Pennsylvania Historic Preservation

Blog of the Pennsylvania State Historic Preservation Office

Category: Environmental Stewardship (Page 2 of 3)

2015: The Year of the Pennsylvania Barn

June 10, 2015 / / 6 Comments

by Curt Musselman

YearOfPAlogo

Official Year of the Pennsylvania Barn logo designed by Bob McIlhenny, 2014, using barn woodcut by Annie Rubel, 2013

Ten years ago,  Historic Gettysburg Adams County (HGAC) received a grant from the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission (PHMC) to help establish a barn preservation program within Adams County. One of our first steps was to begin a survey of the historic barns in the county so that we would know more about the resources we were trying to save. Teams of HGAC volunteers photographed, measured and made observations about the style and construction techniques used on each barn. One of the first things that we learned was that 80 percent of the barns in Adams County are of an architectural type known as the Pennsylvania Barn. This type of barn has two distinctive characteristics; entrance to the second floor by means of a bridge or a built-up ramp, and an overhang or cantilevered forebay on the front of the barn. Within Pennsylvania, these bank barns evolved in the 18th and 19th centuries to their ultimate form, which was influenced by traditional designs brought to America by immigrants coming from Switzerland through Germany. Continue reading

Ceramic figurine uncovered along I-95 in Fishtown. Courtesy of PennDOT.

Digging Deep: Pennsylvania and the Making Archaeology Public Initiative

May 20, 2015 / / 2 Comments

by Joe Baker, PennDOT Cultural Resources Program

Dr. Frank Vento along the banks of the Susquehanna River. Photo by Joe Baker.

Dr. Frank Vento along the banks of the Susquehanna River. Photo by Joe Baker.

On a lovely morning in early autumn, I arrive at an old farm along the Susquehanna River to find Dr Frank Vento in his natural element. That is to say, he is squatting down at the bottom of backhoe trench some eight feet deep, carefully examining the many layers of flood-deposited sediment left behind by the great river. Frank is a geomorphologist: a geologist and archaeologist whose specialty is the formation of floodplains, terraces, and other kinds of landforms created by the interaction of climate, gravity, water, wind, and sometimes, humans. Frank is down there looking for something, and as I walk up to the edge of the trench, he finds it.

“Hah! I knew it!” Continue reading

Offbeat Outing: Shades of Grey – On the Road in Pike County

May 13, 2015 / / 0 Comments
The mansion at Grey Towers National Historic Site.

The mansion at Grey Towers National Historic Site.

Offbeat Outings is a bi-monthly series that highlights the travels of BHP staff as they experience history first-hand throughout Pennsylvania.

 

Although I’m Pennsylvania born and raised, I’m the first to (sheepishly) admit that there are many counties within the Commonwealth where I have never stepped foot. So when the invitation arose under the guise of project and covenant review to visit Pike County in the far northeast reaches, I eagerly accepted and grabbed an able co-pilot, Karen Arnold, for what turned out to be a gorgeous day in April. (Disclaimer:  the musings of one mere BHP staffer does not do these places justice –if you’ve never been, add them to your bucket list – they do not disappoint [unlike my writing skills]). Continue reading

‘Disaster Planning for Historic Properties’ Exhibit Debuts at the PA State Association of Township Supervisors Conference

April 29, 2015 / / 3 Comments

Staff from the PA State Historic Preservation Office were on location at the Pennsylvania State Association of Township Supervisors’ (PSATS) 93rd Annual Educational Conference and Trade Show in Hershey, Dauphin County, from April 19-21 to promote the Commonwealth’s new Disaster Planning for Historic Properties Initiative and to convey the importance of considering the impacts of a variety of natural disaster types upon historic resources. Continue reading

Mt. Carmel Borough, Northumberland County. Photo by Dave Maher.

Preservation in a Changing Economic Climate

January 21, 2015 / / 5 Comments

Many of Pennsylvania’s communities face the challenging task of adapting to a vastly different economic climate than the one that led to their historic growth and development.  This new economic reality of dramatically reduced population, deindustrialization and loss of tax base has resulted in historic downtowns and residential neighborhoods pockmarked by disinvestment and vacant properties.  Abandoned, demolished or marginally repurposed historic churches, schools and factories are especially vivid reminders of changing times and the large social and economic forces at work. Continue reading

BHP’s Offbeat Outings: Worlds End

June 11, 2014 / / 0 Comments

Offbeat Outings is a bi-monthly series that highlights the travels of BHP staff as they experience history first-hand throughout Pennsylvania.

A few weeks ago, I headed north on Friday afternoon and drove just over 100 miles to Worlds End State Park in Sullivan County.  Until living in Harrisburg and working for the Pennsylvania State Historic Preservation Office, my territory was mostly focused south and east of Franklin County.  Traveling north by myself was a new experience.  Having had some pretty great adventures, I was surprised by this experience and by finding a landscape of such dynamic character.  Continue reading

Farm to City Week, November 22-28, 2013

November 13, 2013 / / 0 Comments

Farm-City Week was a national initiative begun in the 1950s to recognize the interdependence between rural and urban people, emphasizing the linked economies of agriculture and the industries that produced the machinery and products used by farmers to grow food and get it onto urban tables. Today many counties across Pennsylvania still host events observing Farm-City Week to bring attention to the mutual concerns of agricultural and urban communities. Continue reading

The South Mountain Region

Historic Preservation Opportunities Found Through Collaborative Management

September 18, 2013 / / 0 Comments

What should you do for something you enjoy having in your life –a favorite building, deli, museum, music collection, antique, pet, or person?  You ensure its survival by providing healthy surroundings.  What if your labor to support and protect what you hold dear is eased by others who feel the same?  Many hands make light work.  What if that shared labor meant coordinating over fifty organizations composed of non-profits, businesses, and local, state, and federal partners?  Things would get a bit complex.  This is both the opportunity and the challenge of collaboratively managing – involving multiple stakeholder groups along with conventional managers, researchers, and specialists – in managing historic resources. Continue reading

Farmstead in the Oley Valley. Credit: Zachary Pyle.

Preserving the Oley Valley Rural Historic District in Pennsylvania

July 17, 2013 / / 0 Comments

by Brenda Barrett

Editor’s Note: This post was originally published in the Living Landscape Observer and appears here with the permission of the author and founder of that publication, Brenda Barrett.  We appreciate Brenda’s contributions and reporting on this subject.

Oley Valley gristmill. Credit: Zachary Pyle.

Oley Valley gristmill. Credit: Zachary Pyle.

Even in a state famous for its agricultural landscapes, the Oley Valley in southeast Pennsylvania is an exceptional place. Located in a in a bowl-shaped valley flanked by the forested hills of the Reading Prong and underlain by limestone, the region is drained by two small creeks, the Manataway and the smaller Monocacy. English Quakers, French Huguenots, and Palatine farmers from Switzerland and Germany settled in the valley as early as 1725 in search of religious freedom and good farmland. They found both, producing an 18th-century pattern of farmsteads, fields, and villages that has marked the landscape ever since. Continue reading

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