Hershey Story

We have been asked if the streets of Hershey, PA are paved with chocolate and if we could smell the chocolate when we went through town.  The answer to the second question is no.  We never got a whiff, although I will say that we didn't go by the factory.  To answer the first question we went to the Hershey museum.  This is a view of the Hershey Park from the Museum parking lot.  This is one of 12 roller coasters.

What we learned from The Hershey Story is that the streets are paved with chocolate and the buildings and houses are built with chocolate.  Hershey actually started as what is called a "company town".  Hershey wanted his employees to be healthy and happy.  He built houses then charged his employees low rents and encouraged them to own their own homes with low interest home loans through his loan company.  He built the city park, zoo, school, swimming pool, lake so that his employees could enjoy themselves on their days off.  He thought that happy employees were loyal and innovative.  He was right.  His employees created many new machines and methods to make the company better.  The city today sports an amusement park, Hershey Gardens (originally Hershey's front yard), an entire interactive experience called Hershey's Chocolate World Attraction, Milton Hershey School & Founders Hall Visitors Center.  The Children's Home for orphaned boys is still in operation but is for all children now.

This clock was purchased by Hershey for his house then moved to the museum.  It features the twelve apostles at the trial of Jesus in a tableau at the top.  It shows the phases of the moon, the second, hour, day, month and other interesting stuff.

Hershey started and failed at many enterprises before he hit upon candy.  His first really successful venture was manufacturing caramels.

He was convinced, however, that the real money was in chocolate, so he sold the caramel business and created a unique way to make chocolate.

On of the most important pieces of machinery in the making of cocoa.  The museum cost $9 for seniors.  It was worth it.  The museum is chock full of great displays of information and artifacts and lots if interactive displays.  After our tour I needed a chocolate fix so we hit the gift shop.  We found some Kiss ornaments for our little Christmas tree (always looking for mini ornaments) and some Special Dark Kisses.  Yum!

The Kisses were just to get our taste buds ready for ice cream.  We tried the Jigger Shop again. (Remember, it was closed the first time we tried).

They serve ice cream from their soda fountain style work area and sandwiches and fries in a little area at tie right.  This line is actually twice this long.  The wait was no longer than 15 minutes, though.

Typical sundae.  The whipped cream is dispensed through a hose connected to a vat of the stuff and it just keeps coming!

Our sweet tooth sated, we headed home ahead of the storm clouds.  This is the sum total of the sunset.  Not a bad ending to a good day.

Next up... more chocolate 

Louise and Duane

Roadside America

Saturday was a much better day.  The weather man was predicting rain so we took the truck down some country roads to a little town called Stouchsburg.  Duane was looking for a cemetery where one of his ancestors is buried.  We didn't think to take a pic of the town until later when I noticed an anomaly.  The town was very small, basically one main road with a few cross streets.  It consists entirely of houses--no businesses of any kind.  We noticed an old cemetery where we entered the town so we looked there.  The graves dated from the early 1800's but most of the stones were worn and unreadable.  Duane said it was not the right one anyway.  We asked in town and were pointed in the opposite directions and there it was.  By then we had time for only a cursory look, so we decided to do more research and try later if we had time.  From there we drove to:

This is the result of a boyhood dream that turned into a big hobby.  Two brothers, Paul and Laurence (10 years old, Paul was older) Gieringer conceived the idea of building a miniature town, and worked in their basement carving, painting and assembling each piece over 7 years before Paul left home.  Laurence continued his hobby for over 60 years.  Each year at Christmas he would assemble part of his village for his children.  In 1935 the local newspaper wrote a feature story about it and interest grew.  A local company donated the use of its building for the display with all earnings going to local charities.  The Gieringer exhibit officially became a public display.  Laurence was still adding to it and it traded homes twice more before it found its present home in Shartlesville.  All of the pieces are hand carved by Laurence and Paul.  Laurence made the stained glass.  His wife Dora made the shrubbery and trees and their children did detail work and figure painting.

