Historical Sketch of Elk County

Posted by on Nov 29, 2013 in | Comments Off on Historical Sketch of Elk County Elk County is named for that noble animal that once abounded in the region in great numbers. The last native elk, however, was shot in 1867 in Elk County by an Indian, Jim Jacobs. Today, Pennsylvania’s only Elk herd roams freely over the area bounded by Elk and Cam­eron Counties. It is descended from the Elk herd imported into Pennsylvania in 1913 from Montana and Wyoming. The history of...
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Lehigh County: The Land and Its People

Posted by on Nov 29, 2013 in | Comments Off on Lehigh County: The Land and Its People Lehigh County encompasses the western half of the Lehigh Valley in eastern Pennsylvania. Bounded on the east by the Lehigh River, the main geographical feature of the larger valley, and on the north by the Blue Mountain range, the land is a mosaic of lime­stone plain, sinks and rolling hills. While the southern region of the county lies astride the so-called South Moun­tain and the hills of the...
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One Should Not Overlook Union County

Posted by on Nov 29, 2013 in | Comments Off on One Should Not Overlook Union County Union County on the West Branch of the Susquehanna River is one of Pennsylvania’s smaller counties, encompassing a bare 258 square miles, with a population of 30,000, including 3000 college stu­dents and 1900 inmates of two federal prisons. Few of its residents have held high political office and fewer of its names have appeared in Who’s Who in America. Yet the historical...
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Pike County: A Peak of Natural Perfection

Posted by on Nov 28, 2013 in | Comments Off on Pike County: A Peak of Natural Perfection “I went through a constant succession of scenery that would have been famous had it existed anywhere in Europe.” – Washington Irving   Shaped roughly like a diamond, Pike County is situated in Pennsylvania’s Northern Tier, bordering the Delaware River on the cast across from the states of New York and New Jersey. The northwestern side of the diamond lies in Lake...
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Reading’s Past Will Be a Part of Its Future

Posted by on Nov 28, 2013 in | Comments Off on Reading’s Past Will Be a Part of Its Future Travellers, visitors, or out-of-towners have associated Reading, Pennsylvania, at various times in its history with its most sa­lient industry or activity. In the eighteenth century, had our ancestors been as ready as we to identify a per­son or place solely by one feature, Reading could have been known as “Felt Hat City.” In the nineteenth century, when railroading became one of...
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Erie County: Where Geography Has Shaped History

Posted by on Nov 28, 2013 in | Comments Off on Erie County: Where Geography Has Shaped History Erie County forms the northwest corner of the state, bounded by Lake Erie on the northwest, the states of Ohio and New York on the west and east respectively and parts of Warren and Crawford counties on the east and south. Historically the county was divided into two sections. The sou them region of 259 ,000 acres fell within the original land grant to William Penn. The northern portion of...
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Proclaim Liberty Throughout All the Land

Posted by on Nov 27, 2013 in | Comments Off on Proclaim Liberty Throughout All the Land In the mid-nineteenth century, the Liberty Bell – capped by an eagle from Peale’s Museum – was enshrined in Independence Hall.   Each year thousands of Americans, as well as foreigners, travel to Philadelphia to visit the dozens of historic sites, structures and complexes associated with the nation’s independence. For many, their first stop is a small glass pavil­ion...
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The Unhappy Tale of Building Philadelphia’s City Hall

Posted by on Nov 27, 2013 in | Comments Off on The Unhappy Tale of Building Philadelphia’s City Hall Philadelphia’s City Hall is widely regarded as one of the most im­pressive in the world. A great marble wedding cake that fills the square at Broad and Market streets. So big in fact that it was the largest public building in the country until the Pentagon was built in the early 1940s. The building is also admired as something of an outdoor art museum, with decorative stone and bronze...
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A Quaker Testimony to the American Revolution

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on A Quaker Testimony to the American Revolution On a cool, pleasant early autumn morn­ing in the year 1834, John Price Wetherill made his way hastily down the vacant streets of Philadelphia towards the city’s western edge. Most of the respectable people were already seated in their churches, listening to the angelic sound of a choir or the piercing exhortation of a min­ister. Little did Wetherill care on this Sunday morning about...
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Philadelphia, First

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Philadelphia, First If it happened, it happened in Philadelphia,” so goes an old adage. And one not terribly far from the truth, either. Philadelphia has witnessed much of the history of the early United States. The sign­ing of the Declaration of Inde­pendence, probably the nation’s most hallowed docu­ment, drew the colonies’ lead­ing statesmen – including George Washington, Thomas...
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