Oct 3, 2016 2 min read

For decades, decorative art in the public meeting room of Washington County’s Courthouse Square office building has consisted of photographs of county commissioners past and present.

Sherri Taddeo, graphic arts supervisor for the Washington County Planning Commission, is redesigning the photo array, and she wants the display to be as complete as possible.

But she has no photos of two 20th century commissioners, John N. O’Neil, a Republican who served from 1935 to 1945, and Ross R. Cummins, a Democrat who was elected in 1939 and served until 1947. The 1940 U.S. Census lists a Ross R. Cummins as a West Virginia native who lived at 241 Smithfield St., Canonsburg, and was born about 1893. His wife was Madge Lucille Cummins, and his son was William C. Cummins.

O’Neil may have been a resident of Washington, and he had enough clout to be chosen as president of the County Commissioners Association of Pennsylvania, based in Harrisburg. Minutes of the county commissioners’ meetings state he resigned from the board, then attempted to withdraw his resignation, but a judge appointed Henry J. Lowstuter of Charleroi to replace him. Lowstuter is indexed in the Observer-Reporter photo negative archive, which includes the postwar period, so his picture, made from a digitized image, will be part of the county’s display.

Taddeo asked anyone with family photos of O’Neil or Cummins call the planning commission at 724-228-6811. She has placed her photo montage on hold temporarily, hoping that someone can lend photos that she could copy.

“I was almost ready to hang them, but didn’t want to substitute and put the next guys in if I could find” pictures of O’Neil and Cummins, Taddeo said.

Ross R. Cummins is not to be confused with J. Blatch Cummins of Washington, a Democrat who served in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives from 1957 to 1958, when he resigned and became a Washington County commissioner until 1963.