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BARNESVILLE -- The Watt Center for History and the Arts will welcome Nancy Napolitano to share the story of her life as a racehorse trainer at 7 p.m. Thursday.
Doors will open at 6 p.m. so visitors can enjoy the local history displays prior to the presentation. A suggested $5 donation at the door will help ensure future programming at the center. The facility is located at 511 Watt Ave. in Barnesville.
Napolitano grew up in Cleveland and later moved to Belmont County to become a trainer for Daniel Stearns, doctor of veterinary medicine.
According to the Watt Center's Facebook page, Napolitano was a trail ride escort rider during high school. Following high school, she attended Meredith Manor International Equestrian Centre in Wood County, West Virginia, became a riding instructor and returned to the Cleveland area. She began re-schooling horses for Stearns and he asked her to ready his horses for racing.
Stearns owned and operated Harmony Hill Farm, a thoroughbred breeding farm south of Barnesville, from 1965 until his death in 2011. Their efforts produced more thoroughbred race winners than any other farm in Ohio during those years.
In late 1981, Napolitano and her family made the move to Stearns' Belmont County farm to train his horses full time. Napolitano went back to school in 2007 to become a registered nurse while still working full time for Stearns. When Stearns died, she chose to end her 30-year career with horses and saw that all of the horses were placed in new homes. Napolitano now works for the Walton Retirement Home in Barnesville.
For more information about the program or the Watt Center, call volunteer Mary Sidwell at 740-926-1547 or visit The Watt Center Facebook page.
The Watt Center for History and the Arts strives to preserve and display artifacts illustrating Barnesville's rich historical record of business, industry and agriculture. Its foundation is the Watt Car and Wheel Company, founded in 1862 as the Joseph Watt and Son foundry. The Watt Center is currently a historical site and museum.
The organization is also accepting donated books for its annual book sale. Books can be left on the center's porch. The center asks that people be mindful of the weather when dropping off books. The Watt Center will not accept textbooks or encyclopedias, but people can recycle these items in the recycling bins located next to the building.