Powwowing: Ritual Healing in Pennsylvania Dutch Country

Posted by on Dec 13, 2016 in | Comments Off on Powwowing: Ritual Healing in Pennsylvania Dutch Country It was just after dark when the powwow doctor arrived at the elderly woman’s home in Lebanon County. The woman had been suffering from swelling in her legs that made walking difficult. Regular medical treatment had proven to be unsuccessful, so after enduring several months of painful discomfort, she called a powwower on the advice of a friend. Tonight would be the third successive...
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Good Road Followed … From Metro Philly to Rock Hall: An Interview with John Oates

Posted by on Jun 6, 2016 in | Comments Off on Good Road Followed … From Metro Philly to Rock Hall: An Interview with John Oates John Oates is one half of the best-selling rock duo Hall & Oates, as well as an accomplished solo artist. Singing from the time he could talk and playing the guitar since the age of 5, John Oates was destined to be a musician. He was born in 1948 in New York City, but his family relocated to North Wales, Montgomery County, in the early 1950s, a move that would change the course of his life....
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Pennsylvania Governors Residences Open to the Public

Posted by on Jul 17, 2015 in | Comments Off on Pennsylvania Governors Residences Open to the Public Pennypacker Mills Pennypacker Mills possesses a lengthy history dating to about 1720 when Hans Jost Hite built the fieldstone house and a gristmill near the Perkiomen Creek, Schwenksville, Montgomery County. Purchased in 1747 by Peter Pennypacker (1710-1770), the house was enlarged and a saw mill and a fulling mill were constructed. The property acquired its name for the three mills. Peter...
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Introducing Harry Whittier Frees, World-Famous Animal Photographer

Posted by on May 8, 2015 in | Comments Off on Introducing Harry Whittier Frees, World-Famous Animal Photographer Long before William Wegman (born 1943) began photographing dogs – primarily his own Weimaraners, beginning with his first, Man Ray, whom he acquired in 1970 – wearing clothing and costumes, Pennsylvania native Harry Whittier Frees (1879–1953) became famous for his unusual photographs of young cats, dogs, rabbits and chickens wearing all sorts of garments and engaged in a variety of activities....
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Historian of Pennsylvania Exceptionalism: Samuel W. Pennypacker

Posted by on Dec 2, 2013 in | Comments Off on Historian of Pennsylvania Exceptionalism: Samuel W. Pennypacker Reflecting on “the play of forces” that propelled him to Pennsylvania’s governor’s office in 1903, Samuel Whitaker Pennypacker (1843–1916) confidently declared, “there is no such thing as an accident” (a notion popularized by Sigmund Freud, the founding father of psychoanalysis). This was not to say chance plays no part in history because he pronounced with equal certitude: “To every man certain...
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Montgomery County: The Second Hundred Years

Posted by on Nov 30, 2013 in | Comments Off on Montgomery County: The Second Hundred Years County histories, written in most cases during the late nineteenth or early twentieth centuries, serve as the starting point for most research in local history. Montgomery Coun­ty’s classic county history, by Theodore W. Bean, is no exception. History, however, did not stop as the final pages of that volume were written. Much has happened since. Just as the Centennial of our nation spurred...
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Montgomery County: Cultural Microcosm of the Commonwealth

Posted by on Nov 30, 2013 in | Comments Off on Montgomery County: Cultural Microcosm of the Commonwealth The third most populous county in Pennsylvania, with ap­proximately 480 square miles of rolling hills criss-crossed by rivers, streams and superhighways, Montgom­ery County is a microcosm of the Com­monwealth, a reflection of its cultural development. Pan of Philadelphia County until 1784, Montgomery Coun­ty served as a sanctuary for numerous ethnic and religious groups seeking the freedom...
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Bryn Athyn Cathedral: Where Man May Forget the World

Posted by on Nov 29, 2013 in | Comments Off on Bryn Athyn Cathedral: Where Man May Forget the World Bryn Athyn Cathedral, tucked well back from Second Street Pike in Montgomery County, is not immediately visible to the passerby. One is intro­duced to the finely chiseled spires, granite towers and sparkling glass in rapid, stop­-frame glimpses through a dense stand of trees. As the full view unfolds, one is at once compelled by the loom­ing one hundred and fifty foot central tower and beckoned...
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The Merry-Go-Round Kings

Posted by on Nov 29, 2013 in | Comments Off on The Merry-Go-Round Kings Murmuring voices and laughter, mingling with the strains of band organ music and the rustling of long white skirts and crisply starched shirts, filled the sum­mer air of 1904 at Philadel­phia’s Woodside Park. A new carousel, one of the finest in America, had just introduced a kaleidoscope of festive color and design to the familiar old amusement grounds. It was, especially, the onset of...
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What Love Can Do: William Penn’s Holy Experiment in Education

Posted by on Nov 29, 2013 in | Comments Off on What Love Can Do: William Penn’s Holy Experiment in Education The founder of Pennsyl­vania stands atop Philadelphia’s City Hall, seemingly sur­veying a “Holy Experiment” he nurtured out of the ideals of his Quaker faith. William Penn, the political theorist, is still remembered for his daring experiment in establishing a colony dedicated to pacifism, civil liberty and religious free­dom in a seventeenth century world conditioned by...
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