‘I’m trying to link those little stories’: Trafford Historical Society gathers stories, unlocks community memories through map project

In the last days of her life, Nancy Woodall was flooded with memories of her childhood — all because of a yearbook and the Trafford Historical Society’s quest to identify the 250 oldest buildings in the borough.

Woodall’s daughter, Lia, began searching years ago for a copy of her mother’s high school yearbook. She said her mother regretted getting rid of the book in a previous house move or cleaning.

The effort to track down the book eventually led to an act of kindness through the Trafford Historical Society, which is one of many organizations highlighting the community as part of the 250th anniversary of the founding of Westmoreland County.

“I was just determined to try to find it,” said Lia Woodall of Phoenix. “Classmates never had it. … The school was no longer there. I called the (Penn-Trafford) school board. I called around and never really got anywhere.”

On a trip to Pittsburgh in July, Lia visited Trafford to take pictures to bring back to her mother in Mesa, Ariz.

She came across the Trafford Community Public Library.

After some searching, the library volunteers found two copies of Trafford High School’s 1945 yearbook. Lia took photos of each page for her mother to look through.

Days later, Trafford Historical Society President Andrew Capets mailed her one of the copies.

“She was so excited just to hold the book, and she couldn’t believe it,” Lia said. “We learned things about her — being a senior and what her desires were and she loved french fries and she had this favorite actor.”

After graduating from Trafford High School in 1945, Nancy Woodall moved away and only kept in touch with her hometown through sporadic visits. The yearbook opened the gates of Woodall’s Trafford memories. She began sharing stories with Lia and her son, Jim Woodall, of her time in the borough.

Capets contributed to the nostalgia.

Lia and Jim sent Capets a photo of their mother — a 1941 portrait of Woodall, then Nancy Piper, wearing a grass skirt in the backyard of her childhood home.

She received the skirt for her 14th birthday from her cousin, Harry J. Piper, who was stationed at the Schofield Barracks on the Hawaiian island Oahu.

Capets’ curiosity spiked.

Old photo reaps new discovery

Upon further research, Capets discovered the historical significance of Woodall’s childhood home on Westmoreland Road. It is the Shaw-Stevenson House, built by Robert J. Stevenson in 1873.

This fit perfectly with Capets’ Trafford 250 Map, a project he started with historical society members Tom Kelly and Steve Perovich in honor of Westmoreland County’s 250th birthday.

The goal was to identify the 250 oldest buildings in the borough.

They found 267.

The three layered several online maps to compare the buildings from Trafford’s foundation in 1904 to those standing today — including the Westmoreland County GIS tool and maps from the Pitt and Penn State library systems.

The buildings are homes, businesses or vacant structures. They range in age from the 1797 John Stewart II and Jane Cavett Homestead to the 101 structures built in 1915.

The findings are marked on a map that is linked on the Trafford Historical Society’s website at traffordhistory.org/lookingback/. Tabs are included on the map for sites that have yet to be researched and notable buildings that no longer exist.

Since it was built before Trafford was founded, Woodall’s home is not included in the 267. But it is identified on the map alongside seven other pre-Trafford buildings that still stand today.

Some of the marks on the map include old and current photos of the buildings.

Some feature stories community members have shared with Capets about the structures, which he posts on the Trafford Historical Society Facebook page.

Church gone — steps, foundation remain

Jim Fike, like Woodall, had a story to share.

A small set of concrete steps and the remaining foundation of a former church lie in his backyard.

Fike has lived on Duquesne Avenue in Trafford since 1974, but he never knew the full history of the partial church structure until he learned about Capets’ project.

“I told Andrew about it — ‘You know, I got steps in my backyard,’ ” Fike said. “And he was so excited, he ran over right away.”

Capets discovered that the foundation and steps once belonged to Methodist Episcopal Church, which was built in 1907. It remained in the building until 1924 when a larger structure was built two blocks away.

Bethel Baptist Church moved into the Duquesne Avenue building the same year. It stayed there until 1947, when the congregation joined with members of Mt. Pleasant Baptist Church on Brinton Avenue to form Mt. Bethel Baptist Church.

With the steps starting to deteriorate, Fike attempted years ago to remove them himself.

“I gave up on that project real quick,” Fike said. “When they built something back then, they built it to stay.”

Whoever buys the house after Fike will “inherit the steps and the foundation,” he said.

For insurance purposes and the safety of his grandchildren, Fike was advised to put a railing on the steps that lead to nowhere.

When he sits on his back porch, he wonders about the people who once climbed the steps on Sunday mornings.

“It’s kind of a nice thought,” he said.

Maps indicate the Duquesne Avenue structure was still standing in 1954, Capets said, but he was unable to determine when the structure was torn down.

“The fun part of it is discovering something for the very first time — not knowing anything about this store, about this business or the family and where they lived in Trafford at the time,” Capets said. “I’m trying to link those little stories to that house.”

Jim Woodall, who enjoys researching his family’s genealogy, mirrored this sentiment.

“Pieces of the puzzle start falling together. It’s a piece here, a piece there. Then, all of a sudden, you’ve got a much fuller story,” said Woodall of Mesa, Ariz. “To me, that 250 project is kind of the gathering of the stories.”

Film sparks childhood memories

Capets’ research continued.

He came across a film of a train traveling through Trafford in 1904, passing Woodall’s former home along the way.

“She always said from the first time her dad had seen that house, he wanted it and eventually got it,” Jim Woodall said. “That view may very well have been the view that he saw that convinced him he wanted the house, because he was a conductor on freight trains in the area.”

Woodall’s parents moved into the Trafford home in 1923. Woodall was born five years later.

When her mother would let the family’s cat inside in the morning, it would race up the stairs to awaken Woodall, Jim said.

Woodall found a stone in the yard that was carved into the shape of a turtle. It became her play toy.

Because her father retired from his railroad job due to contracting tuberculosis, Woodall grew up sharing time and fond memories with her father — his love of gardening, the trees in the yard, fetching worms and waiting for birds to gather.

Woodall’s father died when she was about 9 years old, and her brother, James R. Piper, was killed in a plane crash in Butler County in 1941.

She and her mother lived in the Trafford home until Woodall graduated from high school. The two moved to Washington, D.C., for Woodall’s job with the FBI’s fingerprinting division.

She later worked in the mailroom of the Atomic Energy Commission, where she met her husband, Paul Woodall.

Woodall enjoyed flipping through the pages of the yearbook and watching the Trafford scenery pass by in the train film several times before she died July 28.

She was 95 years old.

Her obituary directs donations to the Trafford Historical Society.

“It just felt like a really appropriate way to amplify (the society) and thank them,” Lia said. “Really, I do feel like Andrew was pivotal in making sure she could hold that book.”