Lancaster County: Diversity of People, Ideas and Economy

Posted by on Nov 30, 2013 in | Comments Off on Lancaster County: Diversity of People, Ideas and Economy When Lancaster County was established on May 10, 1729, it became the proto­type for the sixty-three counties to follow. The original three counties­Philadelphia, Bucks and Chester – were created as copies of typical English shires. The frontier conditions of Ches­ter County’s backwoods, from which Lancaster was formed, presented knot­ty problems to the civilized English­men....
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A Dynasty Tumbles

Posted by on Nov 29, 2013 in | Comments Off on A Dynasty Tumbles The saga begins and ends with two com­monplace scenes: a teenaged immigrant alighting a ship in colonial Philadelphia with but two letters of introduction and three guineas to his name, and a gravesite ringed by a half­-dozen black-clothed mourn­ers. But during the century and a half that encapsulates these vignettes, a Pennsylva­nia dynasty rose and fell- and rose and fell again. From Robert...
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The Political Ascent of James Buchanan

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on The Political Ascent of James Buchanan As the nation enters the third century of the American presi­dency, only one Pennsylvanian has had the distinction of serving as its chief executive. In 1857, at the age of sixty-five, James Bu­chanan of Lancaster County became the fifteenth president of the United States. He was well prepared for the office, having spent more than thirty years in public service in various elected and appointed...
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A Blast from the Past: Cornwall Iron Furnace

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on A Blast from the Past: Cornwall Iron Furnace Driving on narrow sinuous back roads through lush, verdant forests – just a half dozen miles north of the busy Pennsylvania Turnpike – unsuspecting travelers can’t help being struck by an odd-looking complex of Gothic Revival-style buildings and structures. This place, this curious collection of buildings, both large and small, appears to have been literally plucked from a far...
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Letters to the Editor

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Letters to the Editor Furnace Folklore The folklore of Cornwall Iron Furnace includes three apocryphal tales: Washing­ton and Lafayette visited; the value of gold extracted at Cornwall was sufficient to pay all mining expenses, all other revenue being pure profit; and stone from the dis­mantled Robert H. Coleman mansion was used in the construction of St. Luke’s Epis­copal Church in Lebanon [“Letters to...
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Letters to the Editor

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Letters to the Editor Loved Lizzie! I just loved your article on Lizzie Stride [“A Champion for All Seasons” by Barbara Gregorich, Summer 1998]! I see Pennsylva­nia Heritage only occasionally (when I return home to visit family in Pennsylva­nia) but each time I do, I’m extremely impressed. The photographs in this article were great. It made one feel – as Walter Cronkite used to say on...
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Discovering Religious Diversity Along the Pennsylvania Trails of History

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on Discovering Religious Diversity Along the Pennsylvania Trails of History William Penn (1644-1718) knew well the sting of discrimination and the misery of persecution for his religious beliefs. He suffered the consequences of breaking with the Church of England, leading to estrangement from his father, Admiral Sir William Penn (1621-1670). When imprisoned for attending meetings of the Society of Friends – commonly called Quakers and Friends – the younger...
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