The display consists of a town shown in different time periods from pioneer log cabins to modern homes and businesses and cars.  Several trains also represent the different time periods.  A lot of the pieces have historical significance.  The large building on the right is a mountain resort called Paul Revere Tavern which stood near Moston Mass and was destroyed by fire in 1849.  The observation tower represents the first one built by Union troops on the Tennessee Mountains in 1862.

Many displays have moving parts.  There are buttons to push to make these things move.  Of course there are buttons for each of the trains and the trolley.  In this zoo the little elephant in the doorway rears on its hind legs.

The first part of the display is the modern one.

This cathedral has 44 hand painted windows.  It required 400 hours to make.

Modern downtown shopping district.  The white building on the left is a department store.

The Barnum & Bailey Circus's last rehearsal before loading to tour the nation.  A button puts the parade in motion.

Early oil bell and pumping station,

American farm at the turn of the 19th century.

Shrine Church is a replica of a memorial chapel with beautiful stained glass windows in the Alps.   American churches are copied from it.  Note the cemetery plots on the left.

Sleepy Hollow, an American village of the 1800's.

The trolley line makes regular trips from the village to the summer resort on the Hill.  Automobiles and Fishing not permitted on Sundays.

Blacksmith shop and waterway of the old Union Canal

Country barn dance.  A button makes the circular platform spin and the people dance.

Blacksmith shop in the pioneer village of the early 1700's.  A button makes the blacksmith use his hammer.

In the country old mud roads were impassable many times of the year.  Note the early car on the hilside, mired in mud.

Overview of the display.  The blue line on the right is an upper level observation deck.  The back wall is a mirror.  This shows the paths of some of the many roads and railroads.  These pix represent just a tiny fraction of the thousands of pieces in this display.

Display of old trains for my train loving family members.

This old steamboat was used as an advertisement for the Steamboat Restaurant.  The restaurant is not in the steamboat.  Duane thought it was cool.  Makes you want to tour it doesn't it!

Our tour complete, we headed for Lebanon and church, then home.

Next--chocolate!

Louise and Duane

Amish country?!

Friday is the day we "crapped out".   We started out well with a good pickleball practice.  After showers we decided to eat some good home cooking in Amish country.  We were ok riding the bike because the day started out overcast but ended up sunny.  We decided to explore Amish country in general and the town of Intercourse in particular.  Yes that really is the name.  It used to be called Cross Keys.  Go figure.  The GPS took us many miles along miles of corn and soybean fields.  The farms here tend to be very large and well maintained.  This area of PA offers some great bike rides along winding, gently rolling hilly roads.

By the time we hit town, I was very hungry.  We saw this place and decided to check it out since it offered the first food we spied.  We parked in the large and very busy lot and found an historic house that housed a nice restaurant with indoor and outdoor seating.  It was also the only restaurant in this complex and "somebody" was very hungry, so we went in.  What a disappointment.  The place was actually a bistro with trendy food.  For instance, the mayo offered was raspberry mayo. Duane got a burger and I got a Reuban with not saurkraut, but "pepper cabbage" which turned out to be sweet.  And so it went.  The Christmas shop featured ornaments made in---you guessed it--China.  There were some handmade Amish things but we had to hunt for them.  We bought some locally made peach jam, but it had corn syrup in addition to the sugar.  We looked for cinnamon rolls and found sticky buns.  We found no other little bakery.  I did find a fabric shop with reasonably priced fabric and bought a panel for a future project.  We passed on the homemade ice cream because we planned on getting some in Mt. Gretna on the recommendation of our new friends Bonnie and Ken.  A bit let down by this place, which was more "English" (non Amish) than Amish, we didn't take any pix and decided to see what the rest of the town had to offer, at least in the main street.  

We found this,

and this

this,

and this.  I tried to get a pic of a really cool close-line system people had adopted in and around this town, but kept glimpsing them between houses.  Heavy traffic and no place to pull off made it impossible to turn around and stop for a pic, so I was doomed to disappointment.  Still in search of little Amish business like the ones in Shipshewana, IN and Millersburg, OH--fruit/vegetable stands, little general stores, bakeries,etc.--we tooled on down the road.  All we saw were large farms.  Hot and tired, we headed for the best hand dipped ice cream ever.

