Altoona, Pennsylvania

“ In order to give its division heads that tremendous training, the Pennsylvania sends its men through its own West Point, the great shops at Altoona. The men who have sat in the big, roomy office in Broad Street Station, Philadelphia, and who have been addressed as president, have been proud of the days when they were up in the hills of the Keystone State, standing their trick in overalls at the lathe, or carrying chain and rod over long stretches of track. To-day every Pennsylvania superintendent, possibly with a single exception or two, is a civil or mechanical engineer. ”

“ For nearly eleven miles we were carried without steam, and with the brakes on, through very fine scenery, down the mountain-side, but the summit was crossed in the darkness of a tunnel 1200 yards long. There are some striking engineering feats in the way of curves and gradients, and the trace of the line is very bold all the way down to Altoona, where the Pennsylvania Railroad engine and machinery shops are established—the centre of a population of some 17,000 souls, where twenty years ago "there were," as a friend said, "only bears, deer, woodpeckers, and skallywags." The Duke, Mr. ”

“ Pennsylvania Railroad Shops, Altoona
Leaving Harrisburg behind, we pass the splendid new bridge of the Pennsylvania Railroad, across the Susquehanna (Fig. 29) , and go through the gap in Blue mountain. Soon we turn away from the main river and enter the winding valley of the Juniata. The grades are easy, the roadbed is smooth, and by deep cuts through the rocks the curves have been made less abrupt. It is only when one looks out of the car window that the land is found to be rugged and mountainous. ”

“ The growth of Altoona dates from the entrance of the railroad in 1885–6. At that time it was a town of some 300 inhabitants, and a dozen business houses. The development of the oil and gas fields in the vicinity in the '90s added greatly to the importance of the city. ”

“ Is the center of one of the richest bituminous coal and natural gas districts in the world. Oil fields lie mainly in basins of Allegheny and Ohio Rivers. Staple manufactures are iron, steel and glass. The history of Allegheny County presents a greater variety of startling incidents than almost any other portion of the state. Mound builders were primeval inhabitants, site of ancient fortifications are on Chartier’s Creek, eight miles from Pittsburgh, county seat, second city in size in the state, on site of Shannopin’s Town, chief of about twenty families of Delawares ”

“ Ole Bull’s Castle, with a great stone wall, still partly standing, was built about a mile below Oleona, on the crest of a bluff. Travel is generally good in summer, during the winter the heavy snowdrifts are often too deep for passage, temperature often falling to 40° below zero.
Coudersport, county seat, settled in 1807; population 2836; courthouse, substantial, colonial building in the square, on the main street; in the grounds is the Soldiers’ Monument, a granite shaft, pedestal has names of Potter County men who fell in war for the Union. ”

“ Indeed, if beauty of scenery is the attracting cause, we know of no more glowing outline of shore and mountain than hems the summer traveler, over the Alleghenies and along the rich wooded banks of the Ohio. Western Pennsylvania, with its Juniata, and its heavy-forested mountains, has no rival in the world of silvan beauty. The heights are sharp, and bold; the torrents are foamy, and wreathed into combing waterfalls, that drip, to the eye, through bowers of green. You see below you tops of woods, and forests that seem bandlets of shrubbery, and great rivers that are ribbons of silver. ”

“ In writing of the Delaware Valley, Edmund Clarence Stedman says: “But here there is no swooning of the languid air, and no seeming always afternoon; it is a morning land with every cliff facing the rising sun; the mist and languor are in the grain fields far below; the hills themselves are of the richest, darkest green; the skies are blue and fiery; the air crisp, oxygenated, American; it is no place for lotus eating, but for drinking water of the fountain of youth, till one feels the zest and thrill of a new life that is not unrestful, yet as far as may be from the lethargy of mere repose.” ”

