The Harrisonburg Rockingham Historical Society

The Rockingham County Historical Society was organized in 1898, when a commission of Captain Frank A. Byerly, Major George Chrisman, and James B. Stephenson drafted a constitution and bylaws for the new organization. Its first president was Colonel John E. Roller (shown at left). Meetings were held in a room in the county courthouse and several committees were established, among them one for a library and another for Confederate soldiers.

During the 1930's the Historical Society was reestablished largely through the efforts of Peter Cline "PC" Kaylor and George Warren Chappelear, the latter a professor at Madison College. Preservation of courthouse records was especially important to this group and in 1939 under the auspices of the County Board of Supervisors, the Historical Society published Abstracts of Land Grants Surveys 1761-1791 compiled by Mr. Kaylor with the assistance of Professor Chappelear. The activity of this group soon came to an end, perhaps as a result of dislocations brought about by the second World War.

The present Rockingham County Historical Society began on April 1, 1944. Although it can be considered a revival of the two earlier organizations, a new constitution was drawn up naming the Society, stating its purposes, and providing for officers, committees, and an honorary advisory board. The primary purposes of this organization according to its constitution are "to collect and preserve diaries, letters, old account books, family records, tombstone inscriptions, pictures, old newspapers and other periodicals of historical value," and " to publish from time to time such materials sought after by libraries, school and colleges, historical societies and individuals doing research work in history, biography, or genealogy and to erect monuments, markers, and other memorials." Most instrumental in this revival were Joseph K. Ruebush, Harry A. Brunk, Noah K. Showalter, W. A. Mowbray, C. E. Lokey, and Flavia A. Converse, but the guiding spirit for this organization was the historian John W. Wayland. Under the chairmanship of its Publication committee, the Historical Society began to publish the Rockingham Recorder, a journal that provided an outlet for local historians to publicize their research. The first issue appeared in April 1945 and the publication continued regularly until June 1961.

With the death of Wayland in 1962, the Rockingham Recorder ceased to be published and the Society itself fell into a brief period of inactivity. In the late 1960a, however, a renewed interest in the society developed. A set of by-laws was instituted to strengthen its organization and Robert J. Sullivan was elected President. In 1968 the Society acquired the Stonewall Jackson Electric Map and Museum from the defunct Civil War Roundtable and a museum grew up around the electric map in the municipal building in downtown Harrisonburg (present location of the Quilt Museum). When the Cromer-Trumbo house in Dayton was given to the Society by the estate of Shannon Trumbo, the Historical Society moved and later built a new facility on the land, which was expanded in 2000. The site in Dayton now features a genealogy library , bookstore and museum shop, auditorium, both permanent and temporary exhibit space, the Electric Map, as well as ample archive and conservation storage space.

Shown above: General John Edwin Roller was established as the first president of the historical society in 1898. Born in 1844, he touched nearly every part of life in the valley in the late nineteenth century. At the beginning of the Civil War he attached himself to a unit and served until the end of the war. He graduated from Virginia Military Institute and the University of Virginia and practiced law in Rockingham County. Later in his career he was appointed by the Governor of Virginia to the rank of General in the Virginia Militia. Our new exhibit hall is named in his honor.