In the mid-eighteen fifties a small red-haired street urchin in
       Patterson, New Jersey, frequently gazed into the display window 
       of a pastry shop and yearned for one of the delectable goodies.
       One day he had a dime and with great expectation went into the 
       shop and sat on a stool at the counter. The proprietor promptly
       swung at the boy and knocked him off the stool. That little waif
       was my grandfather, John A. McCollom, Sr. ("Red-haired street
       urchin" was my grandfather's own description of himself.)
         Some years later in his youth, John got a job with the Pioneer
       Silk Ribbon Mafg. Co. Paterson was the capital of the silk ribbon
       industry. He rose to become president of Pioneer, was elected
       president of the National Silk Manufacturers Association, and in 
       1886 moved to Allentown, Pennsylvania, to start his own business.
       It prospered until, in the late 20's, the United Textile Corporation
       consisted of nine silk ribbon mills. He was also a Shakespearean
       actor.
         My father, John A. McCollom, Jr., was general manaqer of the silk
       mills. A few years after my grandfather's death, the business failed
       because the crash of '29 coincided with the change in women's styles.
       Women bobbed their hair and no longer wore the profuse ribbons on 
       their hats and dresses.
         My father combined two different lives, in addition to being an
       industrialist, he was also an actor, director, and playwright of
       quite some renown. He studied play writing with Cecil B. DeMille's
       mother. He was frequently called to New York to work with David
       Warfield and David Belasco, the two geniuses of the theatre in their
       time. He directed Josseph Cotton in Joseph's early days.
         Once, in my teens, I came across a newspaper clipping which was my
       father's obituary, telling of his death at the age of 17, years before
       I was born. I learned in 1903 he was the first person ever to recover 
       from an appendectomy at the Allentown Hospital. Before then, when
       anyone underwent that surgery, the newspaper automatically published
       their obituary.
         My mother's maiden name was Mabel Newhard. She, too, was active in
       the theatre. For years her father, Elwood Newhard, an alderman, was
       master of ceremonies before the grandstand of the Great Allentown Fair.
       He gained local fame by translating the opera Pinafore into Pennsylvania
       German, directing it, and starring in it, as Sir Joseph in Allentown's
       Lyric Theatre. (An ancestor, Conrad Newhart, was an armorer in the
       village of Newhart in Odenwald, Germany. His name is found in records
       in the year 1140. Emperor Frederick, called Barbarossa, elevated him
       to the dignity of a Patrician and gave him a coat of arms for his
       proficiency.)
         My grandmother, Martha Newhard, was revered by all who knew her until
       her death in her early nineties. We all affectionately called her Mammy.
       Her father, Geroge Snyder, was a hotel owner and a breeder of thorobred
       horses, one of which held the world record in harness racing. The town
       of Snydersville, Pennsylvania, was named for him and his family.
         The Elwood Newhards had six children: Mabel, Elizabeth, Ruth, Winfield,
       Fred, and George.
         Most of my years in grade school were spent in a country school with
       eight grades in one room. After graduation from Muhlenberg College, and
       after struggling through the Depression years, I was employed by the
       NBC Network in Washington, D.C., as a broadcast engineer in radio. Later,
       with the introduction of television, I transferred to that medium and
       rose to become a Technical Director. I was married to Frances Rambo, and
       we were blessed with one son, John (Jack) Rambo McCollom. Frances passed
       away when Jack was 13.
         The following year I married Beverly Horney with Jack's enthusiastic
       support. Beverly, a native of Medicine Lodge, was also with NBC, and
       Jack and Beverly had become good friends. They once appeared on the NBC
       Wide Wide World show portraying mother and son.
         Beverly and I had a beautiful wedding in the Washington National
       Cathedral. Later I joined RCA, the parent company of NBC, and was sent
       to Denver. During this transition, Jack attended Medicine Lodge High
       School for one semester. In Denver Beverly and I were plessed with the
       birth of our son, Robert George.
         A year later RCA transferred me to the Missile and Surface Radar
       Division at Morrestown, New Jersey, near Camden.
         A couple of years later, I rejoined NBC in Washington in management.
       There, on Easter, 1963, we were blessed with the birth of William Girard,
       (Jerry).
         In 1976 Beverly and I decided that I would retire, and we would move
       to Medicine Lodge. This has proved to be a very happy experience.
         In review, I am adding a few items. With NBC radio I was once engineer
       in a boradcast from the Italian Embassy. The Italian Ambassador asked
       me if, after the broadcast, I would look at a radio that was not working.
       After I fixed the radio, he said, "My wife will be so happy to have this
       radio working again. You know, she is the daughter of Marconi."
         I participated in radio broadcasts of President Franklin D. Roosevelt
       and Harry S. Truman. Later, as TV Technical Director, I was in charge
       of telecasts of President Eisenhower from the White House and the
       telecast in front of the capitol of the second inauguration of President
       Dwight Eisenhower and of Richard Nixon as Vice President.
                
     Source:Chosen Land - Barber County, Kansas, pg. 293 
     Submitted by: John Alexander McCollom III.