With tints of orange and pink decorating the eastern sky I loaded my car and went to pick up Jim. We stopped for Ann Marie and then headed south. It was a beautiful morning and we were hoping for clear skies for our trip.
We were off to visit Mount Vernon, not the one in Virginia, home to our first president but the one in Bullskin Township, just a little closer. There is a connection to the president though! Not far from the city of Mount Pleasant in Westmoreland County, just across the Fayette County line, lies what used to be a small community called Mount Vernon.
With our usual breakfast snacks and cups of coffee we were ready to traverse the countryside. We followed rt.66 south, avoiding the “new” toll section, eventually driving through Greensburg, the county seat of Westmoreland County.
As you come into the main section of this town, you crest a hill and the dome of the courthouse can be seen ahead. You have to pay attention as you drive through the city, the arrows on the roads change lanes in each block. It is a beautiful town with lots of impressive old buildings. Ann Marie and I will be returning one of these days to do a “walk about”.
Passing through the town we eventually came to the edge of New Stanton, where rt. 66 intersects with rt.119 and the turnpike. We merged onto 119 and soon were coming into the Mount Pleasant area.
Driving towards the east the sunshine on the windshield made us turn down the heater. Outside, the temperatures were close to freezing. We drove across hilltops with views of farms stretching out to the hills in the distance. A few animals were in the fields making the scenery even more spectacular, worthy of a calendar! Best thing of all was that there were no other cars on the narrow roads, we could take our time and enjoy the views.
It didn’t take long to reach Woodsdale and the Mount Vernon Park. The first thing we did was to go outside, braving the cold…to get a couple geocaches. They were quick and easy finds and once found, we could go to what it was that brought us here, the Mount Vernon Iron Furnace.
Even though this is an extremely old furnace, built in 1798, nearly 229 years ago, it sure doesn’t look like it! It has been re-built at least two times. It’s first re-do was in 1801 after an explosion destroyed part of the furnace, along with killing some of the workers in the process. More recently it was redone in 2006 by the Bullskin Township Historical Society, a process that has taken well over 10 years.
The furnace worked for 32 years, finally being blown out in 1830. A small town named Mount Vernon surrounded the furnace, containing a schoolhouse, stores and houses for the workers. They are all gone now, all that remains of this community is the stack.
The man who built it and owned it, Isaac Meason, named it in honor of his friend, George Washington. Meason owned four other furnaces in the area, his house still stands a bit further south in Dunbar Township.
Bullskin Township started cleaning up the furnace and the area around it in 2006, the work continued on through 2016. They have succeeded in making a wonderful exhibit showing what iron furnaces made and how they did it. The destructive trees and plants have been removed from the stones which will help it survive much longer. The area has been cleaned up, a local man made a water wheel to add to the site, a casting shed has been added along with signage that help explain the process of making iron.
It was definitely worth the time to drive down here to see this! Since we were so near, we decided to visit another Pennsylvania historic site. Just about 8 miles away sits the town of Kecksburg.
On December 9th, 1965, reports were made of a mysterious object flashing across the sky. It was seen from 6 states and Canada. In Kecksburg, people reported seeing blue smoke, feeling vibrations and hearing a loud “thump”. Apparently, something had landed in the woods near-by. State police and the Army sealed the area, keeping people away. Some residents said they saw an Army flatbed truck leaving the area with something covered with tarpaulins. Officials said that nothing was found.
All sorts of tales arose afterwards. Some said it was a Soviet satellite, others said it was an American spy satellite while others think it came from another planet. Years later, NASA supposedly said that pieces picked up at the scene were from a spacecraft originating in Soviet Russia. When asked for documents, they said that the paperwork was surprisingly, missing!
Witnesses said they saw weird hieroglyphic writing on it and that it looked like an acorn.
What happened that night is still unknown and is up to speculation. It is up to the individuals reading and hearing the multitude of stories and reports about the incident to decide for themselves. A yearly UFO festival is held in the town. There is a museum and a gift shop across the street from the replica the town mounted on a hillside. Sadly, they weren’t open when we visited.
All I can say is that here in Kecksburg, less than ten miles away from the now non-existent town of Mount Vernon, history was somehow made back in 1965. With this last bit of history in our minds we turned the car around and returned back to Pittsburgh, happy to have soaked up a little more of what Pennsylvania has to offer.
1 comment:
Sounds like a really fun day. Photos are really good
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