In October 1988 the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of the beginning of construction on Pennsylvania's first super-highway. October 1990 will mark the similar anniversary of the turnpike 's official opening to traffic. Probably few of those who travel the turnpike today are aware that the route was originally planned as a railroad and that after two years of construction in the 1880's, the project lay abandoned for fifty-three years before the Turnpike Commission revived it.
1989 Summer, Volume 6, Number 1
The story of Molly Pitcher of Monmouth, firing her cannon at the British over the body of her husband, was (and is) a popular part of the history of the War of the Revolution, as read by Americans after 1840. After the story had been repeated in one historical account after another and depicted in several well-known prints, it became widely accepted as an accurately recounted event.
This author's interest in the cityscape of Mechanicsburg was aroused several years ago during a bit of genealogical research. A letter written by Mollie Schafhirt in 1893 describes as "Tower Hill" the section of Mechanicsburg to which she had come as a bride. The house, on East Coover Street, still displays a tower. Nearby are five other houses with towers, all sitting on a hill at Coover and Market Streets.
Passageways evolve out of topography and out of the general location of the area with reference to destinations. For about seventy miles the Cumberland Valley of Pennsylvania extends southwestward from the Susquehanna River across from Harrisburg to the Potomac River in Maryland.
Most people are unaware of the unique origin of the Borough of Newville, Cumberland County. Early towns usually grew up around springs, taverns or industries. Newville was planned by a church and laid out on church property.