Beaver’s Diary, Document and Lifesaver

Posted by on Mar 9, 2020 in | Comments Off on Beaver’s Diary, Document and Lifesaver The Pennsylvania State Archives has in its collection numerous diaries recording the personal experiences of prominent people in the state’s history. One of those diaries not only documented its owner’s life but also possibly saved it. James Addams Beaver (1837–1914), born in Millerstown, Perry County, was an attorney in Bellefonte, Centre County, who would serve as the 20th governor of...
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From the Executive Director

Posted by on Mar 13, 2017 in | Comments Off on From the Executive Director As a trained historian who has devoted his life to the preservation and teaching of American history, I am embarrassed to admit how little I knew about my own family’s history—only a few bits and pieces passed down from my parents. I was told that our family settled in the old Northwest Territory before Ohio became a state in 1803 and that some of my ancestors came from Pennsylvania. I...
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That Was the Week That Was: The First Battle of Harrisburg

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on That Was the Week That Was: The First Battle of Harrisburg It is widely conceded that the major military event of summer 1861 was the First Battle of Bull Run on Sun­day, July 21. The battle lasted only one day, but it caused great humiliation and forced important changes in the North’s subsequent approach to conducting the war. The creation of the Military District of the Potomac under Gen. George B. McClellan several days later signaled a reform...
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Bucktail Monument, Driftwood, PA.

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on Bucktail Monument, Driftwood, PA. This sounds as if the Bucktails were coming don’t it?” asked an unknown writer to Miss Bessie McPhee of Pittsburgh in a postcard mailed on April 6, 1908, at Driftwood, the second — and last — incorporated borough in Cameron County. Today a community of one hundred residents, Driftwood was incorporated as a borough in 1872; the county seat, Emporium, was incorporated in 1864. The postcard bears a...
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The Union’s Forgotten First Defenders

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on The Union’s Forgotten First Defenders Throughout the four years of the American Civil War, more than two million men served the Union, some for months, others for years. The vast majority were volunteers, young boys and aging men who willingly left home behind to fight for the preservation of the Union and the eradication of slavery.1 Historians have documented the stories of countless citizens-turned-soldiers, recalling the...
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Waging War Their Own Way: Women and the Civil War in Pennsylvania

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on Waging War Their Own Way: Women and the Civil War in Pennsylvania Pennsylvania’s recently conserved Civil War Muster Rolls, housed at the Pennsylvania State Archives, document the commonwealth’s contributions to the Union. Nearly 345,000 Pennsylvanians served in the U.S. Army during the war, or approximately 60 percent of the adult male population.1 A century and a half ago clerks carefully transcribed the names, ages, regiments, and brief...
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The Bucktails

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on The Bucktails Three days after the Confederate bombardment of Fort Sumter in South Carolina’s Charleston Harbor on April 15, 1861, President Abraham Lincoln issued an emergency call for troops to help defend the nation’s capital. Thomas Leiper Kane (1822–1883), scion of a prominent Philadelphia family, helped raise a mounted rifle regiment in Pennsylvania’s Northern Tier counties of Cameron, Elk, McKean, and...
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An Interview with Richard C. Saylor: The Impact of the Civil War Legacy in Pennsylvania

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on An Interview with Richard C. Saylor: The Impact of the Civil War Legacy in Pennsylvania Richard C. “Rich” Saylor, an archivist with the Pennsylvania State Archives, has been deep within the treasures that are the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission (PHMC) collections for nearly twenty years. He has become a highly respected expert on Pennsylvania Civil War history, research, and artifacts on behalf of the Commission. With a master’s degree in American Studies from Penn...
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Bookshelf

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on Bookshelf Wonders of Work and Labor: The Steidle Collection of American Industrial Art by Betsy Fahlman and Eric Schruers published by Earth and Mineral Sciences Museum and Art Gallery, 2009; 176 pages, cloth, $50.00 Mention Penn State and a few names immediately come to mind: Pattee Library, Happy Valley, the Blue Band, Berkey Creamery and, naturally, Joe Paterno and the Nittany Lions. What the average...
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Pennsylvania’s War Governor

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on Pennsylvania’s War Governor On September 14, 1862, Pennsylvania’s Governor Andrew Gregg Curtin invited the governors of the northern and border states to a meeting to be held at Altoona, Blair County, in ten days. The purpose of the meeting that became known as the Loyal War Governors’ Conference — or, simply, the Altoona Conference – was to “take measures for a more active support of the government’s prosecution of...
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