Be part of a new pictorial history of Naples businesses!

The Naples Historical Society is creating a pictorial history of Naples businesses in 2021. Prior albums were done by former Town Historian, Bill Vierhile, in 2000 and in 1976. Over the next months, photos of people and their businesses will be taken for an updated photo book.

If you would like your business to be included, contact Cindy Scoda by email at c_rella55@hotmail.com.

After Cindy Scoda and her husband moved to Naples from Victor five years ago, one of the first places she spent time was in the archives at the Naples Historical Society (NHS), following up on stories she had heard about her mother’s best friend’s mother, and aunt and uncle, who lived in Naples in the early 1900s. After retirement, Cindy had also begun researching her family history on Ancestry.com. Her personal connections to the research took her down rabbit holes, and pretty soon she was hooked on local Naples history.

Page from 1976 photo album with photos and hand-written captions by Bill Vierhile.

Cindy is now a Society member and volunteer, and meets with a group on Thursdays at the Morgan Hose Building in the archives. She joins Blanche Warner, Trish Lambiase and Joan Luther, to organize and catalogue ephemera and artifacts about Naples.

While sorting through pieces last summer during the pandemic, Cindy came across “old-school” photo albums of Naples businesses in 1976 & 2000, compiled by Bill Vierhile with snapshots and brief hand-written captions. Looking at the photos, it struck her that the year 2000 was already significantly in the past, and she realized it would be good timing to record modern-day businesses in Naples.

Page from 2000 photo album with photos and hand-written captions by Bill Vierhile.

The project kicked off with announcements on the NHS Facebook page, and Cindy says she has already met with several local businesses, and has also incorporated information from Rotary presentations such as a recent one about Sutton Spoons. Working on this during the pandemic was not as difficult as one might have thought. Some of the businesses she would still like to reach include a few more B&Bs, restaurants, artists and craftspeople, and anyone else who is interested. She estimates there will be close to 100 businesses and service organizations in total to profile for 2021.

Cindy is finding the project to be a good fit for her retirement time. She has always enjoyed photography as a hobby, taking “artsy pictures of flowers” and the outdoors. She calls this “a fair weather project, dependent on nice weather.” Her goal is to get pictures while the sun shines, and then work on putting a book together during the cooler seasons. She is making efforts to be sure she also covers seasonal businesses not open during the summer (such as Hangii’s Tree Farm).

An updated photo book

Cindy hopes to turn the information about Naples businesses into a printed book, perhaps using a service such as Shutterfly, which allows both text and photos to be arranged with ease. One idea is that the book could also become a fundraiser, with copies printed for the public to purchase, depending on interest. It might also be useful information to make available to local tourism groups.

And it will become another invaluable historical document about Naples. Describing her excitement about the project, Cindy says, “Twenty years from now, someone else could be looking at these photos to see what Naples was like.”

If you would like your business to be included, please contact Cindy Scoda by email at c_rella55@hotmail.com. She will get in touch with you to set up a time to visit and take photos. As a newer Neapolitan, Cindy says, “I love getting to meet people and discover all the new things happening in the hills of Naples. And when you talk to people, you can usually always find something in common!”

See more photos from Bill Vierhile’s 1976 & 2000 collections shared on the Naples Historical Society’s Facebook page.