Philip Ginter, Summit Hill, Carbon County

Happy October!

I'm still working on the Carbon County marker book - I expect to be finished before too much longer. So it takes up a lot of my mental energy because I'm honestly quite excited for it. (To quote from the recently released trailer for the back half of the Wicked movie, "I'm obsessulated.")

That being the case, here's another preview for my faithful blog readers, revisiting an earlier post. As with the previous post I've done of this sort, this is not the entire chapter, just a truncated version. I have to save some of the good stuff so people will buy the book, after all!

Oliver Pollock, Mechanicsburg, Cumberland County

I've decided to do something a little different for a future blog post. On reddit they sometimes host "Ask Me Anything" (AMA) sessions with various individuals based on their occupations or other life experiences, and I thought it might be interesting to do something like this here. So leave a comment - anonymous if you prefer - asking me anything you've ever wondered about what I do regarding this blog. The questions can be about the markers themselves, about my so-called adventures collecting them, people I've met, things I do or do not do, my cats, my books, and so on. As long as it's a reasonable inquiry, I'll most likely answer it. I'm not sure when I'll post all the answers, it'll depend on how many questions I get and how soon.

Meanwhile, for this week's quest, we're going over a marker I collected two and half years ago. When time permits, Kevin and I like to go marker-hunting in Cumberland County after a meeting of our Sherlock Holmes club, the White Rose Irregulars, and this was one of the results of such a hunt. I will admit that part of the reason it's taken me so long to write about this one is that there's a insignificant portion of the gentleman's history that makes me decidedly uncomfortable.

However, what I didn't learn until much later was that this largely-forgotten figure of the American Revolution has a much bigger claim to fame than anything mentioned on his historical marker, and I'm genuinely surprised that it's not included. He devised a little something that we here in the United States use pretty much every day, but I think it's fair to say that most of us barely give it any thought. It's just something we're taught when we're young and use for the rest of our lives and we rarely, if ever, question its origins.

I'm about to introduce to you the man who invented the dollar sign.

Jenkins' Fort, West Pittston, Luzerne County

I ended up taking last week off from blogging, due to chronic medical nonsense. It's annoying, but sometimes I have to concede defeat for a day or so. On the bright side, I'm in the home stretch on the new book. I had hoped to be finished in time for my birthday, but now it's looking more like the end of September or very early October. I found some cool stuff (or at least I think so) that ended up causing a handful of updates and edits and rewrites, so I'm still plugging away when time and energy permit.

Speaking of history books, I will once again be signing copies of Laury's Island at the Laurys Station Community Day festivities this coming Saturday, September 20th. There will be food trucks, local wineries, craft vendors, a big raffle, live music, fun stuff for kids, community programs and nonprofits (including a camper full of kitties!), and, well, me. Everything kicks off at noon at the Laurys Station fire company headquarters; you can get the details here.

Meanwhile, this week the quest map leads us back to Luzerne County for the first time in a while. Like nearly all of the colonial forts, this one is long gone, but not forgotten.

Carl A. Spaatz, Boyertown, Berks County

Before diving into the heart of this week's post, I wanted to share some fascinating news that's been released by the PHMC (you know, the folks who put up these markers I chase). As part of the celebrations for America's 250th anniversary in 2026, they're going to be organizing some of the historical markers into "trails" according to certain themes. These include We the People, for "stories of identity, belonging, and community," and Unfinished Revolutions, for "ongoing struggles for justice, equity, and freedom." The trails will be announced quarterly, starting this fall, and will be a significant reminder of Pennsylvania's place in our country's history. Check out all the details here!

In other, arguably less exciting news, my longtime readers might remember that this is my birthday week. I am a lot older than I like to think and a lot younger than my body sometimes feels. I was hoping to finish the first marker book in time for the occasion, as a gift to myself, but I've still got a couple chapters to go so I probably won't quite make it. But we're celebrating by going to Knoebels and probably grabbing a few more markers along the way. I hope that you'll celebrate the occasion by doing something nice for yourself. (If you want to do something nice for me as well, consider going back and reading older posts to bump up my hit count for the month!)

As for this week's quest, we're heading to beautiful Berks County, where Boyertown was the birthplace of one of the country's foremost Air Force personnel. You might have heard of him; I'll admit that I never did until I found his marker.

Sylvania Electric Products, Emporium, Cameron County

Still at work on the book I mentioned last week. Have you ever heard the Weird Al song "Everything You Know Is Wrong"? That's sort of how some of the chapters of the book are making me feel. I almost cringe looking at my blog posts on the subject, because it's clear to me that I've grown as a writer in the years since they were first done, but also because so much of what I wrote was based on incorrect information. Granted, that's not entirely my fault, but it's still humbling. 

But I'm still doing my best! This week we're debuting the first post from Cameron County, thanks to a picture sent by the Shenandoah Sentinel's Kaylee Lindenmuth. She had to make a trip there one day this summer and sent me a few pictures. (She always thinks of this blog when she sees a marker and tries to help. I appreciate her so much.) This company's story is a little bit complicated, because the names changed a lot, but I'll try to make it as easy to follow as I can.

Fort Allen and Fort Allen Well, Weissport, Carbon County

Some of my older readers might be looking at that subject line and thinking this looks familiar. They might even be thinking Laura, are you feeling all right? You wrote this post seven years ago.

I'm fine, thank you. Actually, I'm a little giddy, because I have been making excellent progress on the first book version of this blog! I'm really happy with what I've got so far, I'm about halfway through at this point. The book will contain all of the blog posts about Carbon County, which is thus far the only county in which I've completed posts about all of the markers. (Well, all of them except for the ones related to the Walking Purchase. That's a big hornet's nest that needs special consideration.) The original posts are being expanded, with more information, more images, and - my apologies - more humor.

I recently finished the chapter about Fort Allen and its well, and I thought that as a sneak preview, I'd redo the blog post and put in some of that new stuff. I won't put in all of it, of course, because I have to save some goodies for the finished project. But if you like what you see here, then you have an idea of what I'll be releasing fairly soon!

Lititz, Lancaster County

I can't say for sure that creating an Instagram for the blog has definitely impacted the traffic. However, according to Blogger's stats, the numbers are much better than they were at this time last year, so at the absolute worst, the Instagram isn't hurting anything. Maybe these newfangled apps have their uses.

One thing that Instagram has definitely done, at least, is connect me with a lot of historical organizations across the state. The exciting part is that not only am I following them, but some of them are following me back! One of those, which is admittedly what kind of inspired me to do today's post, is the Lititz Historical Foundation. I've done all but one of the markers in Lititz, which was once voted the "Coolest Little Town in America," and by sheer happenstance the one remaining is the official marker of the community. I've only spent one day in Lititz, but I was completely delighted with it (apart from how cold it was, being late winter) and hope to go back.