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New Resource for Alleghany, Ashe and Grayson Counties

Aunt Emma Jean
Emma Jean

Imaging Specialists is working on a new resource for our area. Emma Jean’s Blue Ridge Almanac will feature information for Alleghany and Ashe Counties in North Carolina and Grayson County, Virginia.

The almanac will be packed with calendar info, area services, humor, advice and lots more! This new resource will also include affordable ad space for area merchants and a reasonable selling price!

For more information on ad pricing or sales, to submit recipes or questions for Emma Jean or to just contact us, go to www.emmajeansalmanac.com.

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1st Annual Alleghany Empty Bowls Event

Imaging Specialists was fortunate to be able to assist Alleghany Ministerium’s Solid Rock Food Closet with their 1st annual Empty Bowls event taking place April 16, 2010 at Village Park in Sparta.

We printed Announcement Letters, Event Admission Tickets, Flyers, Posters, and Raffle Tickets. We also created a web page for the event. The Raffle Tickets were for an original pottery piece by Alleghany Artist Bet Mangum, in whose honor the event will be held. We shot photos of the pottery and printed them onto the tickets and flyers and added them to the website.

Continue reading 1st Annual Alleghany Empty Bowls Event

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Alleghany Historical Society Newsletter

We are getting ready to go to press with the latest (March 2010) Alleghany Historical – Genealogical Society, Inc. newsletter. A large section of the newsletter focuses on the 75th anniversary of the Blue Ridge Parkway.

Alleghany County is proud to celebrate this anniversary because of our close relationship with it. A few notable ties are:

  1. Work was begun on the Parkway at Cumberland Knob, Alleghany County, N.C. September 11, 1935.
  2. Midpoint of the Parkway is in Alleghany County near Mahogany Rock Overlook, elevation 3436′, mile marker 235 of 469 total miles. (Mahogany Rock is also a popular hawk watching site.)
  3. First section of Parkway to be completed and open was 7.641 mile stretch from U.S. Highway 21 to Air Bellows Gap in Alleghany County, N.C.

    Sculpture of Robert Doughton on the Alleghany County Courthouse lawn.
    Sculpture of Robert Doughton on the Alleghany County Courthouse lawn.
  4. Alleghany native, U.S. Representative Bob Doughton sponsored original bill.
  5. Doughton Park in Alleghany & Wilkes Counties is the largest recreational area in the entire park.
  6. The Blue Ridge Parkway is the most visited U.S. National Park.

We’ve also added an article on the 50th anniversary of the monster March 1960 snows and efforts to develop a county historical museum.

Imaging Specialists regularly generates and prints the Newsletter for the Historical Society and several other groups in the area. Contact Claire today for pricing. Call 336-272-3002 or email claire@imagingspecialists.net.

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Alleghany Star Vol. 1, No. 1

ISI recently completed publication of 10,000 copies of a reprint of the original 1889 Alleghany Star Newspaper. We scanned a copy of the newspaper supplied by Sparta Mayor John Miller. The original paper was only 4 pages with few ads.

ISI added 4 more pages of county news stories and 78 period style ads. Advertisers were encouraged to submit ads in the same style as the original 1889 Star pages, without logos. Any logos we received, we regenerated to line illustrations. Though not entirely historically accurate (some clip art was from the 1920’s) the paper contained no photos, colors, or screens. All illustrations were line shot style in black and white.

Publishing the entire paper, from inception to delivery was approximately 2 months. ISI sold all ads, built or rebuilt all (but 3) and got 100% advertiser approval before the print date.

This first fundraiser for the Alleghany County Sesquicentennial put the finance committee in the black before the kickoff at the Mountain Heritage Festival from ad sales alone, as all but one ad was paid for by deadline. Copies are available at 50-cents per copy all around Sparta.

Here are examples of ads we generated: