchased,” French said, adding that anyone can go to the senior center to look at the class composites.