About 45 years ago, it was a desire to connect with her own history that led Susan Rynerson to join TCGHS. “Even though I was very young at the time, I’d already lost both of my paternal grandparents and my dad didn’t know a whole lot about our ancestry either, so I turned to TCGHS to get started,” she recalls. “Research in those days was much more difficult than it is today. Over time I came to be more involved with the operations side of the group and my retirement from Caterpillar coincided with a need at the Society as the scope of our work continued to broaden.”

When TCGHS began, members scoured every cemetery and death record they could find, publishing cemetery books from their findings. Preservation was a key part of this as many gravestones had become illegible or completely erased by time and erosion.

Marriage and census indices, naturalization records, atlases, and histories followed, with their sales funding the Society’s work. After moving into their current building at 719 North Eleventh Street, they held dinner tableaus and featured cemetery tours around the county.

Their current collection includes tens of thousands of books, county histories, maps, local vital records, family histories, unique research material such as the Ortssippenbucher collection, photos, postcards, and other ephemera specific to the greater Tazewell and surrounding areas. “The archive holds one-of-a-kind ledgers, journals, letters, advertising, and many other very unique things,” Susan adds. “The collection here is staggeringly large and growing all the time.”

While school learning generally focuses on national or global history, Susan emphasizes: “Local history is the building block of national history. There is no national story that does not begin as local history. The threads of our individual stories are woven together to form the national fabric.”

“Fabric” is the word for a reason. Like any garment, history without proper care and preservation eventually fades and then disintegrates. Susan has spent years reviewing, compiling, and stitching together holes in published histories for Tazewell County and the surrounding area. “There is so much that fades from memory in just a generation or two,” she says. “It is extremely important to save the records from which these stories can be harvested.”

“History is our identity as a community,” Susan continues. “It connects us to our past and can provide a sense of belonging and pride in all the wonderful things that happen along the way. We learn why our ancestors behaved the way they did when we know all the experiences they endured.”

For Susan, getting to know how her ancestors were shaped meant doing family genealogy, which in turn, “gives us an ownership interest in national history as we learn the roles our ancestors played in the nation’s development,” she states. “I’ve learned more about history — U.S. and World — following my ancestor’s steps than anyone could ever learn in school.”

TCGHS is a FamilySearch affiliate, allowing access to digital records from around the world. To help educate on the importance of history, they offer monthly meetings, research and publish significant stories, dedicate Illinois State Historical Society markers, and engage with schools and civic groups through speakers and stories for any occasion. 

TCGHS recently dedicated monuments to five Revolutionary War soldiers buried in Tazewell County, dedicated a marker to the Shipman Freedom Pursuits of 200 years ago, and marked the graves of and held ceremonies for many Underground Railroad participants.

To help preserve history, become a member of TCGHS. Individual membership is $25 a year, with members receiving a monthly 20-page publication about local history.

Consider donating either a tax-deductible monetary donation (TCGHS is a 501c3), or with a historical donation of documents, photos, ledgers, journals, or ephemera, (no clothing, trophies, or sports equipment, please). “We can always use more volunteers,” Susan urges. “There is indexing, typing, repairing, researching, and many other opportunities available for members.”