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Strassburger family photographs
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Held at: Wissahickon Valley Historical Society [Contact Us]Whitpain Public School 1895 Building, 799 Skippack Pike, Blue Bell, Pennsylvania, 19422
This is a finding aid. It is a description of archival material held at the Wissahickon Valley Historical Society. Unless otherwise noted, the materials described below are physically available in their reading room, and not digitally available through the web.
Overview and metadata sections
Ralph Beaver Strassburger (1883-1959) was a prominent businessman born in Norristown, Pennsylvania. A graduate of the United States Naval Academy, he entered the Navy as a young man, and later entered the diplomatic service during World War I. He married May Bourne, daughter of the president of the Singer Sewing Machine Company, in 1911. He likely used his father-in-law's wedding gift to purchase the property Normandy Farm in Gwynedd Valley, Pennsylvania, which he named after his French honeymoon destination.
In 1921 Strassburger entered the newspaper business, combining two local papers into the Norristown Time Herald. An avid historian and genealogist, he published his family history in 1922, and a book on Pennsylvania German Pioneers in 1934. Strassburger was also well known as a Thoroughbred racehorse owner and breeder. After his death in 1959, Normandy Farm remained in his family until 1994.
Bibliography:
Normandy Farm Hotel and Conference Center. "History." Accessed December 12, 2011. http://www.normandyfarm.com/history.asp
Strassburger, Ralph Beaver. The Strassburger Family and Allied Families of Pennsylvania. Gwynedd Valley, Pa.: Private publication, 1922. Accessed December 12, 2011. http://www.archive.org/details/strassburgerfami00instra
The bulk of this collection is photographs of the Strassburger family and Normandy Farm estate (interior and exterior), circa 1880-1940. It also contains one letter from 1863, one postcard from 1932, and an auction catalog and history of Normandy Farm from 1994.
Gift from Old York Road Historical Society, September 1996.
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Subject
Place
- Publisher
- Wissahickon Valley Historical Society
- Finding Aid Author
- Finding aid prepared by Celia Caust-Ellenbogen and Michael Gubicza through the Historical Society of Pennsylvania's Hidden Collections Initiative for Pennsylvania Small Archival Repositories
- Sponsor
- This preliminary finding aid was created as part of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania's Hidden Collections Initiative for Pennsylvania Small Archival Repositories. The HCI-PSAR project was made possible by a grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
- Access Restrictions
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Contact Wissahickon Valley Historical Society for information about accessing this collection.