Millersville University, Millersville, Lancaster County

I ended up skipping last week's post mainly on account of the weather. My longtime readers may remember that as someone with multiple chronic medical conditions, I tend to be at the mercy of the weather, and the subzero temperatures which have plagued Pennsylvania in recent weeks have really done a number on me. Fortunately, this week things are much more normal for the time of the year, so I can be more myself again.

Speaking of being myself, Zenkaikon is looming next month as it always does. I'll be making three history-themed presentations, and I'm really looking forward to sharing all of them. I think the one about samurai warriors visiting the White House during James Buchanan's presidency will be the most interesting (one of the warriors had a crush on Buchanan's niece!) but hopefully they will all be good, and if they're made available on YouTube I'll be sure to provide links for anyone interested.

In the spirit of the annual trip to Lancaster, we're heading for that county in this week's quest, thanks to some guest photography from one of my fellow congoers. I think this might actually be my first Lancaster County post set outside of the city of the same name. If you've ever heard of a "normal school" and wondered what it was, we're going to answer that question.

Gnadenhütten, Lehighton, Carbon County

As promised, after last week's unusual post, it's back to business as usual. I had hoped to finish my Carbon County book last October, but life has a tendency to get in the way. Between work, health, weather, and the holidays, I haven't gotten it done. But it's almost done. I have two chapters and an afterword left to finish, plus some tweaks I want to make to the finished chapters, and I'm hoping to get it wrapped up in the next few weeks.

So when I was trying to decide what to write about this week, I took a poll on the blog's Facebook account asking if people would rather have a new quest or another sneak peek at the book. It was a close call (things were in a dead heat even when I woke up this morning), but the tie finally broke with one last vote to do a sneak peek. 

The original post about Gnadenhütten remains one of the most popular I've ever done, and I'm extremely proud of how I've fleshed it out in the book. I won't share the entire chapter, but here's a look at some of the detailing, including an image I've never before shared on this blog.