Welcome Aboard the Party Train: The Pennsylvania–Texas Power Nexus

Posted by on Jan 14, 2026 in | Comments Off on Welcome Aboard the Party Train: The Pennsylvania–Texas Power Nexus As U.S. House Speaker and Vice President John Nance “Cactus Jack” Garner (1868–1967) of Texas could attest, no congressional outing in the 1930s was complete without Pittsburgh’s Joe Guffey (1870–1959). In 1901, Guffey’s uncle, James, with money borrowed from the Mellon family, brought in Spindletop on the Gulf Coast. James Guffey midwifed the Texas petroleum industry — and provided the Mellons...
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Editor’s Letter

Posted by on Jan 14, 2026 in | Comments Off on Editor’s Letter With this edition of Pennsylvania Heritage, we begin our commemoration of the 250th anniversary of the year of American independence. In the coming months, the Pennsylvania Historical & Museum Commission and its Trails of History sites will be offering an array of related programs, exhibitions and events that you’ll hear about in these pages. This winter, The State Museum of Pennsylvania...
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Letters

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on Letters Saintly Connections The feature story on Saint Katharine Drexel was brilliantly written by William C. Kashatus [“Philadelphia’s Sainted Katharine Drexel,” Summer 2007]. This article is of great interest to our Keating family and others here in northeastern Pennsylvania. My aunt, Esther Keating, of Pittston, Luzerne County, was educated in nursing at the University of...
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An Activist Government in Harrisburg: Governor George H. Earle III and Pennsylvania’s “Little New Deal”

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on An Activist Government in Harrisburg: Governor George H. Earle III and Pennsylvania’s “Little New Deal” Despite substantive efforts by Governor Gifford Pinchot (1865-1946) during his second non-consecutive term, from 1931 to 1935, unemployment, underemployment, and poverty continued to plague the Commonwealth. The Great Depression had crippled the nation and Pennsylvania – America’s workshop – was hard hit as unemployment soared to nearly 40 percent in several industrial...
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