Pennsylvania Historic Preservation

Blog of the Pennsylvania State Historic Preservation Office

Month: January 2013

Silver Broach

Camp Security

January 30, 2013 / / 1 Comment

Camp Security is a Revolutionary War period prisoner-of-war camp occupied by British, Scottish and Canadian prisoners and camp followers (often wives and other family members) between 1781 and the end of the war in 1783. The site is located about four miles east of the City of York, in a relatively small, undeveloped portion of suburban Springettsbury Township. Thirty years ago, PHMC archaeologists Barry Kent and Charles Hunter, with a small field crew, located over 100 archaeological features containing artifacts dating to the latter part of the 18th century. In all likelihood, these materials are related to the prisoner-of-war camp. Most of the features are pits which were dug into the ground and which ultimately became receptacles for a variety of domestic debris associated with the occupation of the camp. Continue reading

Pennsylvania At Risk: Twenty-Year Retrospective of Pennsylvania’s Endangered Historic Properties

January 23, 2013 / / 0 Comments

Preservation Pennsylvania established the annual Pennsylvania At Risk list in 1992, making us the first statewide preservation organization in the United States to have an annual roster of endangered historic properties.  Since 1992, we have listed and worked to preserve more than 200 endangered historic resources, including individual buildings, historic districts and thematic resources statewide.   Continue reading

Interns Makenzie and Robyn on a PennDOT Bridge Replacement Scoping.

Preservation’s Next Generation: PennDOT/PHMC Internships in Cultural Resource Management

January 16, 2013 / / 2 Comments
Hannah

Hannah touring the Lackawanna Coal Mine

If you’ve been to a preservation or archaeology conference lately, you may have found yourself looking out at a sea of grey heads. The generation that began working on public projects in the 1970’s and 1980’s with the initial implementation of Federal and State Historic and Archaeological Preservation laws and regulations, is now retiring. These are the people who invented what is known as Cultural Resource Management (CRM). If important historic places are going to continue to be protected and managed for the future, a new generation of cultural resource professionals will have to carry the standard. Continue reading

Pamela at the Broad Street Market Building (1878)

New Year, New Approach to Environmental Review

January 9, 2013 / / 0 Comments

As we ring in a new year, the PA Historic Preservation Office (PA HPO) is also fine tuning a new approach to the review of state and federal projects that have the potential to affect historic structures.  The review process, mandated by federal law (Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966 as amended) and state law (the PA History Code), is a core responsibility of all state historic preservation offices.  Here in Pennsylvania we have made some changes in order to expedite and streamline our review process. Continue reading

The Agricultural History Project Regions Map

The Agricultural History Project: Agricultural Regions Map

January 2, 2013 / / 0 Comments

Did you know that the Lehigh Valley was once a major producer of potatoes? Or that Tioga County had a robust tobacco-growing industry? Or that Southwestern Pennsylvania was known for its sheep farms? The list of agricultural products grown and produced in Pennsylvania over the past 300 years is as long and diverse as the state is large. When you put all of these pieces of information on a map, some very interesting and unexpected patterns emerge, and these patterns have a lot to tell us about why our agricultural buildings and landscapes look the way that they do. Continue reading

The Pennsylvania Agricultural History Project: Researcher’s Guide

January 2, 2013 / / 1 Comment

The Pennsylvania Agricultural History Project involved a unique partnership among the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation, and the Pennsylvania State University with funding from the Federal Highway Administration and the federal Preserve America program.  An outcome of the project is a comprehensive website that addresses the scope and character of Pennsylvania’s agricultural resources.  Research for the project began in 2001.  We are proud to release the culmination of this 12+ year partnership on our website at: http://phmc.info/aghistory.

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Replica of the John Beale Bordley marker being set up at the 2012 Farm Show photo by CHRIS KNIGHT, The Patriot-News

Scavengers, Markers, and Ice Cream at the PA Farm Show

January 2, 2013 / / 0 Comments

To celebrate PHMC’s 2012 annual theme “The Land of Penn and Plenty: Bringing History to the Table,” Historical Marker Program staff developed a scavenger hunt featuring markers related to Pennsylvania’s rural and agricultural history for the 2012 Pennsylvania Farm Show.

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Uncommon Modern

January 2, 2013 / / 1 Comment

Professional Offices, Chester, Delaware County. Photograph by Betsy Manning.

Being one of the earliest areas of European settlement in the United States means that Pennsylvania has an incredible, and in some ways unrivaled, architectural legacy that encompasses every major era in American history.  We’ve got colonial taverns, frontier log cabins, charming farmhouses, monumental churches, imposing 19th century factories, one-of-a-kind government buildings, and everything else in between.  But being the place where so many important events of our nation’s founding took place, and where America’s industrial age flourished, also means that the buildings that came after those periods don’t often get the attention or respect they deserve.  That’s right, I’m talking about Modernism – the buildings of the post World War II era.  The architecture of the automobile.  The design of the Space Age.

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Sharing What Pennsylvanians Love About Pennsylvania!

January 2, 2013 / / 0 Comments

Dale Engle Walker House Buffalo Township Union County

As the Commonwealth’s State Historic Preservation Office, the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission’s Bureau for Historic Preservation (BHP) is responsible for partnering with all the citizens of Pennsylvania to advocate for the protection of the Commonwealth’s natural and cultural heritage.  To do this, the Bureau for Historic Preservation (BHP) develops a statewide strategic plan every five years that lays out goals and actions steps that will guide our priorities over the next five years.  It’s a big job to develop and implement this plan, because, as you know, Pennsylvania is a very big and historic place.  To preserve and protect our important history, we need everyone to pitch in.  And, this is why I’m sending you this inaugural message about BHP’s latest effort to improve our communication with all of you!  I’m hoping that you will be receptive to our messages and that we will hear back from you!

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