First Troop Philadelphia City Cavalry: America’s Oldest Active Service Unit

Posted by on Aug 13, 2026 in | Comments Off on First Troop Philadelphia City Cavalry: America’s Oldest Active Service Unit On November 17, 1774, three members of Philadelphia’s Committee of Safety met with 28 citizens at Carpenters’ Hall to discuss forming a volunteer troop amid rising tensions with Great Britain. From that meeting emerged the Philadelphia Light Horse, later known as the First Troop Philadelphia City Cavalry (FTPCC), or simply the “First Troop.” Its founders pledged to equip and support themselves...
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Preserving Pieces of Pennsylvania’s Past: An Inside Look at the Building of the Commonwealth’s Collections

Posted by on Nov 30, 2013 in | Comments Off on Preserving Pieces of Pennsylvania’s Past: An Inside Look at the Building of the Commonwealth’s Collections Associations between butterflies and buttons, Conestoga wagons and cannon, sculpture and arrowheads, or fossils and founder William Penn’s original Charter may seem tenuous, even obscure and, perhaps, nonsensical. But a relationship does exist: they are among the one and a half million objects and thirty thousand cubic feet of manuscripts, records, maps and photographs in the custody and...
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