These books in the parlor of the Senator Walter Lowrie House were owned by the Sullivan family and were recently taken out of storage for the staging of the parlor. The family members' names are written in some of the books.

Like many others during pandemic shutdown, members of the Butler County Historical Society used their free time to clean house.

The results will be available for inspection when the group's Senator Walter Lowrie House, 123 W. Diamond St., reopens to the public Aug. 22.

Jennifer Ford, the executive director of the historical society, said she and Sara Donaldson, the society's collections manager, used the time since the COVID-19 pandemic closed the Lowrie House in mid-March to go through boxes of stored material.

“We got more done in six months than we expected to be able to do in the next year and a half,” said Ford.

What she and Donaldson found were the belongings of the Sullivan family, whose members lived in the house from 1839 to 1959 when the house was closed up.

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