Letters to the Editor

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Letters to the Editor Quite a Rau I was intrigued by John C. Van Horne’s article on William Herman Rau in the Fall 1996 issue of Pennsylvania Heritage [see “‘The Greatest Highway to the West’: Photographer William H. Rau Documents the Pennsylvania Railroad”]. I edit a similar magazine in Alabama, and we have exchanged copies with your magazine for years. I always enjoy seeing what our...
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Shorts

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Shorts “A Patchwork of Pennsylvania” at The State Museum of Pennsylvania, Saturday, June 7 [1997], will explore the state’s quilt heritage. Harrisburg quilt makers will explain the materials and demonstrate the techniques of the craft. Visitors may meet and lunch with Lucinda Cawley, Lorraine Ezbiansky, and Denise Nordberg, authors of the book, Saved for the People of Pennsyl­vania:...
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Currents

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Currents Let’s Motor! Although Detroit has earned the title of “Motor City,” Pittsburgh was home to twenty automobile makers at the turn of the century, manufacturing such notable vehicles as the Penn 30 Touring Car, the Standard Model E Touring Car, the Keystone Six-Sixty, the Brush Model D Runabout, and the Artzberger Steam Surrey. Several of these automobiles attracted widespread...
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Pennsylvania State Archives

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Pennsylvania State Archives A popular destination for researchers, historians, and genealogists from throughout the world, the Pennsylvania State Archives in Harrisburg safeguards millions of government records, dating to the 1681 Charter granted to William Penn by King Charles II. Holdings also include manuscripts, photographs, maps and drawings, court dockets, papers of prominent Pennsylvanians and their families,...
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Bookshelf

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Bookshelf Guide to Genealogical Sources at the Pennsylvania State Archives by Robert M. Dructor Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, 1998 (374 pages, paper, $12.95) The Pennsylvania State Archives acquires, preserves, and makes available for study the valuable public records of the Commonwealth, with particular attention given to the official records of state government. In fulfilling its...
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Bookshelf

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Bookshelf The King of the Movies: Film Pioneer Siegmund Lubin by Joseph P. Eckhardt Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1998. (286 pages, cloth, $55.00) That immigrant Jews exerted a profound impact on the growth of American cinema is well known and has been the subject of considerable scholarship. However, the country’s first Jewish movie mogul, Siegmund “Pop” Lubin (1851-1923) of...
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Shorts

Posted by on Nov 25, 2013 in | Comments Off on Shorts An intensive eight-day study tour examining the England of Pennsylvania founder William Penn (1644-1718) will be conducted under the auspices of the Pennsylvania Heritage Society in Octo­ber 2000. Participants, led by historian Larry E. Tise, will visit the Church of Ail Hallows Barking, where Penn was bap­tized and where, in 1999, Governor Tom Ridge and PHMC Chairman Janet S. Klein presented a...
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Cook Forest

Posted by on Nov 25, 2013 in | Comments Off on Cook Forest I was about four years old when the first cabins were rented out at Cook Forest, only one to a family, because there were only four or five. My parents decided to rent one of the cabins and a tent for a week for our family of six. My memories of this cabin are that it was very small and dark and that I was afraid to go to sleep at night, although I knew my parents were right outside the cabin....
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Revisiting Valley Forge

Posted by on Nov 25, 2013 in | Comments Off on Revisiting Valley Forge I will never forget the Bicentennial of 1976. The year before I had volunteered to work at Valley Forge State Park after seeing a notice asking for people to staff the buildings. We were given paper patterns with which to make our outfits, hopefully resembling those from the eighteenth century. Mine was comprised of a knee-length white shift, long skirt, lace-up vest, and a “mob”...
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Genealogy Notebook

Posted by on Nov 25, 2013 in | Comments Off on Genealogy Notebook It’s difficult to get around the fact that genealogy is a highly personal journey one that can be shared but not duplicated by kindred souls. The people of Pennsylvania stem from a mosaic of ethnic backgrounds and so there is no such thing as a “typical” Commonwealth pedigree. Early history is populated by English Quakers (the Religious Society of Friends), mainstream and...
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