“Winter Wonderland”

Posted by on Dec 16, 2022 in | Comments Off on “Winter Wonderland” Few people may be aware that one of the most memorable and popular holiday songs of all time, “Winter Wonderland,” was written in a small town in northeastern Pennsylvania. For the folks of Honesdale, Wayne County, holiday festivities would be incomplete without celebrating the song and its writer, Richard “Dick” Smith, with the annual Winter Wonderland festival and parade. Born in Honesdale in...
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Pennsylvania Heritage Foundation Newsletter

Posted by on Dec 16, 2022 in | Comments Off on Pennsylvania Heritage Foundation Newsletter Topics in the Winter 2023 Newsletter: PHF Holds First Sip & Savor Fundraiser PHMC Curator Highlights Prized Object from Collections Jennifer Eaton on Model 1917 Light Tank PHF Announces New Board Members  ...
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2022 Trails

Posted by on Dec 16, 2022 in | Comments Off on 2022 Trails With what feels like record speed, it’s once again time for our look back at the past year. Our steady rebound from 2020’s COVID-19–related site closures and event cancellations continued into 2022, with ongoing efforts to balance staff and visitor safety with everyone’s desire to get back out onto the Pennsylvania Trails of History. Visitation levels that started to increase in 2021 have...
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Death of the Daily News by Andrew Conte

Posted by on Dec 16, 2022 in | Comments Off on Death of the Daily News by Andrew Conte Death of the Daily News How Citizen Gatekeepers Can Save Local Journalism by Andrew Conte University of Pittsburgh Press, 176 pp., hardcover $26.00 The internet and digitization have changed the economics of delivering news. Print newspapers in particular, with some exceptions, are struggling to survive. Many already haven’t. Small towns and rural areas have been especially hard hit. Communities...
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Barnstorming in Eastern Pennsylvania and Beyond by Jeffrey L. Marshall

Posted by on Dec 16, 2022 in | Comments Off on Barnstorming in Eastern Pennsylvania and Beyond by Jeffrey L. Marshall Barnstorming in Eastern Pennsylvania and Beyond by Jeffrey L. Marshall Pennsylvania German Cultural Heritage Center, 224 pp., hardcover $30 In this beautifully illustrated volume, highly regarded preservationist Jeffrey L. Marshall shares his wide-ranging knowledge about Pennsylvania barns and conveys his deep affection for these remarkable structures. The book is geared to the general reader...
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Beethoven in Beijing by Jennifer Lin

Posted by on Dec 16, 2022 in | Comments Off on Beethoven in Beijing by Jennifer Lin Beethoven in Beijing Stories from the Philadelphia Orchestra’s Historic Journey to China by Jennifer Lin Temple University Press, 192 pp., hardcover $35 Beethoven in Beijing offers a behind-the-scenes look at the Philadelphia Orchestra’s historic 1973 visit to China. Drawing together interviews, personal accounts, press reports and diplomatic cables, it paints a vivid picture of both the complex...
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American Workman by Maxwell King and Louise Lippincott

Posted by on Dec 15, 2022 in | Comments Off on American Workman by Maxwell King and Louise Lippincott American Workman The Life and Art of John Kane by Maxwell King and Louise Lippincott University of Pittsburgh Press, 288 pp., hardcover $40 American Workman: The Life and Art of John Kane reconsiders the legacy of a prominent, self-taught Pittsburgh artist. Kane was a pugnacious, heavy-drinking Scottish immigrant who toiled for 40 years in mines, steel mills and railyards before achieving...
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Germantown Jewish Centre

Posted by on Dec 15, 2022 in | Comments Off on Germantown Jewish Centre Rising dramatically above curving Lincoln Drive in the Mount Airy neighborhood of Philadelphia is the Germantown Jewish Centre. Part synagogue, part school, the stone building is entirely striking. The synagogue section facing Lincoln Drive suggests a mountainside breaking open to reveal a limestone tablet bearing the Ten Commandments. The opposite end features a smooth black granite wall within...
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Living in the Cornplanter Grant

Posted by on Dec 15, 2022 in | Comments Off on Living in the Cornplanter Grant The Cornplanter Grant is well known as the Warren County home of Cornplanter (Gy-ant-wa-chia, 1740?–1836), chief warrior and leader from the Seneca Nation in northwestern Pennsylvania and western New York. For nearly 200 years, this 700-acre tract of land along the Allegheny River was home to a thriving community of Cornplanter’s heirs and several hundred Seneca, Cayuga and Onondaga families....
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Harry Houck, Edwin Armstrong and the Superheterodyne Receiver

Posted by on Dec 15, 2022 in | Comments Off on Harry Houck, Edwin Armstrong and the Superheterodyne Receiver Harry Houck (1897–1989), a pioneer of radio technology, was born and raised in New Cumberland, Pennsylvania. At the age of 14, he built his first ham radio rig and began transmitting and receiving messages. He graduated from Harrisburg Technical High School in 1916 and then joined the U.S. Army shortly after the United States entered World War I on April 6, 1917. In February 1918 Sergeant Houck...
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