Meet Your Neighbor… Becky Hall

By DONNA NICKEL

Like many residents, Becky Hall knows North Canton is a nice community. But what makes her unique is that Becky made it her business to learn why the city is a great place to live and how it got to be that way. Furthermore, armed with that knowledge and her work experiences, she’s optimistic about the future of her adopted hometown despite recent economic setbacks.
Becky and her brother grew up in Kent with her father, a barber and local politician and her mother who was a secretary. After graduating from Kent Roosevelt High School, she decided to stay close to home and attend Kent State University. In 1978 she earned a bachelors degree in education. At that time she met her husband Ted who was also an education major. Ted has spent his career with the North Canton City Schools and is currently the district’s media specialist.
“At that time, there weren’t many teaching jobs for women unless you wanted to coach.” Instead of teaching, Becky continued her education and earned a masters in geography. “I’d always been interested in applied geography. I like planning and development.” Becky worked for the Stark County Regional Planning Commission for five years before staying at home to raise the couple’s only child, Peter.
To stay involved with the working world, Becky wrote part-time for the Perry Post and the Jackson/North Canton Tribune in the late 1980’s and early 1990’s. “I covered mostly community news and human interest stories.” During this time Becky also served as the director of the Canton Preservation Society.
A North Canton resident since 1989, Becky brought her experience to the North Canton Heritage Society where she was director from 1992 to 1997. “When I first started with the Heritage Society, I knew North Canton was a nice community, but I didn’t know why. What I liked about the Heritage Society was so many of the volunteers were women who had lived all their lives in the city and they had so many fond memories to share about growing up in North Canton. I thought, This is a story that needs to be told.”

It was the countless number of photos the Heritage Society had in its possession that motivated her to organize the memories into a pictorial history of the city. In 2002, Becky, along with Paul Kieffer published the book “North Canton: A Place in Time.” Over 200 pages long, the book contains more than 350 photographs and covers events from 1740 to 2002. “Paul covered the national events while I wrote about local history.” Becky said she believed she was called to do the project. “It was a hard job, but I felt it was something that had to be done. There were just so many photos to go through. But we just thought it was something we had to share with the community. It basically covers why North Canton is such a nice community, and how it got to be that way.” She explained the Hoover factory’s location set the tone for the town. “It’s not often you see a major manufacturing facility located in the center of town.” She said history showed that the wealth of the community was largely the result of “a benefactor who supported the community that supported his business.”
Seeking a full-time position, Becky left the Heritage Society for Bleckman and Associates where she writes housing plans and administers government grants. Her work involves visiting other Ohio communities in Columbiana, Ashtubula, and Geaugua counties. She served her own community on the North Canton zoning board of appeals from 2000-2003. “It was really hard and challenging to sit on that board because you had to tell people ‘no’ sometimes.”
Becky was recently appointed to the North Canton Chamber of Commerce’s economic development committee. “I’m looking forward to seeing where I can contribute. There are some interesting directions the city can go in. A lot of people are very sad because of the Hoover Co. situation, but things could be a lot worse. We have a lot of good things already. We have a YMCA, a community pool, a library, and a great school system among other things. I’ve seen a lot of communities with a diminishing manufacturing base that don’t have these things.”
An active member of John Knox Presbyterian Church, Becky is a member of the bell choir. She’s also in the process of learning to play the hammered dulcimer. She also spends spare time with her nose buried in her collection of how-to books. “I love to build things.” She frequently finds projects to keep her busy at Ted’s family’s cottage on New York’s Finger Lakes. “I drive Ted crazy because he thinks I should go to the cottage to relax.” There are also frequent trips to Boston to visit son Peter who attends Emerson University.
Becky said she enjoys being busy and never finds herself bored. “We’ve always valued family and been involved at church. I feel we have to be good stewards of our community and our lives.”