Along the Lincoln Highway with American Songline – Leg #1: Greensburg to Ligonier

I have Lincoln Highway fever!

Cece Otto and pianist Aaron Gray on stage at Ligonier Town Hall.

After I caught American Songline songstress Cece Otto’s performance at the Ligonier town hall last Thursday night, we decided to meet up over the weekend and do some sightseeing along the Lincoln Highway since she was spending the next week in the greater Pittsburgh area.  We spent a beautiful Saturday by taking a mini road trip through western Pennsylvania, from Greensburg to Stoystown and back, tracing the original 1913 Lincoln Highway route and stopping at various murals and gas pumps along the way.  I had an absolutely wonderful day.  It was great to spend the day with a new friend and do some historical exploring.  Throughout the next series of posts I plan to relate our travels and try and describe how we followed the route.

The tricky part about following the Lincoln Highway is that not only are there different generations of the road where portions were rerouted, but some sections are either inaccessible (blocked, difficult to drive on, located on private property) or destroyed, so at some points you have to follow detours or subsequent generations of realignments. We tried to follow the original 1913 route as much as possible and were successful most of the way that was drivable, according to the Lincoln Highway Association’s interactive map. Thanks to the Lincoln Highway Heritage Corridor, the 200 miles of the route that they cover have been marked with signs, which reassured me that we were going the right way!

Greensburg to Ligonier

Although Hanna’s Town is not located on the Lincoln Highway, the site’s historical importance lured us there for a visit. Founded in 1773 and named after Robert Hanna, the colonial settlement known as Hanna’s Town was the first county seat in Westmoreland County and the first English court west of the Allegheny Mountains.  It was an important settlement during the Revolutionary War Period.  The town was irretrievably burned in 1782 during a British and Indian attack during one of the last battles; the land was eventually converted to farmland and the county seat was permanently moved to Greensburg in 1786.

Left to right: Louise Tilzey-Bates, Cece Otto, Me

Today the site is managed through a partnership between the Westmoreland County Historical Society and Westmoreland County Parks and Recreation and features a reconstructed tavern and courthouse, three 18^th century log houses, a Revolutionary-era fort and a wagon house. Historians and archaeologists have benefited from the extraordinary amount of artifacts that have been found in the area through digs.  We happened to visit during the season’s Opening Day and met up with Louise Tilzey-Bates, heritage tourism coordinator for Westmoreland Heritage, a county-wide partnership of historical organizations.    We also watched a gun demonstration by a militia encamped in the fort.

After leaving Hanna’s Town, we caught the Lincoln Highway about midway through downtown Greensburg on East Pittsburgh Street.  Generally following East and West Pittsburgh Streets, the Lincoln Highway went straight through the city as it connected many cities and towns along the route.  It’s easier to follow the road eastbound, starting off on Tollgate Hill Road (turn right at the Gabriel Brother’s intersection on Route 30) because East and West Pittsburgh Streets are now one-way.  If you are heading westbound, you’re going to be detoured along West and East Otterman Streets.  After stopping for a quick picture of a painted Lincoln Highway sign on a viaduct, we left downtown Greensburg and hopped onto Route 30, which we followed until passing Westmoreland Mall. I was pretty excited to find what my friend characterized as a Lincoln Highway Easter egg: a subtle reminder of the road’s presence in this area.

Making a right at the main intersection past the mall, we followed Old Route 30 (the Lincoln) for a bit, got back onto Route 30 and made a left onto Frye Farm Road/Trail 604/Old Route 30 (the Lincoln). I have to confess that for a short distance we followed a 1930 realignment of the Lincoln Highway instead of the 1913 route (my bad!). We followed some windy roads, passed the Inn at Mountainview and ran parallel to Route 30 as the Clair E. Frye farm, before being forced to rejoin Route 30 at Beatty Crossroads (intersection of Beatty County Road and Sand Hill Road), near the new home of the Westmoreland County Historical Society.

Unfortunately, at this point the Lincoln Highway disappears for a while and so we weren’t able to join back up with it until we passed Latrobe. The route between Beatty Crossroads and Latrobe is not drivable as it essentially passes through what is now Arnold Palmer Regional Airport. Allegedly there are remnants of the road in the fields near the airport and I am told there are actually remnants of four roads near the site of St. Xavier’s Academy and Convent (the oldest Sisters of Mercy institution in the country): 1) the Forbes Road; 2) the Old State Road/Pennsylvania Road/1790 State Road; 3) the Philadelphia-Pittsburgh Turnpike; and 4) the Lincoln Highway. However, we couldn’t see anything from the highway and to do so would probably require us trespassing on private property and getting yelled at.

