Lee of Conshohocken

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Lee of Conshohocken Shortly after the end of World War II, Pope Pius XII received a small group of GIs from the U.S. Occupation Force. Following the benediction. he asked them where they lived in America. “New York, New York,” answered one. “Very big … bigger even than Rome,” the Pontiff replied as he turned to another, “And you?” “California, Los Angeles.”...
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Those Beautiful Bodies of Yesteryear

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Those Beautiful Bodies of Yesteryear On a balmy spring day in 1880, a seventeen-year-old youth from Ire­land’s County Galway arrived at Boston. An orphan with scant formal education, he had spent his meager savings for the transatlantic ship passage. He had neither friends nor close relatives in the United States. He did not even have the promise of a job. But Joseph J. Derham knew he would succeed. America was the golden...
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Noble Ambitions: The Founding of the Franklin Institute

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Noble Ambitions: The Founding of the Franklin Institute In the minds of its founders, the Franklin Institute was built on noble ambitions,” historian Bruce Sinclair has written. And born of a young man’s fury, it might be added. In 1823, twenty-two year old Samuel Vaughan Merrick was denied membership in a Philadelphia mechanics’ asso­ciation. A number of similar organizations had sprung up in the early part of the nine­teenth...
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