by Ken Lahmers
Editor
Aurora -- City Councilman-at-Large and retired Aurora High School teacher John Kudley knew compiling a history of Aurora wouldn't be an easy task.
He said he anticipated the project to take three years.
He's already done hordes of research in the past two years, and he expects it will be another year before his book is published, so he's right on schedule.
Kudley is writing the book as a sequel to the historical society's "Aurora: From the Founding to the Flood," written by Carol Bowman and Dick Fetzer. It covered the town's history from 1799 to 1913.
That historical publication came out during Aurora's bicentennial year of 1999. Kudley's book will focus on history from 1913 to the decade of the 1970s.
"I've laid out some topic areas, and I figure the book will contain about 12 chapters," said Kudley. "Each chapter probably will focus on a topic or a decade."
Kudley said he thought when he retired from AHS around the end of 2006 that he'd have plenty of time to work on the book, but that hasn't been the case.
"I've really been busy since my retirement," he noted. "I'm a substitute teacher, supervisor of some University of Akron student teachers, track coach, facilities manager for school sporting events and Councilman."
HE'S ALSO writing the Aurora chapter for an updated Portage County history book, and a bicentennial (2009) history of the Church in Aurora.
"As a longtime educator, I looked forward to doing some writing after I retired, but I'm doing more than I expected," he said, adding it's exciting to get his name in print, especially on a book that will be around "long after I'm gone."
Kudley said he has conducted several interviews with some of Aurora's longtime residents such as Liz Strahan, Ric Mattmuller, Robert Harris Sr. and fellow Councilman Jim Vaca.
He said he plans to write about the three sections of town -- the center district, the train station district and the Geauga Lake area -- plus Geauga Lake Park.
One of his topics will be the period when Aurora was moving toward becoming a city in the early 1970s, where he will focus on the problems encountered with that transition.
He also plans to write about Aurora men who served in World War I such as Claire Eggleton, who was the first to enlist and later was killed in that war.
The recently chartered Aurora American Legion Post is named after Eggleston.
What transpired on the homefront during World War II also will be covered, and Kudley said he obtained a lot of WW II information from George Hettinger, his father-in-law.
THE TOWN'S sesquicentennial in 1949 will be covered. Details about Aurora's schools, sports and the day former President Richard M. Nixon passed through town during his re-election campaign in 1972 also will be included.
Kudley said he plans to include a chapter called "Challenging Valves and Beliefs," which focuses on the area's Ku Klux Klan connection, local attitudes toward ethnic groups and the civil rights movement.
He said he might include information about some of the city's churches, as well as some of its earlier subdivisions such as Walden and Four Seasons.
According to Kudley, he has most of his research of the 1920s to 1940s completed, and is now focusing on the '50s to '70s.
Although Kudley has talked to many residents, he said it has been a struggle to get people to sit down and talk.
In addition to interviews and historical society documents, he said he's found the Aurora Advocate, Record-Courier and Chagrin Falls Exponent to be good sources of information.
Kudley said he still is willing to hear residents' stories relating to Aurora history, and welcomes contributions of old photos for possible use in the book.
Anyone with information to share can contact him at 330-562-9430 or johnkudleyjr@msn.com.
E-mail:
klahmers@recordpub.com
Phone: 330-688-0088 ext. 3155