Leslie (Babe) Byers, his wife Evelyn, and their young daughter Barbara moved to Johnstown in 1937 where Babe worked as a butcher for Hays Market. In 1940, he worked at the Red and White Grocery for Ed McClure until he purchased the Community Cold Storage in November 1941. He renamed it Byers Cold Storage. The…
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Harvey Parish was a staunch prohibitionist. As the town founder, he once owned the entire west side of Main St (Parish Ave) – that side of downtown was considered “dry” long before the 18th Amendment established Prohibition on January 1, 1920. To help keep his town respectable and free of public drunks, Harvey attempted to…
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The Gray family’s roots in Johnstown date back to 1885 when James Albert Gray, his wife Ellen, and their six children moved to the Hillsboro district near what would become Milliken. The family settled on a quarter-section of land and lived in a dug-out until it was possible to build a house. In 1901, James…
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In the late 1800s, country schoolhouses dotted the landscape on the edges of local farms. They usually had one or two rooms; the two-roomed schools seated first through fourth grade in one room, and grades fifth through eighth in the other. Each classroom had a wood burning stove for heat and a water bucket and…
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Historical Society Fundraising To Preserve The Johnstown Breeze Newspaper Archives A local newspaper is the beating heart of its community. Often the most factual account and near complete record of a town’s development over time, it becomes a living scrapbook holding within its printed pages the details of its community’s struggles and triumphs, thus capturing…
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William Parkin and John Sansom purchased lots on the east side of Main Street (Parish Ave) in April 1906 for $800 under a stipulation that they would erect a building valued at a minimum of $800 within one year, or the property would revert back to the seller – the Great Western Railway Company. William…
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