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Health & Fitness

But Wait There's More. Household Furnishings and Art Objects of Woodside.

A high quality antique shop could be outfitted with the treasures that were once in daily use in Woodside, Maplewood's link to the past.

That persons of wealth, such as the Rannells Family, builders of Woodside (if you’re new to the subject, please see the previous posts) once owned a wide variety of interesting household goods is not unusual.  What is unusual is that the descendants still preserve many of them.  That many are of high value and the family still clings to them is a testament to the respect they have for their family history.

While researching Woodside, I was fortunate to be allowed access to many of these fine things.  Far away family descendants were kind enough to provide photographs of the items in their care.  There are far too many to include in this forum so I’ve selected a few that I hope you find of interest.

Pay particular attention to the two green vases.  The family believes they were made on the property connected with Woodside.  Indeed the smaller of the two has the word,”Rannells” written on the bottom prior to being fired.

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There exist in the Rannells family papers (last post) documents concerning a clay mining operation owned at least partly by Edward Rannells.  I’m fairly certain that the quarry was west of Laclede Station Road and north of Manchester.

A wide variety of activities occurred on the Rannells farm.  The family papers can shed much light on these.  I straightened many of the papers in my basement throughout the winter of 2005 or 6.  It was overwhelming.  I was relieved when we came up with the idea to donate them to the depository at UMSL.  Since they were folded and bundled I had actually seen only a small percentage of them.

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The Rannells papers have been sorted and cataloged by the staff of the State Historical Society of Missouri Research Center-St. Louis.  Bless them.  The content of the documents is an untapped treasure lode for anyone interested in the history of our community.

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