Remember Fold-Out Paper Maps?

In the "good ol' days," before smartphone digital apps directed us along precise routes to our destinations, we had digital maps we could view using MapQuest or Google Maps or some such web-based system (using our laptops or desktop computers).  Some of us remember the even further-back "gooder ol' days" (apologies for being ungrammatical for the sake of a laugh) when people used paper maps.  You know, the kind that you'd unfold, stare at blankly, then struggle to refold correctly.

"You Are Here .."  Where's That, Now?

Perhaps paper maps have gone the way of the dinosaurs, but they can be valuable historical documents, as they're a snapshot-in-time of the way a place used to look (at least on a map).  There are old streets that may no longer exist or have been renamed.  Routes may have changed, or new highways constructed.  Advertisers place the map in time, too.

The Mooresville Chamber of Commerce produced a paper map that they distributed (ca. 2005) that shows Mooresville, Indiana as it looked then.  There are a few copies floating around, but we've digitized one so you can see it online.  Click the image below.

The reverse side of the paper map shows Morgan County, Indiana.

 

If you have a paper copy of this map, tuck it away safely for your great-great-grandchildren to look at a century from now.  Mooresville will undoubtedly look quite different.  It certainly has changed significantly since a century ago.

 

Digitized Mooresville (Indiana) High School Yearbooks

Click the links below to see digitized vintage Mooresville High School (MHS) yearbooks, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons:

• 1909 Senior Annual
• 1911 ‘Levenite
• 1914 The Argos
• 1917 The ’17 Packet
• 1920 The Cauldron
• 1923 White Lick Review
• 1925 White Lick Review
• 1930 Arch Wisdom

The Wikimedia scans are of the images that appear in the yearbooks, with original text from the yearbooks extracted from the original scans and typed out (like ordinary text) for easier reading.

These yearbooks were also digitally scanned (showing the entire pages as they originally appeared in print) and stored on the Mooresville High School Alumni Association Facebook page, but access might be restricted to their authorized FB group members.  You can check those links, too, to see if you can access them (click below):

MHS Alumni Association Facebook Page Links to Digitized Yearbooks:

• 1909 Senior Annual
• 1911 ‘Levenite
• 1914 The Argos
• 1917 The ’17 Packet
• 1920 The Cauldron
• 1923 White Lick Review
• 1925 White Lick Review
• 1930 Arch Wisdom

More recent digitized MHS yearbooks, called Wagon Trails, are also available (click links below), courtesy of OCI Digital Imaging Service and Mooresville Public Library.  (NOTE:  For yearbooks 1950 or later, to search for a name or word within a yearbook, you should download it and open it using Firefox, Google Chrome, Adobe Acrobat, SumatraPDF, or another PDF reader software; then use the “find” search function to look for the desired name or word, and it should take you to the place(s) in the yearbook where those terms are found.)

 

Click here to see the digitized yearbooks on the Mooresville Public Library website.

Digitized Mooresville High School Vintage Yearbooks

Thanks to the Mooresville High School Alumni Association, we now have digitized copies of vintage Mooresville High School (MHS) yearbooks available online. Click the image below to visit our local history links page to find links to the yearbooks.

MHS Digitized Yearbooks Available Online

If your family hails from around these parts, maybe you'll see your great-grandparents (or other relatives) in these photos.

Early MHS yearbooks were not called Wagon Trails, as they have been known since 1946. Titles included Senior Annual (1909), 'Levenite (1911), The Argos (1914), The '17 Packet (1917), The Cauldron (1920), White Lick Review (1923, 1925), and Arch Wisdom (1930).

Many thanks to the MHS Alumni Association for preserving these invaluable historical resources.