A Signature Series Bus trip was taken to Winterthur Museum, Garden and Library on Wednesday, October 5, 2011 to see "Paint, Pattern & People: Furniture of Southeastern Pennsylvania, 1725-1850." This exhibit, on view through January 8, 2012, prominently displays two items on loan from the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission’s Ephrata Cloister. 



Accompanying the exhibition is a major scholarly book, authored by Winterthur Senior Curator Wendy A Cooper and Assistant Curator Lisa Minardi.  Cooper and Minardi presented a special exhibition lecture to Heritage Society members during their visit. 

On June 21st, Dr. Jon Butler of Yale University presented the Signature Series lecture to Pennsylvania Heritage Society members and guests at The State Museum of Pennsylvania, Harrisburg, followed by a dessert reception. Coinciding with this year's annual theme adopted by the Pennyslvania Historical and Museum Commission (PHMC), "William Penn's Legacy: Religious and Spiritual Diversity," Dr. Butler spoke on "Religion and Politics in the American Experience, " with a focus on the colonial period. The lecture aligned with the Pennsylvania Heritage Society's Teaching American History professional development institute for teachers held during the same week at The State Museum and the Pennsylvania State Archives.

Dr. Shannon’s lecture was supported by a Teaching American History grant to the Central Susquehanna Intermediate Unit from the United States Department of Education.

On June 22nd, Timothy Shannon, author of Iroquois Diplomacy on the Early American Frontier (2008), and Professor of History at Gettysburg College, presented the Signature Series lecture to Pennsylvania Heritage Society members and guests at The State Museum of Pennsylvania, Harrisburg followed by a dessert reception. 

Dr. Shannon's talk, Pennsylvania's Chain of Friendship with the Iroquois Nations, discussed Pennsylvania's reputation as a "peaceable kingdom" where Indians and colonists lived together in cooperation and friendship rather than fear and hatred.  The lecture examined Pennsylvania's long diplomatic partnership with its most powerful Indian neighbors, the Iroquois confederacy of New York, and its impact on the colonial and native peoples of Penn's colony.

Dr. Shannon’s lecture was supported by a Teaching American History grant to the Central Susquehanna Intermediate Unit from the United States Department of Education.

For our fourth year, museum stores from the Pennsylvania Trails of History™ and other participants joined us for two days of festive shopping and holiday cheer in the Commonwealth Keystone Building in Harrisburg on November 20-21.

This year's participants included Ephrata Cloister, Landis Valley Museum, Radius: HACC Gallery and The State Museum Store, The Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania Department for Community and Economic Development, and the Pennsylvania Department for Conservation of Natural Resources and Wild Resource Conservation Program. Acorn Services and Tony's Cafe at Keystone provided specialty samplings from The Best of Mennonite Fellowship Meals cookbook, in coordination with a Pennsylvania State Bookstore presentation by one of the book's authors, Phyllis Pellman Good.  The event was sponsored again this year by the Pennsylvania State Employees Credit Union (PSECU).

Visit our Trails of History™ page to learn more about all 25 historic sites and museums.

On June 25, Dr. Matthew Countryman, Associate Professor of History and American Culture at the University of Michigan, presented on civil rights in Philadelphia during the 1960s, and the key players in the Black Power movement.  Heritage Society members and Teaching American History participants enjoyed Dr. Countryman's presentation based on his book, Up South: Civil Rights and Black Power in Philadelphia (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2005), followed by an audience discussion of the era.

Dr. Countryman’s lecture was supported by a Teaching American History grant from the United States Department of Education. Click here for more information on this project.

"The atom changed American life.  Once the new bomb had been developed and used, the world would never be the same.  In the United States, technological developments led to the creation of bigger and better bombs, and the nation's defense strategy changed accordingly.  Meanwhile, Americans worried about the impact of radioactive fallout - and built fallout shelters - as they hoped that the peaceful effects of atomic energy could compensate for its lethal potency.  This lecture examines everything from military strategy to popular culture in describing how Americans dealt with the impact of the bomb."

The Pennsylvania Heritage Society highlighted the PHMC's 2009 theme, "Energy: Innovation and Impact," with a Signature Series lecture by Allan M. Winkler, distinguished professor of History at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio on March 12, 2009 at The State Museum of Pennsylvania in Harrisburg.  Dr. Winkler is the author of several books on Cold War America, including The Cold War (Oxford University Press, 2000), and Life Under a Cloud: American Anxiety About the Atom (Oxford University Press, 1993).  He received Miami University's Benjamin Harrison Medallion for "outstanding contributions to the education of the nation."

Dr. Winkler's lecture was supported by a Teaching American History grant from the U.S. Department of Education. Click here for more information on this project.

This year's Holiday Marketplace was our biggest ever! Fourteen different museum stores from the Pennsylvania Trails of History™ and other partners joined us for two days of festive shopping and holiday cheer in the Commonwealth Keystone Building in Harrisburg, November 20-21, 2008.

This year's participants included Ephrata Cloister; Landis Valley Museum; Pennsbury Manor; Pennsylvania Military Museum; Radius: HACC Gallery and The State Museum Store; The Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania; Somerset Historical Center; The State Bookstore; Pennsylvania Department for Community and Economic Development, and the Pennsylvania Department for Conservation of Natural Resources and Wild Resource Conservation Program. Harrisburg Dairies provided complimentary eggnog to shoppers.  The event was sponsored again this year by the Pennsylvania State Employees Credit Union (PSECU).

Visit our Trails of History™ page to learn more about all 25 historic sites and museums.

