OWCC: Snyder honored for lasting legacy to college, county

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Editor’s Note: This is the last of eight stories appearing daily in the News Journal on the members of the 2017 Class of the Outstanding Women of Clinton County.

Christine (Hadley) Snyder was born on an historic Clinton County farm that has become part of the enduring county scene. For her lifelong involvement in preserving the Quaker heritage of Wilmington and Clinton County, and for her eminent service to higher education, she has been nominated to the 2017 class of the Outstanding Women of Clinton County.

Snyder’s ethic of commitment began early in life as an award-winning 4-H member, and continued as a college graduate (and newlywed) in a tour of duty in the Peace Corps in Central America.

With degrees in Science Education, Spanish, and Latin American Affairs, she has taught at Wright State University and has served as a Spanish interpreter not only at the Wright State School of Medicine but at many meetings and conferences in the United States and abroad. She also helped found the Bi-Lingual Communications Committee of the Friends World Committee Consultation, and has been an election observer in Nicaragua.

Her longstanding service to Wilmington College has been exceptional. In two six-year terms on the college Board of Trustees, she was active in the Agriculture, Academic Affairs, and Finance committees — and was, in fact, the first woman to be elected Chair of the Board.

During her tenure, the college completed a major campaign for the renovation and expansion of the Boyd Cultural Arts Center, and her fundraising efforts helped make the college’s Quaker Heritage Center a reality. At the Center’s dedicatory program, she presented “Scenes from Our Quaker Past and Present,” a unique collection of photographs of local Quaker events, both historic and recent, which she had carefully compiled and researched.

She has continued to participate actively in Quaker Center programs, exhibits, and workshops.

Snyder also led fundraising for the installation of the college’s “Who Sends Thee” sculpture, memorializing the 1862 visit of local Quakers to President Lincoln to voice their advocacy of emancipation.

More recently, she served on the three-member committee for the erection of a plaque at the college remembering 14 local men who volunteered to work in war relief efforts during and following World War I.

Following her service as Trustee, she was invited to join the Wilmington College President’s Advisory Council, a position she continues to hold. She has also served as Chair of the Sam Marble Society Council, the advisory group for planned giving to the college.

In her efforts to preserve her 1830-era family farmhouse, Snyder arranged for the house and its wooden threshing barn to be listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The Hadley Farm is now a favorite venue for many local organizations and events, including “Dinner in the Fields” and the Wilmington College Freshman Orientation Dinner. It has truly become a living museum of an early 19th-century Quaker farm, full of family artifacts and valuable genealogical documentation.

Employing sound soil conservation and waterway practices, the 200-acre production farm belongs to Clinton County Open Lands and is one of the stops on the Bicentennial Barn Quilt Tour.

Snyder has also taken a leading role in developing the Quaker Scenic Byway under a grant from the Ohio Department of Transportation — identifying, photographing, and researching local sites of Quaker history in order to plan the route.

A long-term member of the Clinton County History Center, she served as President of the Clinton County Genealogical Society from 2010 to 2013 and regularly volunteers in its library. She has been Presiding Clerk of the Ohio Valley Yearly Meeting and a Trustee of the Quaker Heights Nursing Home.

She is, in addition, a very active member of the Southwest Ohio Returned Peace Corps Organization.

Tickets for the March 4 Outstanding Women of Clinton County luncheon at 11:30 a.m. at the Roberts Centre are $25 (cash or check accepted). Reservations can be made at the Wilmington News Journal, 761 S. Nelson Ave., Wilmington, OH 45177. The News Journal’s office hours are 8 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Friday. If you have any questions, please call 937-382-2574. Reservations will be accepted through March 1.

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