Please ensure Javascript is enabled for purposes of website accessibility
Skip to main content

Thank you for supporting journalism at your local newspaper. This article is available exclusively for our subscribers, who help fund our work at Santa Rosa Press Gazette.


Community

Keeping history alive: The largest known collection of turpentine industry artifacts is tucked into the backyard of a Holley home.

| Staff Reporters

At the end of a dead-end road in Holley, the largest known collection of artifacts from the turpentine industry is kept in a tidy clay-colored building behind Raymond Melvin’s home.

Melvin, whose dad, granddads and great-granddads all trace their roots to the industry, started his collection when he was 22. More than 50 years later, it includes more than 1,000 items ranging from tools and scales to cut trees and cups to hold the sap.

Raymond Melvin, who has the largest known collection of artifacts from the turpentine industry, poses with some of the tools dating back to the early 1900s.

 

The remainder of this article is available only for our website subscribers, who help fund our mission of keeping you updated on news you want and need to know. You can become a subscriber for as little as $5.67 a month.

error: Content is protected !!