After leaving Latrobe, we rejoined the Lincoln Highway right after where Route 30 splits into eastbound and westbound lanes that straddle both sides of the Loyalhanna Creek for several miles.  This is such a beautiful drive through the Ligonier Valley, with walls of lush, towering trees on both sides of the road, creating a cool, shady tunnel. This is a pretty confusing stretch because the Lincoln Highway, the Route 30 bypass and the former roadbed of Ligonier Valley Rail Road all run together in this area. I think it’s easiest to generalize the eastbound lanes as the Lincoln Highway and the westbound lanes as the Route 30 bypass around Ligonier (former railroad roadbed).  When the eastbound and westbound lanes meet up again the 1913 Lincoln briefly becomes the westbound lanes near Timberlinks Golf Course until heading up into the hills near the intersection of Route 259 (along an inaccessible stretch) and then running parallel to Route 30  as it heads into Ligonier. I’ll explained more about this going westbound when I detail our return trip in a future post.

Shirley Iscrupe shows us a unique postcard featuring Betsy, the Lincoln Highway Association’s 1918 Packard Twin-six touring car furnished by the Packard Motor Car Company

Cece and I spent a very lovely afternoon in Ligonier, a very picturesque and historic town.  After having lunch right on the Lincoln Highway at the Ligonier Tavern, we visited the Ligonier Valley Library. I wanted Cece to meet Shirley Iscrupe, the Pennsylvania Room Archivist, and check out the library’s annual historical photo show, the theme of which is the Lincoln Highway through the Ligonier Valley.  Not only does the exhibition feature wonderful pictures of the Lincoln Highway in and around the town, but it also focuses on the businesses and attractions that sprung up along the route. The photo show runs until June 29. Ligonier (Fort Ligonier, to be exact) was an important point along the Forbes Road, a strategic British expedition to take Fort Duquesne and usurp control of the Forks of the Ohio from the French (now the confluence at present-day Pittsburgh) during the French and Indian War. It’s not surprising that, since colonial days, Ligonier continued to be a featured town along main roads through western Pennsylvania, including the Lincoln Highway.

Mill Creek Bridge Ribbon Cutting Ceremony

After following the gradual progress of the Ligonier Valley Trail over the last few years, as it grew from an abstract idea into a scenic half-mile stretch of limestone, I was excited to attend the ribbon cutting ceremony for the new bridge that was installed over Mill Creek a few weekends ago.  Thanks to the bridge, the Ligonier Township Recreation Board and partners will be about to extend the trail into the borough and beyond.  I wasn’t involved in the project’s inception or development, but I hope in some small way I helped out by occasionally telling the story of the trail through my newspaper articles.

I got up early and headed to Ligonier on a beautiful Saturday morning to watch the ribbon cutting ceremony and I’m so glad that I did.  It was a very nice ceremony and an wonderful reason to spend some time outdoors enjoying the fresh area and sunshine.

Not only does the new bridge connect the borough and the township together, but it involved the cooperation of many people in both municipalities.  Trail Project Manager Rose Stepnick was joined by several trail committee members, including Ligonier Township Recreation Board President Sharon Detar and members Larry Shew, Elizabeth McDonnell and Bob Gangawere.  Other individuals instrumental in the bridge project included Ligonier Township Supervisor Tim Komar and Ligonier Borough Public Works Director Paul Fry.  The ceremony also attracted a happy group of residents who crossed the bridge for an inaugural hike along the trail and back for a total distance of one mile.

Here are a few photos I took of the ribbon cutting ceremony and inaugural walk:

“It was a ‘we’ project,” said Rose Stepnick, crediting the community for enabling the recreation board to get the bridge. “I am so proud of this project and everybody that did it with us.”

The bridge was christened “The Rose Stepnick Crossing” in honor of the project leader. “This bridge would not be here with Rose Stepnick,” said Tim Komar.

We walked about a half mile to the northern end of the trail near Peoples Road in Ligonier Township.

Pedestrians and bicyclists using the trail will pass the Miller Farm, which raises organic beef. According to proprietor Diane Miller, a future pathway through the farm to Carey School Road could create a trail loop.

In the future, the route will stretch north from this trailhead to the Ligonier Township Municipal Complex.

