Link Museum Loses a Great Friend

The Historical Society of Western Virginia lost a gracious supporter Aug. 7. Ellen Arnold, 88, a volunteer at the O. Winston Link and Roanoke History Museums since 2005, died at her Salem home after a short illness. Among survivors is her husband, Bill, also a longtime Link volunteer.

Both Bill and Ellen knew O. Winston Link personally, and Ellen even appeared in a video about the international photographer. She met Link, whom she called “Mr. Link,” when she helped him with a book signing at the Virginia Museum of Transportation in 1987.

Ellen referred to her time at the Link Museum in the former Norfolk & Western passenger station as “the most challenging and rewarding experience of my volunteering.” Prior to helping at the Link, she had a long history of helping, from PTA to sewing costumes for a theater group and working with excursions of the Class J 611.

At the Link Museum, she worked in the gift shop, but the majority of her attention was given to organizing Link’s 2,400 N&W negatives and the 2,200 negatives of his commercial work. She unpacked and organized boxes of memorabilia from Link’s home, curated an exhibit for the museum on his life, gave tours and, most recently, provided captions for photos in an annual Link calendar. She knew almost every detail of Link’s photographs.

“I consider it a rare privilege to be able to volunteer at a museum dedicated to someone I knew,” Ellen once said in an interview.

The Historical Society staff and board consider having had Ellen at the museum also a rare privilege. In lieu of flowers, Bill Arnold asks that donations be made to the O. Winston Link Museum Gift Shop “because that’s what Ellen would’ve wanted.” Funeral services will be private. Survivors include daughters Delores Gordon (Jerry) of Winchester and Lynne Yates (Joe) of Salem, and granddaughter the Rev. Rachel Gordon Plemmons (Joseph) of Emporia.