PHMC Highlights

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on PHMC Highlights Washington Crossing Historic Park has an unusual and highly entertaining way of casting the individual to portray General George Washington at the Bucks County historic site. In September, contestants competed in the 2009 George Washington contest during auditions in which they answered questions about the American Revolutionary War. The winner earned the privilege of playing Washington at the...
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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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PHMC Highlights

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on PHMC Highlights Trains for the Governor’s Residence The Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania annually assembles an operating train layout for the Governor’s Residence in Harrisburg. Governor Edward G. Rendell shows his appreciation to Railroad Museum security chief Dennis Keperling and Railroad Museum educator Troy Grubb.   Then & Now Time Line of Military Uniforms and Equipment 1st Pennsylvania...
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Lock Haven Hospital, Lock Haven, Pa.

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on Lock Haven Hospital, Lock Haven, Pa. This burned since you were here [and] suppose you read of it,” wrote a Mrs. A. McClintock to Mrs. E. H. MacKee, of Buffalo, New York, on a postcard depicting the Lock Haven Hospital in Lock Haven, Clinton County. The postcard was postmarked September 2, 1908, at Lock Haven. Built in 1903 at a cost of $42,000, the Lock Haven Hospital was destroyed by fire five years later, on July 28, 1908....
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Executive Director’s Letter

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on Executive Director’s Letter Beginning with special programs at our historic sites and museums in March to celebrate the anniversary of Penn’s Charter establishing Pennsylvania, the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission (PHMC) has been preparing for the busy summer season. With greatly reduced staff — the result of severe budget cuts to PHMC and its programs — we have been strengthening relationships with existing...
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Letters

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on Letters Walked Away With My Prize I found the planters peanuts article [“Mr. Peanut’s Hometown: Wilkes-Barre and the Founding of Planters Peanuts” by William C. Kashatus] in the summer 2010 issue of the magazine quite fascinating. It exemplified the rags to riches story that America has spawned since its beginning. How a poor Italian immigrant with entrepreneurial skills managed, in a...
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This Is a Beautiful, Bountiful Earth: Joseph Trimble Rothrock and the Preservation of Penn’s Woods

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on This Is a Beautiful, Bountiful Earth: Joseph Trimble Rothrock and the Preservation of Penn’s Woods The lush, verdant woodlands characteristic of Pennsylvania’s landscape are almost entirely second-growth forests, in existence roughly for less than a century. Had it not been for the groundbreaking work of many conservationists in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the Keystone State’s present terrain would be dramatically different. One of the most important of those...
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The Indefatigable Daniel Hartman Hastings

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on The Indefatigable Daniel Hartman Hastings Despite the fact that he unsuccessfully attempted — not once, but three times — to enlist in the Union Army in the early days of the American Civil War, the underage Daniel Hartman Hastings (1849–1903) eventually did find several causes for which to fight. And his courage and persistence brought him many accolades and honors, including the title “Hero of the Johnstown Flood.” Hastings, who grew...
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From the Editor

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on From the Editor Because each edition of the magazine has a long lead time – from manuscript development and illustration acquisition to final design and printing – it’s sometimes challenging to write about a season that’s several months in the future. The nor’easter in late October that deposited nearly a foot of snow on parts of central Pennsylvania – and brought the Weather...
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The Mills Brothers Trace Roots to Bellefonte

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on The Mills Brothers Trace Roots to Bellefonte Most musicologists agree: The internationally renowned Mills Brothers was the greatest vocal group of the twentieth century, a conclusion supported by mounds of evidence and unprecedented “firsts” in the world of entertainment. These family singers were the pacesetters, style blazers, and patternmakers in their field, and the first African American performing artists to attract a...
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