About This Collection
Born in 1840 in Salisbury, Somerset County, photographer, author and Civil War veteran William Henry Welfley would earn a reputation as "the county's historian." Serving 19 terms as burgess of Somerset, the county seat, he carried on in this position even after growing deaf. As noted in his Meyersdale Republican newspaper obituary, the scrapbooks Welfley kept over the years were believed to be the most valuable volumes in his extensive library. Upon leaving his uptown Somerset apartment for the final time, he was said to have looked upon these books and quietly remarked, "Farewell old friends; I may never see you again." On the initial page of the first scrapbook contained within this collection, Welfley notes in January of 1895: "The writer of these lines in preserving the cuttings has been impressed with the belief that in years yet to come many of these cuttings will have a value of their own, and that there will be those who may be much pleased that they have been preserved." William H. Welfley passed away in 1920, just16 days shy of his 80th birthday. Holding ten of the notable historian's obituary scrapbooks within its Pennsylvania Room collections, the Meyersdale Public Library has digitized these scrapbooks in the hope today's historians will indeed be much pleased they have not only been preserved, but shared with as many researchers as possible.
