Members of the have decided to disband after 50 years of providing the Northampton County community with details about its rich legacy, events and people.
Formed before America’s Bicentennial celebration in 1976, the historical society’s president, Jim Martin, said membership is aging and dwindling.
With the board dissolving, Williams Township will be taking on the task of planning for the nation’s 250th anniversary. Supervisors in May unanimously passed a resolution to create a historical society committee at the society’s behest, according to Martin and Melody Ernst, township manager.
“We want to make it part of America 250th,” said Martin, who moved to Williams about 10 years ago. Keeping the society’s records about the township will give people a view of the work that includes updating the community’s last 50 years, he said.
The historical material is being added to , which is in the process of being redone, Ernst said.
Origins of the historical society
Fifty years ago, the township created a bicentennial committee, and its original members collaborated on a 128-page “Bicentennial History of Williams Township.”
“We have tried to capture the history and heritage of Williams Township as reflected in its early Indian inhabitants, its roads, schools, and churches, its contributions to the Revolutionary War, its postal system and commerce,” the authors wrote in the preface.
From that effort, the volunteer members decided there was more history to uncover, Martin said. They formed the historical society, and its work included researching, writing and publishing more books, printing a regular newsletter called The Pastfinder and producing an historical driving tour featuring nearly four dozen homes.
Linda Heindel of Nazareth and her late husband, Ned Heindel, helped found the historical group. They and others worked on cataloging the township history, including its folklore and old homes, barns, churches and one-room schools. Many date back to the 1700s and 1800s, and are still standing.
People drive by such old buildings and don’t realize each one has a history, Martin said.
While Linda Heindel has been editor of The Pastfinder, Ned Heindel, a Lehigh University chemistry professor who died in 2023, had been the historian behind it. Five years ago, the couple, who moved to Williams Township in the mid-1960s, to be preserved for public use as the Hexenkopf Ridge Preserve.
Founded in 1750, two years before the county and 16 years prior to the reading of the Declaration of Independence, Williams Township is home to four structures on the National Register of Historic Places: Coffeetown Grist Mill, Isaac Stout House, Jacob Arndt House and Camelback Stone Arch Bridge.
The group officially ended its five-decade run Sunday afternoon, with a program by Historic Easton Cemetery volunteer Kay Wolff at St. John’s Church on Morgan Hill — another venerable name in an old, unincorporated portion of Williams.
Contact Morning Call reporter Anthony Salamone at asalamone@mcall.com.