“ West Park and River Park are also in Allentown; west of the city is Dorney’s Park, along Cedar Creek. In Center Square is the{426} Soldiers’ Monument to the men of Lehigh County in the Civil War; on the pedestal are bronze bas-reliefs depicting scenes of war and reconciliation, and medallion busts of Generals Meade, McClellan, Hancock, and Hartranft. United States post office, at the corner of Sixth and Turner Streets, classic, built in 1906; brick and Indiana limestone; architect, George B. Page, Philadelphia. Several fine churches of brick or stone show Italian and Gothic architecture. ”

“ The reason of this was, all the accounts of the country north and west of the rivers, Ohio, Allegheny, and the Connewango Creek, represented it as dangerous to go into the country. In the latter part of said year I received three hundred and ninety warrants, the property of the Penn Population company for land situated in the Triangle and entered the same year in my book of entries. In 1793 I made an attempt to go; went to the mouth of Buffalo Creek to inquire of the Indians there whether they would permit me to go into my district to make surveys. ”

“ The country northwest has well-cultivated farm lands; that, southeast, blends with the Pocono Highlands, is wild and picturesque; an almost unbroken wilderness for thirty miles, excepting along the line of the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western Railroad; on both sides of this road are good highways; the main road, the whole length of the valley, is exceptionally fine. ”

“ In cities containing over fifty thousand inhabitants, except Philadelphia, all aldermen in office at the time of the adoption of this Constitution shall continue in office until the expiration of their commissions, and at the election for city and ward officers in the year one thousand eight hundred and seventy-five one alderman shall be elected in each ward as provided in this Constitution. ”

“ Oh, it has its delights! It makes us sufficient unto ourselves! The old Dominion is a world in itself, complete in all its parts."
"But you have to come to Philadelphia to see a great city and get a taste of metropolitan life," said Colden.
Then a discussion, friendly but warm arose as to the respective merits of the Virginia and Pennsylvania provinces, and when it was at its height and the attention of all the others was absorbed in it, Tayoga leaned over and whispered to Robert:
"What did you see at the door, Dagaeoga?" ”

“ Civilization impinges on humanity in Pennsylvania perhaps not more unfairly or cruelly than elsewhere; but the contrasts are shockingly apparent.
But we came to look at the hills and the river, not at the social relativities. And the hills are as sadly marked as the human moles who burrow into them. There is no desecration of a mountain so blighting as the sinking of a mine into its heart. The dark mouth of the shaft, high up on the side of the hill, is repulsive as a cancer to the eye searching for beauty. ”

“ The whole county is a continuous prospect of intensely picturesque scenery; surface mountainous, with ranges broken into innumerable, irregular spurs, indented by streams; from many hilltops views of the greater part of the county may be seen; the “Knobs,” its loftiest summit, is constantly in view, and the intermediate country, a panorama of natural beauty, ever changing in atmospheric effects; all the creeks, tributaries of the West Branch of the Susquehanna, have scenery which beggars description, a veritable feast for the painter, poet, and romancer ”

“ Probably the first white man to cross the county was David Zeisberger, who passed down the Allegheny River to mouth of the Tionesta, Forest County, in 1767; his journal, now on file in the Moravian Library at Bethlehem, tells of the wild beauty of the county. Farming and stock raising are gaining, but the main industry is still lumbering, with second growth of hardwoods, maple, beech, and birch, which will in time be a great nucleus of wealth. ”

“ The Provincial Government had been warned that a band of Indians had left the West on an expedition to the forks of the Susquehanna, but paid no heed until too late.
These Indians crossed the Allegheny Mountains, through the headwaters 722of the Otzinachson, now called West Branch, near Clearfield, thence through the “Great Plains,” now known as Penn’s Valley, Center County, through the gaps of Penn’s Creek, in Paddy Mountains, where they struck the white settlements along the creek, commencing at the present town of New Berlin and down the stream for about a mile in what is now Snyder County. ”

“ When the United States were yet very young, in fact, before the Federal Constitution was even proposed, before Washington was elected president, when the small cluster of log huts, protected by a stockade called Fort Pitt, was all that constituted Pittsburgh, is the time this old newspaper began its long and honorable career. ”

