Remembering TMI 40 Years Later

Posted by on Feb 3, 2020 in | Comments Off on Remembering TMI 40 Years Later In late March 1979, south-central Pennsylvanians were startled to learn of an accident that had occurred at Three Mile Island (TMI) nuclear power plant in the Susquehanna River near Middletown, Dauphin County. In my own experience, the initial news came to me at Dallastown Elementary School in York County after a teacher shouted out to my fifth-grade class to come back inside the school building...
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“Keeping with the Dignity of the Commonwealth”: 50 Years of the Pennsylvania Governor’s Residence

Posted by on Dec 1, 2019 in | Comments Off on “Keeping with the Dignity of the Commonwealth”: 50 Years of the Pennsylvania Governor’s Residence The stately Pennsylvania Governor’s Residence overlooking the Susquehanna River at 2035 North Front Street in the Uptown neighborhood of Harrisburg, Dauphin County, reaches its half-century mark in 2018, a milestone that is being observed with a variety of events and programs throughout the year. The Georgian Revival mansion was completed in 1968, during the term of Gov. Raymond P. Shafer, its...
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Executive Director’s Letter

Posted by on May 8, 2015 in | Comments Off on Executive Director’s Letter In January I enjoyed my first opportunity to spend several hours modestly researching at the Pennsylvania State Archives. I donned white cotton gloves and searched through many boxes of postcards looking for images that would reveal to our visitors the Commonwealth’s rich diversity with minimal need for words or labels. This collection, Manuscript Group 213, spanning from the 19th century to the...
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Letter from the Governor

Posted by on Nov 30, 2013 in | Comments Off on Letter from the Governor COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA OFFICE OF THE GOVERNOR HARRISBURG THE GOVERNOR Dear Fellow Pennsylvanian: As we prepare to commemorate Pennsylvania’s 300th birthday, it is fitting that we take note of the principles and values which formed the foundation upon which our state’s distinctive character developed. It is also important to consider how these principles and values, coupled with...
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A Century of Conservation: The Story of Pennsylvania’s State Parks

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on A Century of Conservation: The Story of Pennsylvania’s State Parks Pennsylvania’s state park system is celebrating its centennial as one of the country’s largest and most popular recreational attractions. Each year, thirty-six million people visit one (or more) of the Keystone State’s one hundred and fourteen parks to picnic, hike, swim, boat, camp, ski, snowmobile, fish, hunt, or raft white water rapids. This sprawling collec­tion of open...
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Executive Director’s Message

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Executive Director’s Message TMI. Even after twenty years, mere mention of these three letters triggers an immediate response from anyone who lived through the harrowing week beginning Wednesday, March 28, 1979, when the entire world held its collective breath and contemplated the possibility of a nuclear catastrophe. The accident at Three Mile Island near Harrisburg is one of the defining events in twentieth-century...
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Memories of a Crisis

Posted by on Nov 25, 2013 in | Comments Off on Memories of a Crisis Living and working in Hummelstown, only five miles from Middletown, the home of Three Mile Island (TMI) and it nuclear power plant, I listened anxiously as the radio announcer warned of a radiation emission or leak from the plant (see “From Chaos to Calm: Remembering the Three Mile Island Crisis, An Interview with Harold Denton” by Kenneth C. Wolensky, Spring 2000). Windows were to...
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From Chaos to Calm: Remembering the Three Mile Island Crisis, An Interview With Harold Denton

Posted by on Nov 25, 2013 in | Comments Off on From Chaos to Calm: Remembering the Three Mile Island Crisis, An Interview With Harold Denton Thursday, March 28, 1979, is a day forever etched in the memory of most Pennsylvanians and, indeed, many Americans. During the pre-dawn hours, events swiftly unfolded at a nuclear power plant on an island in the middle of the Susquehanna River near Harrisburg that would lead to the worst commercial nuclear accident in the nation’s history. In the days that followed, Three Mile Island (TMI)...
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Documents from the Three Mile Island Crisis

Posted by on Nov 25, 2013 in | Comments Off on Documents from the Three Mile Island Crisis In late March 1979, the nation ex­perienced its worst commercial nuclear accident as a result of techni­cal malfunctions and operator error at the Three Mile Island (TMI) nuclear generating station near Harrisburg. The crisis, which began on Wednes­day, March 28, lasted for several days and prompted the evacuation of thousands of residents. The accident and reaction to it are well docu­mented in...
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Bookshelf

Posted by on Nov 25, 2013 in | Comments Off on Bookshelf Devastation and Renewal: An Environmental History of Pittsburgh and its Region Edited by Joel A. Tarr University of Pittsburgh Press, 2004 (281 pages, cloth, $32.00) Visitors to Pittsburgh in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries were invariably shocked by the ways in which industrial development dominated the landscape. Steel mills sprawled across hundreds of acres along the rivers. Land and...
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