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This
month’s artifact, used frequently in the Healdsburg Museum research
library, is a Sonoma County voting register, which lists the names,
occupations, addresses and party affiliations of every registered
voter in Sonoma County in 1944. The official register is organized
into supervisory districts and alphabetized by voting precincts. It
was issued by Walter H. Nagle, County Clerk. The cardboard-covered
book measures 8” x 5” and is approximately 2.5 inches thick. |
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The
Museum’s copy originally belonged to Ande Nowlin,
editor of the Sotoyome Scimitar newspaper.
The Scimitar office served as a polling place. The
voting register was donated to Museum founder Ed
Langhart and the Healdsburg City archives in the
early 1960s, probably by Nowlin’s heirs. Langhart
recognized the book’s future research value. He
also collected voter registration indexes for 1892,
1898, 1910, 1922, 1928, 1934, 1944 and 1950. The
voter registrations from the 1890s actually list
physical descriptions of each voter, including
height, weight, hair and eye color. Distinguishing
features, like missing fingers, pock marks or
paralyzed limbs, also had to be described—in the
days before driver’s licenses and photo I.D.
cards--to help identify the registered voter. These
telling details delight genealogical researchers
today.
The 1944 Sonoma County voting
register is currently in fragile condition. The
Healdsburg Museum has just been awarded a Healdsburg
Community Benefits grant from the City of Healdsburg
to film and preserve some of our valuable and
deteriorating early records. The voter registration
documents will be among the first materials we will
select for preservation.
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