West Pasco Historical Society

Because most of our museum volunteers and many of our patrons are elderly and thus more vulnerable to the coronavirus, the WPHS board has decided to close the museum temporarily. We look forward to reopening and will notify you when we do, both on our web site and Facebook page.

Elizabeth (Lisa) Durrell, who lives in Maine, was a visitor to the museum on March 6, 2020. She is the granddaughter of Hugh K. Moore, a noted chemist who lived in the Becker-Moore home at 5525 Bamboo Lane in the 1930s. It is the pink home that is probably seen more often from across the river on Grand Boulevard. She brought some old photos of the home which she allowed us to scan.

A view inside the home in the 1930s.

A visitor to the museum on March 1, 2020, was Lois (Coast) Barga Burney. She is a daughter of Lee and Helen Coast, who ran the Texaco station on the corner of Main Street and what is now called Grand Boulevard in New Port Richey. She donated a Gulf High School yearbook and an interesting old photograph to the museum. Lois was married to Ben Barga (son of Verbie) and in 1980 she married Butch Burney. She recalled that her parents turned off the traffic light by the Texaco Station each night at 8 p.m. when the station closed. It was the only traffic light in town.

Brian Corley, Pasco County Supervisor of Elections, was the main guest speaker for the historical society on Feb. 29, 2020. He talked about maintaining civility in campaigning and elections. He was accompanied by Kelly Smith, vice chair of the Pasco Democratic Party, and Anne A. Corona, President of the West Pasco Republican Club. Their pictures are in the comments.

Kelly Smith.

Anne A. Corona.

Among the visitors to the museum on Feb. 22, 2020, were Shannon and Matthew Buzbee and their granddaughter Reece, of Branford, Florida.

Shannon’s great grandmother, Sweetie (Witt) Johnson, was a student at the Seven Springs school that is now our museum. The school had been inadvertently built on property owned by Sweetie’s father, Henry S. Witt, and his wife Annie Jane Frierson. Annie’s brother Ed Frierson lived in the home for many years with his wife Willie Maude Frierson.

Matthew’s grandfather, Rev. Elmer Buzbee, was the pastor of Anclote Baptist Church in 1951 when the church attempted a merger with Elfers Baptist Church.

The WPHS did a history presentation for New Port Richey Main Street on Feb. 11, 2020, at the Richey Suncoast Theatre. Pictured is Bob Langford, one of our presenters.

The unholy three from the West Pasco Historical Society — Brian Schmit, Jeff Miller, and Bob Langford — will do a presentation at the Richey Suncoast Theatre today (Feb. 11) during a “lunch and learn” from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. It may be too late to order lunch, but admission without lunch is free. This presentation will be different from previous ones, as each of the three will show 10 of his favorite old local photos and talk about them. We hope to see you there!

Visitors to the museum on Feb. 8, 2020, included Maxine and John Stewart. They are honoring the Seminole native Americans with the jacket that John is wearing and Maxine created. They are standing beside our model, who is also wearing a Seminole patchwork jacket. Seminoles are thought to have lived in our area, but before this type of clothing was in use.

Brian Schmit, the museum curator, easy to pick out in the picture, met with most of our greeters at the museum today, so we took a picture. Our greeters are all volunteers and you are likely to see two of them when you visit the museum. They are, left to right: Bette Conde, Cheryl Sallah, Jean Becotte, Trishia Rich, Kathy Nerad, June Pearson, Gail Lovejoy, Sheila Fecenko, and Dana Jo Russ. A larger version of this photo is on Flickr here.