COMPOSING: use box

Historical collection began in 1985

By NORMA ARDILA
Herald Staff Writer

The Miami Springs Historical Museum, at 45 Curtiss Parkway, on the second floor of John Stadnik's Rexall Pharmacy, is the place.

The concept took shape ``in 1985, when I was recording the meetings of the city's historical board,'' said Mary Ann Taylor, director of the Miami Springs Historical Society, who manages the museum. ``I realized then that no one was collecting historical data.''

So she collected old photographs, newspaper clippings and other related publications and opened the museum later that year.

``I'm very happy that the Miami Springs museum is displaying historical information about Hialeah,'' said Mary Adams, director of the Hialeah Historical Preservation Board.

Her board has been trying to create such a museum for more than a decade, Adams said, but without any luck, local support or funds.

Among the items on display in the museum's five small rooms are newspaper articles about Hialeah's earliest settlers, photographs of the area in the 1920s and pictures of the damage caused by a hurricane in 1947.

Most of the material has been donated by area residents like Evelyn Shull, who has lived in Miami Springs since 1926. She gave the museum a set of old photographs ``because I didn't know who in Hialeah I could leave them to.''