Bio: Kenyon, Dolores (Mohr) - Making History by Transcribing History

Contact: Lori Johnson  - heart_of_hixton@yahoo.com

Surnames: Kenyon, Mohr, Novak, Schwarze, Johnson

----Source: Tribute Written by Lori Johnson

Making History by Transcribing History

At five feet and a bit, Dolores (Mohr) Novak Kenyon may be small in stature but she packs a wallop when it comes to her enthusiasm for genealogy and local history. This born and bred Neillsville lady’s passion, in a roundabout way, led to her becoming a major transcribing volunteer for the Clark County, Wisconsin History website. It is safe to say that if you check out www.wiclarkcountyhistory.org  there is a great certainty that you will come across items she has transcribed. When there are over 45,000 items that list her name as transcriber, it would be hard not to!

Yes, you read it correctly. Dolores has been responsible for transcribing an estimated over 45,000 items for the website since she started in 2003. Thanks to the joys of the Internet, her work has followed her from the State of Washington when she typed her first transcription, to her current home in Black River Falls, WI where she moved in 2012. Not only does she keep up with transcribing items from newspapers such as The Clark County Press and The Thorp Courier every week; she also has gone back and transcribed items from way back as far as 1937, moving forward and now working her way into 1974, from the Clark County Press. She also reads the Banner Journal for obituaries that might pertain to people with Clark County connections. The items she transcribes have included anniversaries, biographies, births, marriages, histories, obituaries, church items, school news, reunions--many of which often involving scanning and attaching of pictures. She then forwards them to the webmaster who posts them on the website. A favorite weekly project is transcribing the Good Old Days section. A bonus for her--coming across any information about the Highground has a close place in her heart as her second husband, sons, sons-in-law, step-sons, step-grandsons and step great-grandson, two brothers, a nephew, and two brothers-in-law have all served in the Army, Marines, Navy, National Guard and Coast Guard.

Dolores is one of many volunteers of the website which was started in 2000 as a retirement project for webmasters, Stan and Janet Schwarze, The site has volunteers spread across Wisconsin, including some living in Clark County. It also has volunteers from the Washington, D.C. area, Florida, Illinois, California and Colorado. The one thing they all have in common is they have roots in Clark County. Currently, there are about a dozen volunteers who are active, but over the years there have been nearly 100 involved at one time or another. According to Stan, “Wisconsin has the second best collection in the country of old newspapers on microfilm. We are able to order copies of these via inter-library loan from the Wisconsin State Historical Society in Madison. We make copies and send to them to various volunteers for transcribing. Also, some of the volunteers have been active in helping read and photograph cemetery gravestones in the 75+ cemeteries across the county.”

Stan utilizes the microfiche of old newspapers, to create an image file which saves each page as a PDF. He transmits those documents for transcription to Dolores, via a file sharing service. She then utilizes a split screen on her computer to read from one side, and type into the other. She also transcribes directly from the hard copies of current local papers, that are delivered to her home weekly via the US mail.

The sheer number of items transcribed, and the many years devoted to this volunteer service is truly inspiring from this busy mother, grandmother, great grandmother and award winning Avon Lady. A brain stem stroke she suffered in March of 2014 hasn’t stopped her from enjoying her hobby. While it is quite unusual for most people in their seventies to care to tackle the complexities of the Internet - Dolores has mastered them! And how innovative is this, when you can go to www.wiclarkcountyhistory.org,  (the site popularly known as the one with the bookshelf), click on any number of topics and find what an impact Dolores and other volunteers have made! As any person interested in family history, when you come to an item that gives you clues that leads to information about one of your ancestors, there is no way to describe the elation you feel!

How did such a wonderful run of transcribing start? Says Dolores, “I was just randomly checking things on the Internet looking for some information for a friend and happened on the website. It said they needed volunteers, so I checked into it. It’s been many years since I’ve lived in rural Neillsville in Clark County, so this was a way to keep connected with my birthplace. It’s fun and I have found out many interesting things each time I sit down to transcribe. It was just the “type” of hobby that appealed to me. And it is so great to meet up with people who, when you mention the website say ‘I have been there and it is a wonderful source of information.’ I have met the webmasters Stan and Janet Schwarze of Rochester, MN, who are natives of Clark Co. also. We work well together.”

Stan Schwarze agrees. “Dolores has worked long and hard over the years as one of our great volunteers. She started working on the website back when she still lived in the State of Washington, but I guess working all the Clark County historical stuff, was part of what drew her heart back to Wisconsin,” in addition to being closer to her family.

Added Janet Schwarze, “Dolores has a wonderful eye for proof-reading. She has also been an extremely prolific transcriber with wonderful work ethics. We feel very blessed to have had the opportunity to work with her over the years. We do indeed appreciate all who have contributed to the site‘s success, whether it be volunteers like Dolores with her transcribing, people who use the website and give us so much positive feedback, or those who have sent in tax deductible donations to our non-profit website.

Janet continued by saying, “We are very pleased that the site has won the Governor’s Archive award and has been the most visited history and genealogy site in the State of Wisconsin. Folks are constantly writing to tell us how happy they are when they find little known information about their family. Both Dolores and her mother. Luella Mohr, (prior to her death) have taken Clark County visitors under their wing and gave them personalized tours.”

One of the perks Dolores found while volunteering is some of her own family questions have been answered, thanks to the website. She has recently discovered that she has family in Germany near where her grandmother's home place was. Searching for relatives, distant cousins’ obituaries in Clark County who also were distant cousins of her grandmother, they found her name as the transcriber. Letters and information have been exchanged and family members connected, an unexpected pleasure which would not have happened without her work on the website. A fitting reward for her dedication, don‘t you think?

Not only has Dolores run into genealogy information, she has also run into news items about her family from years ago, such as this one. According to the write up “In the year of 1954 a dairy cow named “Molly” had the misfortune of falling into an abandoned well. The cow belonged to her parents, Albert and Luella Mohr, who farmed in the Town of Pine Valley. How to get the cow out of the well?…. Zilk’s Garage, which was located on the corner of Division and Hewett Streets in Neillsville, owned a large wrecker and they were called to the Mohr farm. After some organizing, help of friends and the wrecker assistance, Molly was hoisted out. As an included picture showed, with Luella and Albert pulling at her head, two friends helping at the other end, Molly was gotten up on her feet. Other than some bruises and scrapes she was fine and able to join the rest of the cow herd.” Nice to have a happy ending to the story.

The work Dolores takes such delight in doing is aiding not only people in Clark County but interested parties from all over the USA and indeed the world. It’s awesome to think that generations to come will see Dolores’s work and have it be a key to linking the past, present and future! The many hours Dolores puts in on this worthwhile project currently, added to the years she has already devoted, is truly an inspiration to everyone who contributes to and visits this website. She may be transcribing historical documents, but by doing so she is becoming an important piece of history herself as well. And Dolores is not planning on slowing down any time soon!