As I threatened last week, this column is a report on our visit to Chautauqua this summer. In addition to “settling in” to our new summer house inside the Institution, we were treated to a wonderful variety of experiences – high level lectures, concerts, classes, and memorable social occasions – all against a backdrop of beautiful weather. Coupled with the environment of the Institution grounds, it made one think of Camelot. Each week during “the season”, the Institution presents a series of lectures on specific themes, featuring prominent expert speakers in the 4,400 seat Amphitheater. The “Amp” is a covered…

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Forty-five years ago our family acquired a summer cottage at Conneaut Lake; my recollections of the first weekend we spent there are still extremely strong. Each child had his/her own bedroom and access to a bathroom with a tub; Nan and I slept in the kitchen but had our own (shower-equipped) bathroom. Our first summer was spent “settling in” and equipping the cottage with our specific needs. The cottage served us well for three and a half decades and is the scene of many happy memories. This month our extended family is repeating this experience, twenty-first century style, at Chautauqua….

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Once again, I have decided to pontificate on something I really don’t understand. The recent chaos associated with the Administration’s threats and ultimate dramatic expansion of our tariffs has forced me to do some reading on three semi-related topics – the Federal deficit, our trade balance deficit, and tariffs. I think it is appropriate for me to record several relevant bits of information that I have obtained.  One analyst chose to describe our current situation as a major inflection point in our perception of the “World Order”. He subdivided the period since the end of World War II into two…

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Each year I eagerly look forward to the middle of July and the presentation of programs related to the Whiskey Rebellion at our local historical venues. In the past I have greatly enjoyed events in Washington, Pa.; at the Oliver Miller Homestead; and at Woodville. This year’s program at Woodville featured a debate on the Rebellion involving three of my favorite persons – Rob Windhorst, Clay Kilgore, and Brady Crytzer. Brady was selected to be the moderator for the debate, with Rob representing the perspective of the Federal government and Clay that of the local farmers involved in the protest….

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The John B. Higbee Glass Company is a small, but important part of Bridgeville’s heritage. Some of the very first artifacts collected by the Bridgeville Area Historical Society two decades ago were pieces of Higbee tableware. As the years passed our collection grew slowly. Three years ago, in an effort to generate an interest in Higbee Glass, I published a column reporting the initiation of the J. B. Higbee International Glass Collectors Association (JBHIGCA) and drafted all the members of my extended family into the association. My ineffectiveness exploiting social media has been confirmed by the underwhelming response to this…

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Ninety and four! By the time you are reading this, Good Lord willing and the creeks don’t rise, I will be celebrating the ninety-fourth anniversary of my birth, an event I certainly never expected to occur. In 1931 the life expectancy for a male baby was sixty-seven years. As I was growing up, I became comfortable with the concept that one’s ordained life span was “three score and ten”. Consequently, the last twenty-four years have been an unanticipated bonus for me. Whenever I ponder why I have been gifted with this longevity, I vacillate back and forth between two extremes…

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In the past nine years I have gradually become comfortable with the solitary life of a widower, a pleasant life consisting of regular routines interrupted occasionally by minor adventures – lunch with friends, dinner at Beth’s with her family, Historical Society programs, etc. Late last month I was blessed with a visit by my daughter Sara, her husband Jim, and their son Ian. What a difference! Suddenly my house was full of activity and all manner of interesting things were occurring. Every day was an adventure.   On Sunday we went to the Benedum Theater to see the Pittsburgh Civic Light…

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For its final presentation of its 2024/2025 program series the Bridgeville Area Historical Society invited Tom McMillan to discuss “The Year That Made America: From Rebellion to Independence, 1775-1776”, which just happens to be the title of a book he recently published. Mr. McMillan is an old friend of the Historical Society. A few years ago he visited the History Center seeking information on his family (his mother was a Murray) and was rewarded by learning that his grandmother (daughter of William Webb Murray) is actually pictured in our book Bridgeville. Mr. McMillan recently retired after an impressive career as a sports…

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Woodville celebrated Emancipation Day (also known as Juneteenth) with a particularly appropriate program focused on the life of enslaved persons on the Neville estates at Bower Hill and Woodville in post-colonial times. The format for the program was a tour of the Neville House narrated by Rob Windhorst, followed by a demonstration of the cuisine of enslaved persons there by Rob’s wife Erin.  Both presentations were well done and filled with interesting information on a topic that warrants much more exploration. The researchers at Woodville are making a major contribution in our understanding of slavery in western Pennsylvania in the early…

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Bridgeville’s most famous train wreck occurred on April 28, 1907, when a west-bound Wabash Pittsburgh Terminal Railway (WPTR) passenger train “jumped the track” while on the bridge over Chartiers Creek north of town. Fortuitously, three occupied passenger cars came uncoupled during the incident; only the engine, tender, and one empty passenger car went into the Creek. The remaining cars coasted into Bridgeville and came to a stop. The only fatalities were the engineer and the fireman. Because of several unusual factors that prevented injuries to the rest of the crew and the train’s one hundred passengers, its story deserves to…

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