The Lancaster County Drug Task Force searched an East Lampeter Township home, a store garage in Columbia, and two vehicles belonging to 46-year-old Waldo V. Shepard.
Doc Hinkle’s Egg Painting!
Celebrate a tradition that goes back 125 years!
Sunday, March 18, 2018 1-3 PM
Doc Hinkle’s Egg Dye is 125 years old! Celebrate Columbia’s eggcellent history by decorating your eggs with Doc Hinkle’s egg dye. This tradition goes back to 1893 when Samuel Hinkle developed Doc Hinkle’s egg dye in his pharmacy here in Columbia. This traditional egg dye is painted on, rather than being dipped, allowing for each egg to be uniquely decorated and allows for more creative expression and fun!
Join us at Columbia Crossing to decorate 3 eggs for $2. All supplies, materials, snacks and drinks included.
Register by March 14 by calling 717-449-5607 or emailing info@columbiacrossing.org
Columbia Crossing River Trails Center 41 Walnut Street Columbia, PA
http://www.susquehannaheritage.org/event/doc-hinkles-egg-painting/
Columbia Spy reported on this story last week HERE and HERE.
Chris Raudabaugh needed more space for his printing operation, and he found it in Columbia. He bought the building at 131 Locust Street where S & G Printing once operated, and ended up with a double bonus: a piece of Columbia history and a connection to the Underground Railroad.
Raudabaugh, a printer by trade, bought the building last year and moved his operation, presses and all, over the July 4th weekend. He was up and running the following Monday. Unfortunately, there were a few snags along the way – a leaky roof and a lightning strike that blew off bricks on the Bank Avenue side of the building last August. A new roof was installed and repairs were made, and Raudabaugh continued turning out all manner of printed products on an array of letterpress, offset, and digital printing machines from his shop, Art Printing.
Raudabaugh says the business began in 1922 in a shop on King Street in Lancaster, near Ganse Apothecary, but moved to “Cabbage Hill” in 1972. After a few decades there, however, the area became something of a bad fit, because it was a changing residential neighborhood. In search of a suitable venue, he decided on the move to Columbia and found the larger building here afforded him a lot more space (more than 10,000 square feet). “I treasure this place,” he said.
Raudabaugh began his tenure at Art Printing in 2001. At the time, the former owner, Ed Kirchner, wasn’t hiring, but Raudabaugh explained why he was indispensable and persuaded Kirchner to give him a shot. Four years later, Raudabaugh owned the business.
“I’m just one of a long line of employees who stepped up and bought this company,” Raudabaugh says. “Nobody from the outside has ever stepped up and bought Art Printing. It’s always been somebody from within.”
Raudabaugh knew he was going to be a printer from an early age. He calls himself a “Donnelley orphan,” because his parents worked the swing shift at the Donnelley Printing Company. He studied graphic arts at vo-tech and started his career at Brenneman Printing in the Greenfield Industrial Park right out of high school.
“Printing’s kind of always been in my blood,” he explains. He then worked his way up through the trade, learning a variety of skills at various print shops.
Raudabaugh considers himself a bit of a bridge between old and new; he can operate older letterpress machines, and is even able to make his own lead type on a Ludlow machine. But he’s also adept at offset printing and more recently digital printing, now considered state of the art. Letterpress is making something of a comeback, he says, because of the textured impressions the process makes on paper, an effect that can’t be achieved with digital printing. Letterpress jobs are usually requested for special occasions such as wedding invitations and the like, although most demand is for digital. “Printing has come a long way,” Raudabaugh says of digital operations. “Things have changed a lot since I started printing.”
Currently, Art Printing has six people on staff including Raudabaugh, and wife Amy, who handles the paperwork from the in-home office in Pequea. The operation also boasts a graphic designer, Roz, and several other printers. With a turnaround time of five days, the business can produce business forms, note cards, door hangers, tickets, newsletters, posters up to 12” x 18” and even reproductions of paintings, as well as other items. “We can do anything on paper,” Raudabaugh says, adding that the business even has a complete bindery operation.
Raudabaugh says he loves the history of the building. He explains that part of the building, at the main entrance, was a bank. During the Civil War, a meeting of Union Army officers once took place there. Another part was a flour and feed mill in the 19th century, evidenced by artifacts still in the basement: mill stones, wooden supports, large metal gears, and pieces of grain. On the Locust Street side of the basement, a brick archway – now blocked up – appears to be the entrance to a tunnel leading under the street. There is a small opening on the upper right section of the archway. Local historians believe that the tunnel is one of a network of tunnels under Columbia once used to hide and transport slaves in the 19th century as part of the Underground Railroad.
Work needs to be done to the second and third floors, Raudabaugh admits, but says he feels blessed to have the building and is considering future possibilities: maybe a regular ghost tour or a second floor antique shop. He’s also planning for the business’s 100th anniversary in four years, but for now is happy to be in his new location near the river. He says the walk-in traffic here has been “awesome” and includes business customers and individuals. “We’d like to see people in Columbia use us. We’re here. We’re part of this community now,” he says.
Columbia Spy 