The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania: 300 Years of the Highest Court in the Commonwealth

Posted by on May 13, 2022 in | Comments Off on The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania: 300 Years of the Highest Court in the Commonwealth The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania was established on May 22, 1722, in Philadelphia, Bucks and Chester counties, 67 years before the United States Supreme Court came into existence. It is the oldest appellate court in the nation. Its status became official as part of the Judiciary Act of 1722, separating it from the control of the royal governor. The act made significant progress in establishing...
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Editor’s Letter

Posted by on May 13, 2022 in | Comments Off on Editor’s Letter With this edition of Pennsylvania Heritage, we mark the anniversaries of two events that not only sent shock waves across Pennsylvania but also awakened communities to concerns about public and worker safety. Fifty years ago, in June 1972, a tropical cyclone made its way from the Yucatán Peninsula, up the Atlantic Seaboard of the U.S., shifting its strength as it advanced over land and sea....
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The Manumission of Samuel Stephens

Posted by on Mar 19, 2021 in | Comments Off on The Manumission of Samuel Stephens In 1783 Stuart George Dallas and his wife Elizabeth, formerly of the island of Jamaica, filed a manumission contract in Philadelphia for enslaved 12-year-old Samuel “Sammy” Stephens. George Bryan of Pennsylvania’s Supreme Court ordered a writ of habeas corpus for Samuel Stephens to be brought before him on July 1, 1786. The manumission contract, pictured here, is preserved in the Pennsylvania...
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The Formidable Chews of Cliveden Preserve a National Landmark

Posted by on Jun 6, 2016 in | Comments Off on The Formidable Chews of Cliveden Preserve a National Landmark Fifty years ago on October 15, 1966, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed into law the National Historic Preservation Act (NHPA), the federal government’s first official and all-encompassing policy designed to preserve and protect the nation’s irreplaceable historic, cultural, architectural and archaeological sites. The act spurred citizens throughout the country to actively embrace historic...
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Free-Thinking, 19th-Century Style

Posted by on Dec 2, 2013 in | Comments Off on Free-Thinking, 19th-Century Style Francis Ellingwood Abbot (1836–1903) was nothing if not determined. In 1872, as editor of The Index, the nation’s leading free-thought magazine, he began to muster the full force of his small army of subscribers against what was being called “the God-in-the-Constitution amendment.” A philosopher and theologian, he sought to reconstruct theology in accordance with scientific methodology. From the...
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Independence Hall, The Birthplace of a Nation

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Independence Hall, The Birthplace of a Nation September 1824 was a busy month for Phila­delphians. The Mar­quis de Lafayette returned to America for the first time since the Revolution­ary War, and it was rumored that the high point of his tra­vels would be a visit to Penn­sylvania’s venerable State House. Naturally, much of the preparation for his visit cen­tered on the old red brick building where the events of the Revolution had...
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Mailbox

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Mailbox The Afro-American Historical and Cultural Museum, Phila­delphia, has recently acquired the political archives of Robert N. C. Nix, Jr., the first African American to serve on the Pennsylva­nia Supreme Court. To further expand its collections documenting and interpreting the lives and careers of leading African American political leaders and government officials, the museum is seeking documents,...
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Bookshelf

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Bookshelf Saved for the People of Pennsylvania: Quilts from The State Museum of Pennsylvania by Lucinda Reddington Cawley, Lorraine DeAngelis Ezbiansky, and Denise Rocheleau Nordberg Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, 1997 ($14.95, paper, 67 pages) Since its founding in 1905, The State Museum of Pennsylvania has collected nearly two million artifacts and objects which docu­ment and interpret...
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The Country Connection: Farmers Markets in the Public Eye

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on The Country Connection: Farmers Markets in the Public Eye They brought sausages and wursts of all kinds, smierkase, a cottage cheese mixed with cream or milk, dried fruits, buttermilk, apple snits, a gingerbread called lep kuchen, teas, baked goods, fruits, vegetables, eggs, honey, poul­try – both live and dressed – and, beginning just before Memorial Day, abundant flowers of seemingly count­less varieties, some almost unknown today. Truly,...
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New Sweden and The New World – History Lessons From the Morton Homestead

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on New Sweden and The New World – History Lessons From the Morton Homestead Years before William Penn and his Quaker followers set foot on America’s shores, Swedish settlers had established a settlement along the Delaware River and Bay. On this land, now part of both Pennsylvania and Delaware, stands the Morton Homestead, an emissary from a past, an emissary that tells the story of a powerful Swedish king, a white, sandy shore and primeval forest, peaceful fur...
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