About 140 guests joined the PHS and the State Bookstore on October 27 to glean timely political knowledge from noted pollster and Franklin and Marshall College professor G. Terry Madonna.  Speaking just days before election, Dr. Madonna shared his insights on the current election based on elections in history, particularly the 1980 election.  Dr. Madonna is the author of Pivotal Pennsylvania: Presidential Politics from FDR to the Twenty-First Century, which explores Pennsylvania's role in politics beginning in the 1930s, and coincides with the PHMC's celebration of the 75^th anniversary of the New Deal.

PHMC historian Ken Wolensky also provided commentary on the issues and policies of the current election from a 20^th century perspective prior to Dr. Madonna's Signature Series lecture.

Dr. Madonna's book is available online at pabookstore.com.

The event was sponsored in part by PennCord, the Pennsylvania Coalition for Representative Democracy.

Twenty-six members and guests enjoyed a beautiful autumn day viewing New Deal era artworks installed in post office buildings throughout the Scranton and Wilkes Barre areas on October 7.  New Deal mural historian David Lembeck and State Museum curator Curtis Miner provided the fascinating background stories of these artworks and their communities.  The tour included stops at the post offices in Freeland, West Scranton, Pittston, Kingston and Plymouth, as well as the Pennsylvania Anthracite Heritage Museum in Scranton.  Chester Kulesa, site administrator of the museum, hosted the group and provided a special behind the scenes glimpse of the museum's collections storage.

Click here for more photos of the tour.

For more on these artworks, visit The State Museum of Pennsylvania's exhibition "A Common Canvas: Pennsylvania's New Deal Post Office Murals" (see page 41).  The exhibit is co-curated by David Lembeck and Curtis Miner, with photographs by Michael Mumansky.

Dr. Walter Licht, Professor of History at the University of Pennsylvania profiled the history and rise of industrialization in Pennsylvania, and the contrast between industry in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh.  Dr. Thomas Dublin, Professor of History at SUNY-Binghamton, discussed the decline of industrialization in Pennsylvania, specifically in coal, iron and steel regions throughout the Commonwealth.  Licht and Dublin are the co-authors of The Face of Decline: The Pennsylvania Anthracite Region in the Twentieth Century, published by the Cornell University Press in 2005.

Dr. Licht noted that the "Industrial Revolution" of the mid-19th century was really a revolution in textile production specifically, and highlighted the differences between industries in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. Dr. Dublin used the Panther Valley area of the Anthracite region as a case study for the deindustrialization of the coal industry.

These lectures were supported by a Teaching American History grant from the U.S. Department of Education.  Click here for more information on this project.

Heritage Society members and guests enjoyed a memorable visit to the brand new Gettysburg Visitors Center and a fascinating afternoon tour of the Gettysburg Battlefield with Dr. Carol Reardon, a noted military historian and scholar-in-residence at the Penn State University's George and Ann Richards Civil War Institute on Tuesday, May 13, 2008.  Gettysburg Foundation Vice President Elliot Gruber treated the group with an insider view of the creation of the new Visitors Center, while Dr. Reardon's vast knowledge of the battle brought it to life on the field.

As part of the celebration of PHMC’s annual Heritage Week, the Pennsylvania Heritage Society hosted a Signature Serieslecture by Daniel Richter, Professor of History at the University of Pennsylvania, Thursday, March 13, 2008, at The State Museum of Pennsylvania. Entitled “Re-Reading William Penn’s 1681 Letter to the Kings of the Indians,” Dr. Richter explored the significance of a remarkable communication made a little over eight months after Penn first received the royal charter for his colony, and about a year before he visited the it. This fascinating letter provides an interesting perspective into how late seventeenth century English colonizers perceived the place of Native peoples and their land in the empire they were trying to create.

The second annual Holiday Marketplace, a showcase of gift shops of the PHMC's historic sites and museums along the Pennsylvania Trails of History^TM, drew hundreds of State Capitol-based employees and Harrisburg area visitors to the Commonwealth Keystone Building's atrium. Sponsored by the Pennsylvania State Employees Credit Union (PSECU), the event offered holiday items, information about historic sites and museums, costumed interpreters, book signings, and live music all in a festive mood to promote the work and programs of PHMC throughout the Commonwealth

PHS members and guests traveled west to Washington County’s famous Meadowcroft Rockshelter, where they met noted archaeologist James Adovasio, who gave them an in depth tour of the 16,000 year old site – one of the earliest known places of human habitation in North America. The following day the group visited PHMC’S beautiful Old Economy Village near Pittsburgh where they were met by site administrator Mary Ann Landis and staff.

Sixty PHS members and guests from the Bucks County and greater Philadelphia area attended a reception hosted by the Heritage Society to highlight the fall 2007 issue of Pennsylvania Heritage® magazine. Attendees mingled with PHS board members and PHMC leadership and magazine staff at the event, which featured comments from Joe Conti and Irwin Richman, authors of the fall issue cover story on Bucks County artists Faye Swengel and Ben Badura.

Approximately 1,000 adults and schoolchildren enjoyed dynamic Signature Series presentations by Philadelphia native Dr. Guion S. Bluford, Jr., the first African-American to fly in space. In an evening program on September 25 Dr. Bluford delivered “Flying Aboard the International Space Station” before meeting attendees and signing autographs at a reception held in the museum’s Memorial Hall. The following day, Dr. Bluford spoke to students in grades 3 – 12 from fourteen schools in the Harrisburg area about his experience flying on board several space shuttle missions.