This is the second of an eight-part series profiling the 2016 Outstanding Women of Clinton County. Tickets for the luncheon event — to be held at 11:30 a.m. Saturday, March 5 at the Roberts Centre — are $25 (cash or check accepted; make check payable to “OWCC”). Reservations can be made at the Wilmington News Journal, 761 S. Nelson Ave., Wilmington, OH 45177. The News Journal’s office hours are 8 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Friday. If you have any questions, please call 937-382-2574. Reservations will be accepted through March 1. Julie Isphording will be the guest speaker. Julie ran the first ever women’s Olympic Marathon in 1984; she is an award-winning syndicated radio host, national keynote speaker and magazine columnist.
Human records are among our greatest treasures. But too often they are fragile, and easily lost.
No one appreciates this fact more than an inductee to the Outstanding Women of Clinton County class of 2016 who has dedicated herself to the preservation of ancestral information for all who wish — not only to study their own Clinton County roots, but to know more about the deep history of this county, its founders, its traditions, and its families.
While Susan Gregory Henry’s volunteer spirit has served her community in countless ways, she is best known for her devotion to the Clinton County Genealogical Library. According to nominator Maribeth Bevis, her “true passion lies in her commitment to the preservation of the history of Clinton County for future generations.”
A native of Clinton County, Henry resides on her husband’s five-generation farm near Sabina. Her library work began while still a student at Wilmington High School, shelving books at the Wilmington Public Library for 65 cents an hour. Much later, during a period when the library was drastically understaffed, she performed the same service for free. As a mother of two small children, she willingly volunteered at both Smith Place and Denver Place Schools from 1975 through 1980. In 1993, she opened a quilt shop called “In Stitches” in downtown Wilmington, which she managed for the next six years.
Henry started as a volunteer at the Clinton County Genealogical Library in 2004. Since 2008, she has served as chief librarian of that facility and editor of its quarterly newsletter. In 2011, she was honored as Genealogist of the Year. One of her more recent efforts has been to direct a project to copy, preserve, and index a large quantity of extremely fragile newspaper obituaries. She also assists a similar effort to preserve old probate papers for the Clinton County Records Center.
After painstakingly transcribing the notes of her late cousin, Louis V. Lieurance, Henry published The Golden Years of New Antioch, which provides a unique account of life there in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. She has transcribed many other books for the Genealogical Library, and has also helped update cemetery records for both Sugar Grove and New Antioch Cemeteries.
Henry is herself a proud member of a several Clinton County lineage societies, including First Families, Civil War Families, Settlers and Builders, DAR George Clinton Chapter (for which she was regent from 2009-2012), and Colonial Dames XVII Century Indian Trails Chapter. Presently a Diaconate in the First Christian Church of Wilmington, she is president of Christian Women’s Ministries and secretary of Church Women United. In addition to continuing poll work and volunteering at the Murphy Theatre, her other activities include P.E.O. Sisterhood (twice president of the local chapter), Conversation Club (past president), Outstanding Women of Clinton County (past scribe), Lion’s Club (past secretary of Lions Board), Yani Club (past president), English Club (past secretary and currently vice president), and Ohio Auctioneer Association Auxiliary (past president).
