Highlights In The History Of Reading Pennsylvania

This book is a collection of stories from the researchers and writers of the Berks History Center's quarterly journal, The Historical Review of Berks County. It is not a "history book" in the classical definition, more so a collection of informative and entertaining feature stories. You will discover the backstories of familiar city landmarks and be introduced to fascinating men and women who have left their marks on the social, sporting, industrial, entertainment, and cultural elements of life in the city of Reading. (224pp. illus. Masthof Press, 2022.)

Rail transportation has been part of daily life in Reading since the 1830s. Reading Trains and Trolleys portrays the good old days of the Philadelphia & Reading Railway (reorganized as the Reading Company in 1923), the Schuykill Valley Division of the Pennsylvania Railroad, the Mount Penn Gravity Railroad, the Neversink Mountain Railroad, the Reading City Passenger Railway, and the Reading Traction Company. The Reading Railroad gained widespread recognition as a property for sale on the Monopoly board, but the history of trains and trolleys in Reading goes well beyond that iconography. Reading Trains and Trolleys documents the impact of railroad and trolley networks on Reading and adjoining communities, including photographs of the interior of the locomotive shop and the carbarn at Tenth and Exeter Streets, views of the Walnut Street yard before and after the Outer Station was constructed, and views from the Swinging Bridge, which spanned the yard by the Outer Station. The Historical Society of Berks County's collection of rail photographs includes many never-before-published images of diverse scenes in and around Reading.

Wayne's Trace: Fort Deposit to Fort Industry is the first pictorial history to document the culmination of General "Mad Anthony" Wayne's campaign against the Indian Confederacy in 1794. The retrospective draws on a wealth of archival material and popular culture-including unique vintage engravings, photographs, postcards, and philatelic souvenirs-in tracing the U.S. Legion's march down the Maumee River Valley to Maumee Bay. A highlight is Turkey Foot Rock, an "epic of defeat" landmark the author likens to Custer's Last Stand Hill in Montana. More recent images illustrate archaeological initiatives and the evolution of the Fallen Timbers Battlefield and the site of Fort Miamis as National Park Service affiliates. Together, the local history and lore of Waterville, Maumee, and Toledo, Ohio, amplify a great watershed in our national history, the dislocation of Native American peoples, and the first opportunity for colonization by the young United States.

Chapters continued: Australia (South Australia, Victoria, Queensland, NewSouth Wales, and Western Australia); Argentina (Chubut Province); Canada (New Brunswick, Ontario, Saskatchewan, Alberta, and British Columbia).