Mark Holtsberry holds up his recently published book about the World War I Veterans.
It’s been over 10 years of long hard work trying to dig up the past. Some may say that is not good but Mark Holtsberry thinks otherwise. You see, Mark is in love with history. With his occupation at one time being a history teacher, he understands the amount of work and time that it takes to make a properly researched book.
This new book titled, “Paulding County in the Great War”, is 769 pages is strictly about the veterans of Paulding County of World War I. No, that is not a typo. The book documents the veterans of the war that took place 100 years ago takes many writings, pictures, government papers, newspaper clippings and other memorabilia and combines them into this book.
There are approximately 1300 documented soldiers including 8 women and they all are from Paulding County, Ohio.
Mark stated, “This was many years of documented research and the backbone of this book started with a list of WW I veterans originally published in the Paulding Republican newspaper.” Mark visited libraries from all over Ohio to collect the data after looking at the microfilm. He also visited many cemeteries, and not just in Ohio. Some of these cemeteries looked like they went on for miles. He went just to ensure the accuracy of information he had was on the right person.
Holtsberry’s go to guy was his uncle, Ray Keck, who had the Military Veterans book. Mr. Keck recently passed away but he was a veteran of World War II and he knew many of the men who served in the first war.
Mark also found useful information from the Paulding County Recorder’s Office because they still had the discharge papers for the men and much of it had recorded personal and physical details.
Mark knows this may not be on the list of top sellers but it is a top book in ways that may not be counted for by volume alone. There were 50 books made in this initial print run.
If you would like more information or a copy of this title, call Mark at 419-399-2703.