“ You are women. Take the advice of a wise man and remove immediately. We therefore assign you two places to go—either to Wyoming or Shamokin. You may go to either of these places and then we shall have you more under our eye and shall see how you behave. Don’t deliberate, but remove away and take this belt of wampum.”
The old chief handed them the wampum and told the Delaware that, as there was other business to transact, they should depart from the council. There was no diplomatic mincing of words in the speech of the Onondaga chief. ”

“ The northern branch of the Ohio, known as the Alleghany River, has a length of four hundred miles, and its source is in the county of Potter, in northern Pennsylvania. It takes a very circuitous course through a portion of New York state, and re-enters Pennsylvania flowing through a hilly region, and at the flourishing city of Pittsburgh mingles its waters with its southern sister, the Monongahela.
The region traversed by the Alleghany is wild and mountainous, rich in pine forests, coal, and petroleum oil ”

“ M. Talon, who was general manager, planned improvements on a large scale. He built a horsepower grist mill, several stores, a tavern, for which a license was granted in August, 1794, to Mr. Lefevre. A small Catholic chapel was erected, and later a theatre was built. They set up a bakery and built a brewery. A post was established with Philadelphia.
Most of the emigrants had been wealthy, and some of them members of the royal household, entirely ignorant of farming and unused to manual labor, found great difficulty in adapting themselves to their new conditions. ”

“ Several years ago more than one thousand persons from every section of Pennsylvania, and not a few from Southern New York State, journeyed to a most out-of-the-way place up in the wilds of Potter County to do homage to the memory of a great man, and to view the scene of one of the saddest failures in the history of the settlement of our great Commonwealth. ”

“ Zion Reformed Church at Allentown sheltered our Liberty Bell and the Christ Church bells during the Revolution; among their thirty churches in Philadelphia and vicinity, of Gothic architecture, stone, are the First Church, Fiftieth and Locust Streets; oldest of this denomination in Philadelphia; moved from Tenth and Wallace Streets; Palatinate, Fifty-sixth Street and Girard Avenue; St. John’s, Fortieth and Spring Garden Streets; and Trinity, northeast corner of Broad and Venango Streets. There are also five churches of the Dutch Reformed. ”

“ The deadly disease swept away whole families. Eleven persons died in one house within a day.
Philadelphia with 50,000 population in 1792 was then not only the largest and busiest city of the Nation but its seat of government. The Congress moved from the city to Germantown; President George Washington and the members of his Cabinet and their families departed the city, and every person who could afford it followed their example. ”

“ The railroad, trolley and automobile and the approach of the city and its people, have compelled the old ways to succumb, and one of the most romantic and attractive of features of Pennsylvania life, such as exists in no other state, will soon be lost. ”

“ Philadelphia lost power as New York City gained it. Though the counties tributary to Philadelphia constituted the old center of population and political power, the significant fact of growth in Pennsylvania was the increasing importance of Pittsburgh at the gateway to the Ohio Valley. In the Great Valley beyond the Blue Ridge lived the descendants of those early Germans and Scotch- Irishmen who early occupied the broad and level fields of this fertile zone, the granary of Pennsylvania. ”

“ Foster wrote “Old Uncle Ned” and “Old Folks at Home”; was native of Pittsburgh; his grave is in Allegheny Cemetery. The view{296} from Highland Park is very beautiful. Highland and Schenley Parks are connected by Highland Avenue and the Boulevard, making a continuous drive which forms the Carnegie promenade. The Soldiers’ Monument is on Monument Hill, erected in 1871, to four thousand men of Allegheny County killed in the Civil War. Wayside Fountain, Fifth Avenue near Woodland Road. ”

“ Through William Penn’s liberal policy to early settlers, and later being the seat of government of the United States, many national institutions were originated here, and many more historical buildings are here than in any other city in America. It comprises the whole of Philadelphia County, and has a distinctive character of its own, reminiscent of the old Quaker life, which is given in this book in two Colonial Walks; the Revolutionary Period is given in automobile routes, framed on Washington’s itinerary ”