Lancaster County

I think my best friend Andrea is feeling a little wistful about our annual trip to Lancaster. Normally we're there every spring for Zenkaikon, but - like the vast majority of fan conventions - it was canceled because of COVID-19. We're planning to take a run down there sometime in the coming weeks to collect some more of my markers, but for this week's post she asked me to write about "something from Lancaster." So I thought, why not write about Lancaster itself?

The marker is situated on North Duke
Street, right in front of the
Lancaster County Courthouse

The first thing you should know about Lancaster in Pennsylvania is that the pronunciation may not be what you think. Over in England, from which the name originates, it's pronounced as "Lan-CAS-ter." But if you're local to this Lancaster, you probably already know that you say it as "LANK-iss-ter." No, I don't know why it's different.

As the marker notes, Lancaster County was formed in 1729 from a chunk of Chester County. Chester was one of the three original counties created by William Penn himself; Lancaster was the first subdivision and became the fourth county in the commonwealth. The name came from Lancashire in England, which was the birthplace of an early settler, a man named John Wright. As settlement increased, parts of Lancaster County were further subdivided to form York, Cumberland, Berks, Northumberland, Dauphin, and Lebanon Counties.

Lancaster was a popular destination for European settlers, who were drawn by Penn's promise of religious freedom, but it already had a sizable indigenous population. The Susquehannock nation was among the earliest to live in the area; the new arrivals called them the Conestoga, after the name of their principal village. By the time Lancaster County was formed, the Susquehannock had been absorbed by the Iroquois, and many if not most of them had converted to Christianity. Many of them could speak English, and their new neighbors found them peaceful and got on well with them. Pontiac's Rebellion, in 1763, would unfortunately change that, and usher in a very ugly chapter in Lancaster's history, but that's the subject of a future blog post so I'll defer it for now.

The reality is that history isn't always pretty, much as I might want it to be, and that's been the hardest thing about writing this blog. But if we do not learn from the mistakes of our past, we're never going to be better in the future.

Lancaster has a diverse population, as noted by the sign, and this is true both in terms of ethnic backgrounds and also religion. Lititz, a community planned by the Moravian Church (Count Zinzendorf strikes again!), is the location of Linden Hall School for Girls; founded in 1746, this highly regarded institution is one of the oldest schools in continuous operation in the United States. The Moravians also established the Ephrata Cloister not too far from Lititz. That has its own marker and will probably be a long blog post when I get to it. Lititz has another particular claim to fame - the Julius Sturgis Pretzel Bakery, seen at left; this is the oldest pretzel bakery in the United States, founded by the great-grandson of a survivor of the Gnadenhuetten massacre. Lancaster is also home to many Amish and Mennonite people; the Mennonite community founded by Hans Herr, in 1719, is the oldest surviving settlement of European immigrants in the county, and one of the oldest in the nation. I previously wrote about Joseph Simon, a prominent Jewish man in the city, and there remains a strong Jewish presence in the county to this day. Additionally, many French Huguenots fled Catholic persecution in their native lands and settled here.

As the United States became an actual country and moved into the 1800s, Lancaster became prominent due to two particular statesmen. James Buchanan is, at least thus far, the only Pennsylvanian ever to be elected President; his home, Wheatland, is in the city of Lancaster. As you can see here, it's a fine Federal-style mansion, and for the last several years it has operated as a museum. Both the man and the house have their own markers. The other one of whom I speak is Thaddeus Stevens, a man I personally admire very much. This noted "Radical Republican" was not native to Lancaster (he was born in Vermont), but moved there and spent much of his political career there. He was an outspoken opponent of slavery and a fervent supporter of the abolition movement. Both Buchanan and Stevens are buried in Lancaster.

Lancaster gave us a number of other notables as well. General Hand, the physician-soldier from the Revolutionary War, lived (and entertained George Washington) at his estate at Rock Ford. Washington's favorite entertainer, dancer and musician John Durang, lived in Lancaster and has a puppet theater in the city named for him. It was the site of the Christiana Riot, which I mentioned briefly in the post about Richard Moore, and the home of William Parker, a key figure in that event. Milton S. Hershey, the famous chocolatier, first learned his trade in the city of Lancaster before setting up shop. This is the tip of the iceberg; being so old and so historical, it's not surprising that the county would spawn many famous names. The city of Lancaster even spent thirteen years as the capital of Pennsylvania.

A Lancaster Amish quilt on display at the
Lancaster History Museum.
Sorry about the weird angle.

Lancaster also contributes heavily to the arts and education fields. Lancaster Bible College, Franklin & Marshall College, Millersville University, and the Thaddeus Stevens College of Technology are all located here, among several others. Lancaster innovations include the first battery-powered watch, the Conestoga wagon (and the practice of driving on the right side of the road), and the Pennsylvania Long Rifle - just for starters. Possibly the county's most famous contribution to the arts is the Amish quilt. According to a display at the Lancaster History Museum about the quilts, the distinctive details of these quilts makes it possible to identify them as coming from a particular time period, community, and sometimes even the exact family. Their uniqueness "results from the nature of the closed Amish community, in which families typically pass down piecing and quilting patterns," and while many modern quilts are made to be sold to visitors and thus use more printed fabric, quilts the Amish make for their own use adhere to traditional design restrictions.

I had the amusing experience not long ago of being quoted in one of LancasterHistory.org's email newsletters. I commented on one of their Facebook posts to ask, "Is there a word for feeling homesick for places where you don't actually live? I miss Lancaster." Because I do. It'll be great to be able to visit it once again, and I hope that if you get the chance, you'll visit too. I look forward to getting to know each of our counties this way!

A room with a view: gazing down on Penn Square
in the city of Lancaster from the Lancaster
County Convention Center

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Sources and Further Reading:

Official website of Lancaster County

Official website of the City of Lancaster

LancasterHistory.org

LancasterOnline.com

LancasterPA.com

DiscoverLancaster.com

Lancaster County at the Historical Marker Database

If you've enjoyed this, please leave a comment!

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Except where indicated, all writing and photography on this blog is the intellectual property of Laura Klotz. This blog is written with permission of the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission. I am not employed by the PHMC. All rights reserved.