The Philadelphia Zoo, Philadelphia, Philadelphia County

It's really cold in Pennsylvania right now - no surprise, it's December. Speaking for myself, I don't do particularly well in the cold, so as I write this post I've bundled myself into a sort of fleece burrito and I'm thinking warm thoughts. 

I don't know if I agree that it's always sunny in Philadelphia, but it was definitely sunny the last time I went down there. Over the summer, my husband Kevin and I were startled to learn that my best friend Andrea had - despite growing up an hour away from it - never been to the Philadelphia Zoo. Naturally, this needed to be rectified.

First Reformed Church, Lancaster, Lancaster County

I'm in the city of Lancaster at least once a year, and I consider it one of my absolute favorite cities. I go there for a weekend with my friends in order to attend Zenkaikon, an annual gathering of fans of all sorts, and the square outside Lancaster Central Market is overflowing with costumed characters mixed with the (tolerantly amused) regular residents.

We were there again this year, in the spring, and I was at that time awaiting permission from the PHMC to set up this blog. My friends, who were a lot more confident than I was that it was going to happen, were encouraging me to take pictures of the signs and subjects that we found while walking around town. One of these was a beautiful church with an open garden, and we spent quite a few minutes admiring the First Reformed United Church of Christ.

Dery Silk Mill, Catasauqua, Lehigh County

I ended up doing this week's blog post a few days later than usual, on account of some bad weather in my area. My internet was extremely unreliable. I appreciate the patience shown by my Facebook followers, and now I'm taking you back to my hometown of Catasauqua for a look at another famous industrialist.

As I mentioned when talking about David Thomas, I grew up in the tiny borough which is proud to be known as the birthplace of the industrial revolution. The first thirtymumble years of my life were spent on Race Street, the town's main drag, which is also home to the Dery Silk Mill - a cornerstone of the company which was once the largest single private producer of silk in the entire world. 

The Penn Relays, Philadelphia, Philadelphia County

As I mentioned back when I first started this blog, I'm approaching it somewhat like the quest journal of a video game. Well, sometimes in my favorite games, there are quests that I can't undertake alone; sometimes things are just simply inaccessible to me. That's when I have to rely on one of my companions for assistance. Whether they build a bridge, lend me a horse, or just act as my bodyguard on the mission, it's always good to have friends.

Today's blog post is crafted with the help of one of my real life "NPCs." My former coworker Sheila was kind enough to take some pictures of a couple of markers and their subjects down in Philadelphia and send them to me.

The Old Waterworks, Bethlehem, Northampton County

The last weekend in September, some of my friends and I like to visit Bethlehem and attend the Celtic Classic, the largest annual Celtic festival in North America. A couple of my friends are Scottish, Andrea and my husband are Irish, and I myself am Welsh, so we have a pretty decent representation of the nations as we basically eat our way through the festivities. 

This year was nothing out of the ordinary. We listened to bagpipes, browsed the local vendors, and crossed the Monocacy Creek to the Colonial Industrial Quarter. This is where representatives of different Celtic and historical organizations in the United States set up their tents and share their stories. This is also where one of my quest markers is situated.

The Colonial Industrial Quarter is just off of Bethlehem's Main Street, with a walkway right next to the Hotel Bethlehem leading down into the earliest industrial park in the entire country. It was a significant portion of Bethlehem's Moravian community, which is an ongoing topic in several posts in this blog. The positioning of the quarter is deliberate, as the waters of the Monocacy Creek were absolutely vital to the operations. Some of the buildings are ruins - the pottery, the butchery, and the dye house have little to show for themselves nowadays. However, visitors can still enjoy two of the old mills, the tannery, the springhouse, the rebuilt smithy, and today's subject - the Old Waterworks.

Abraham Blumer, Allentown, Lehigh County

I'm learning a lot about Pennsylvania history while doing this project, as you might expect. However, the lesson that I'm learning most often is that, as much as I know about the history of Pennsylvania, and Lehigh County in particular, I don't know as much as I think I do. I'm constantly being surprised.

I celebrated my birthday earlier this month, and my husband Kevin and I spent part of the day at the Lehigh Valley Zoo, of which we are members. (Hi, zoo friends!) It was a great day, with beautiful weather, and I got to feed Murphy the giraffe. As we were leaving, I checked the list of historical markers and realized that there was one more or less on our way home, so we headed for the Jordan United Church of Christ just off of route 309. I was puzzled, to be honest, because I've driven past that church many times over the years and I have never noticed a blue and gold historical marker.

Well, that's because there isn't one.

Fort Allen and Fort Allen Well, Weissport, Carbon County

Edit 8/20/2025: This post has been updated! For the more recent version, click here.

I mostly know Weissport as the little town under the route 209 bridge, which every August hangs up signs advertising their "Redneck Festival" over Labor Day weekend. I also know it from my article about Gnadenhütten, where I mentioned that Weissport was eventually formed from two of the three Moravian settlements by that name. 

In the Gnadenhütten article, I mentioned that Fort Allen was built as a direct result of the attack on the Moravians, and that I'd be getting to that in a later post - and here we are. This is another two-fer, because there are two markers connected to the fort; the well, which is the only part of the fort still existing today, has a marker all its own.