Pictures of the past
JACKSON TWP — When Rita Schoeffel mails out Christmas cards, she offers more than glad tidings.
Fanned out on her sunny kitchen table, an array of cards she has sent over the last 24 years document Schoeffel's original artwork. The reduced replicas of her oil and acrylic paintings also chronicle a rich history of Evans City and nearby townships.
“This is the old Evans City school: That burned down many years ago,” said the 82-year-old Schoeffel, in seventh grade when the building caught fire.
“I could remember it was red brick,” she said, explaining memory and photographs help her rekindle the snowy scenes, many from long ago.Over the years, Schoeffel has painted the Marburger family cutting ice on their pond, the Plains Presbyterian Church, the Evans City railroad station — torn down in the mid-1970s — and the farmhouse at the nearby Ifft turkey farm, where a person reaches to hang a holiday wreath on the door.“I like history very much: You learn a lot of things,” said the retired school librarian, noting she learned the “soft bricks” for the stately white Ifft house were made onsite. As such, they require regular painting to prevent deterioration.Although some paintings help Schoeffel preserve the past, others remind her of all that's been forgotten.In one such scene, a lone figure walks with a dog toward some weathered barns.“Those are the Ramsey barns up here on the corner. Those burned down several years ago,” she said.The scene conveys a peaceful winter day, but Schoeffel can point out the spot where an oil well exploded there in the 1880s.Through her work with the historical society, Schoeffel happened upon a photograph of a memorial service, held for the worker who died in the blast. But her research has turned up no record of the lost worker's name.
In her own life, Schoeffel has found how easily the past goes undocumented, since her own collection of cards is already incomplete. Schoeffel has sometimes given the keepsake copies away when nostalgic friends request extra copies.Some of those friends say they have amassed their own complete collection after saving the cards from year to year.Aleta Giuliani is among them. A distantly related cousin, Giuliani said she has received every card since Schoeffel began duplicating the original creations.“They're all from places you go past all the time,” said Giuliani, citing the old railroad station and a Harmony feed mill among her favorites.“They add a little bit of something special at Christmas,” she said. “It's like a gift coming in the mail. You know one's coming; you just don't know what it's going to be.”Schoeffel said she creates the cards by taking a photograph of the full-size painting, then she prints the image on blank card templates available at many retail stores that offer photo printing.Attesting to the mystery Giuliani described, Schoeffel said she doesn't disclose the subject matter in advance.“People ask ‘What are you doing this year?' I'm not telling,” said Schoeffel, who prints about 100.“You have to wait until you get them in the mail.”
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