Looking south down the limestone trail, which was laid over the former Ligonier Valley Rail Road rail bed. The bridge project also utilized abutments on both sides of Mill Creek that formerly supported a bridge during the railroad’s heyday.

Moo! These cute cows walked along the trail with us!

The bridge was needed for the trail to cross Mill Creek.

American Songline Concert Tour Hits Ligonier on May 2

Feel like taking a road trip today?

Courtesy of Cece Otto

Chicago-based singer and composer Cecelia Otto will be performing a free concert tonight, May 2, at 7:30p.m. at the town hall auditorium in at 120 East Main Street in Ligonier, Pennsylvania – her fourth stop during her American Songline journey across the country.

Cece is in the midst of a pretty awesome and ambitious project celebrating the centennial of the Lincoln Highway, America’s first named transcontinental highway.   In April, she kicked off a six-month concert tour where she’ll be performing early twentieth century popular music and highway songs in venues along the original 1913 route of the Lincoln Highway. All concerts are free admission. You can follow Cece’s progress throughout her singing travelogue project through her website and social media.

After an inaugural performing in New York City, the site of the eastern terminus of the route, Cece has already traveled through New Jersey and headed west through Pennsylvania, stopping at historical sites and tracing the route of the highway as much as possible, until she arrived at the western terminus in San Francisco, California.  Portions of the original 1913 route have been rerouted, renamed, decommissioned and even destroyed, so it’s a difficult yet fascinating endeavor that Cece is taking on.

Cece stops in Ligonier tonight, where she’ll perform with pianist Aaron Gray, a junior at Saint Vincent College. Her set list will include popular operettas, classical pieces and vaudeville songs, music written about the highway and two original songs composed by Dr. Nolan Stolz that are based on The Complete Official Road Guide of the Lincoln Highway, published in 1916. After corresponding with Cece over the last few weeks, I’m really excited to see her performance, meet her in person and hopefully have some adventures learning more about the Lincoln Highway and its impact on the Ligonier Valley and western Pennsylvania in general.

Brian Butko’s map showing the Lincoln Highway across America can be found on his Lincoln Highway blog: http://lincolnhighwaynews.wordpress.com

The The Lincoln Highway really changed the way people traveled by car from town to town and cross-country in the early twentieth century.  Until bypasses were built to reroute increased traffic, the Lincoln Highway was the main thoroughfare through cities and towns like Ligonier, with visitors and tourists bringing revenue to the businesses and roadside attractions that sprung up along the route in 14 states: New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska, Colorado, Wyoming, Utah, Nevada and California. In Ligonier, the Lincoln Highway passes right through the middle of town along East and West Main Streets.

For more information on Cece Otto’s American Songline project, check out the April 29, 2013 edition of the Latrobe Bulletin, in which appears a feature article I wrote about her upcoming performance.  I’ve written a section on the Lincoln Highway in Ligonier Valley Vignettes, but I highly suggest to anyone that wishes to learn more about this historic highway to consult books by Brian Butko, who I consider the foremost authority on the Lincoln Highway, especially in Pennsylvania.  Also check out Brian’s Lincoln Highway blog, where he reports current news happening along the highway. If you want to see the different generations of the Lincoln Highway, the Lincoln Highway Association has a fantastic interactive map posted on their website.  I hope to use this map to help me navigate during my own little Lincoln Highway journey that I’m planning for this spring or summer.

Ligonier Valley Trail Officially Opens Mill Creek Bridge on April 27

The story of the Ligonier Valley Trail is one that I’ve followed for the last few years in Ligonier.  And it’s a story that I’ve enjoyed writing about because it’s such a positive story, with some interesting history behind it.   If you plan to spend any time in Ligonier, please stop by the trail and see the results of a lot of hard work, dedication and passion from dedicated community members and groups.

If you plan to be there TOMORROW (Saturday, April 27), you should try and attend the official ribbon cutting for the new bridge that extends the trail over Mill Creek.  The ceremony is scheduled for 9:30a.m. I hope to be there!

A hiking and biking trail in Ligonier has been in the works by the Ligonier Township Recreation Board  for the past ten years, if not longer. The trail originally started as part of a Rails to Trails initiative designed to re-purpose former railroad lines into walking trails. Phase One of the Ligonier Valley Trail opened in October 2010 and runs about a half-mile on the former Ligonier Valley Rail Road rail bed behind Weller Field from Peoples Road south to Mill Creek.