The place was closed until 5pm.  We arrived at 3:30.  Drat!!!  Next door we saw this.

For some reason they were watering their tennis courts!

O well, we did have a nice cool ride through this soothing forest.  Home again we rounded out the day by doing laundry.  The air conditioner was broken.  

Tomorrow has to be better, right?

Louise and Duane

Harley Factory Then on to Gettysburg Civil War Battlefield

We started our Thursday with a nice bike ride along some zig-zaggy country roads to visit the Harley-Davidson York assembly plant.  This plant builds the Softail, Touring, Trike and CVO models.  The plant offers two Legends In The Making tours.  The Steel Toe Tour goes behind-the-scenes through areas previously unseen by the public.  The cost is $30-$32 and reservations are required.  The free tour also takes you through the entire factory except for the extra areas offered in the other tour.  This tour is conducted at regular intervals between 9am and 2pm.  Tickets are distributed on a first come-first served basis.  The tours start and end in the gift shop.  Who'd of thought?

Of course no photos were allowed except in the little assembly display.  This area also featured a few of the new bikes.  Visitors are encouraged to sit on the bikes, have their pix taken, etc.  Good marketing technique!  

Our next stop was lunch, then the Battlefield HD store in Gettysburg. Duane bought one of their Tshirts.  We always try to stop at each HD store we pass.  This is the first one that didn't have the name on the building.

Close by was our last destination.  From this map we learned that the Union army was arrayed in a rough fishhook east of the town of Gettysburg with the shank running north to south on Cemetery Ridge and Culps Hill and the hook part at Round Tops.  The Confederate troops formed another fishhook running south to north on the high ground of Seminary Ridge with the hook park through town and north of Cemetery Ridge and Culps Hill.

This visitors' center is relatively new.  It houses a bookstore, cafe, ranger station to get your National Parks Passport stamps, a museum, theater and a large circular mural.  There is a charge for the last three.  We opted for the free driving tour.  There is also a cd available for your auto tour

This is McPherson barn.  The Battle of Gettysburg began west of here (on this ridge) about  8 am on July 1, 1863.  Union cavalry confronted Confederate infantry advancing east along Chambersburg Pike.  Heavy fighting spread north and south along this ridgeline as more forces from both sides arrived.

     

This area was the site of fighting around 1 pm the first day.  This battlefield was similar to the one at Vicksburg in that the different sites are marked by monuments dedicated to each regiment in both armies.

I took this pic because it was a pretty site, but found it very interesting to note that we circled closer and closer to it as our tour progressed.  The Union lines were distributed just beyond it.  At the end of the tour we were looking back at where we were at this point!

This large open field is where the last Confederate assault of the battle, known as "Pickett's Charge", took place on July 3.

About 7 pm on July 2 Confederates attacked the right flank of the Union army and occupied the lower slopes of Culps Hill (below).  The next morning the Confederates were driven off after 7 hours of fighting.

This was taken at the foot of Culps Hill (to the right) with Cemetery Hill to the left.  Confederate soldiers also tried to take this hill but were repelled.  By day's end, both hills were still in Union hands.  In the distance in the middle of the pic you can see the eastern edge of Gettysburg.

One of the regimental monuments.

Pennsylvania monument

On July 4 late in the afternoon, some 7000 Union soldiers repulsed the bulk of the 12000 man Picketts Charge against the Federal Center.  This was the climactic moment of the battle.  On July 4, Lee's army began retreating.  Total casualties (killed, wounded, captured, and missing) for the three days of fighting were 23000 for the Union army and as many as 28000 for the Confederate army.

With our minds reeling from all the history we learned on our tour, we headed home through the newer part of Gettysburg.  We decided that it would have been really bad for the residents in and around Gettysburg.  They had to have spent their days hunkered down in their homes as they had no place to go!

Next up we crap out.  Stayed tuned!

Louise and Duane