The rail bed used for the Phase One portion was an extension of the original Ligonier Valley Rail Road line, which spanned approximately 10 miles between Ligonier and Latrobe and served the region with passenger and freight traffic for 75 years until its final run on August 31, 1952.   A six-mile extension was added so the railroad could reach the coal fields north of Ligonier, which were part of the Pittsburgh Seam of coal famously used to produce coke and, subsequently, steel.

How cool is it that pedestrians and bicyclists can now walk where trains brought people, coal and coke from the Fort Palmer and Wilpen communities into the town and beyond a hundred years ago?  Not only is the new trail meant to provide recreation to the community but when extended beyond the the creek it will also afford them an alternate way to travel between the borough and township instead of using the main highway, State Route 711.

After Phase One was complete, the Ligonier Valley Trail Committee imagined further possibilities with the trail, all of which required producing a feasibility study that would plot the future course of the trail, securing easements from property owners, working with the borough and outside groups, securing volunteers to help work on the trail and generating funding.

Ligonier Township Recreation Board members celebrate the arrival of the trail bridge to the Mill Creek location behind Weller Field.
From left to right: Elizabeth McCall, President Sharon Detar, Larry Shew and Project Manager Rose Stepnick. (photo courtesy Rose Stepnick)

But the first obstacle the committee faced was building a new 90-foot-long bridge to expand the trail south over Mill Creek.  All that was left of the former railroad bridge was the abutments flanking both sides of the creek.  After an eleventh-hour push for donations to secure a matching grant for the project, followed by a nerve-wracking search for construction bids within the budget last year, the committee was able to purchase the new steel Pratt truss-design bridge and connecting ramp, which were both installed earlier this month.

Now that the bridge will enable the trail to stretch south into Ligonier Borough, the committee sees the route generally winding through town near major facilities and attractions and continuing west along the Lincoln Highway to the intersection of Route 259 near Idlewild Park.  Hopefully the Ligonier Valley Trail will help to draw more business to the area from visitors using it to explore the area and also give residents another recreational amenity.

For more information, see my past Latrobe Bulletin articles for some additional background on the trail,  the Phase Two feasibility study, the committee’s efforts to secure the bridge and future plans!

Many people from the Ligonier community have been instrumental in realizing the trail project, including the Ligonier Valley Trail Committee, Ligonier Township, Ligonier Borough and the Loyalhanna Watershed Association, not to mention the volunteers who have worked to clean and prepare the trail, as well as those who have contributed financially.  I have to specifically mention Rose Stepnick, trail project manager, who has been extremely dedicated to the project throughout its duration and who has helped me greatly with my trail articles! Thank you Rose!

Follow the progress of the Ligonier Valley Trail through the official blog, Facebook page and Twitter feed!

Ligonier Valley Vignettes: A Visit to Washington Furnace Inn

Photo taken by David Zajdel

After wanting to visit the historic Washington Furnace Inn ever since its new owners reopened the defunct roadhouse last year, I finally took the opportunity to do do so when the Bad Boy Blues Band performed there last Sunday afternoon.  While reporting for the Latrobe Bulletin, I had the opportunity to speak with the new owners Brad Heberling and Rod Beck, when the business partners approached the Ligonier Township governing boards a few years ago with their idea to open a new restaurant and bar in the Ligonier Valley.  I followed up with some research and even contacted the daughter of one of the former owners for some information on the inn.

Named after a nearby 19th century iron furnace, Washington Furnace Inn is located on the Lincoln Highway (Route 30) in Laughlintown, Pennsylvania, only a few miles east of Ligonier.  The inn is not only a cool roadside attraction that harkens back to the days when hungry, thirsty and tired travelers needed a place to pull their cars into, grab a bite to eat and maybe rent a room for the night after a long day of driving along the highways; its also located on the famed Lincoln Highway, America’s first transcontinental highway, which ran right through the center of Ligonier and is celebrating its centennial in 2013.

You can find out more about the Washington Furnace Inn and the Lincoln Highway in my new book: Ligonier Valley Vignettes: Tales from the Laurel Highlands!

Vacation Values: “Rush”-ing Around Toronto

As I mentioned in a previous post about my vacation priorities, whether it means checking out a local band at a bar, attending a concert or simply visiting musically significant sites and venues around town, I love connecting with music while I’m traveling. So, to satisfy the music portion of our Easter vacation in Canada, Dave and I paid homage to one of our favorite bands, the Toronto-based Rush by casually visiting a few places in and around the city connected to members of the band.

Peart’s Place

On the way up to Toronto, we stopped to have lunch in the beautiful city of St. Catherines, located about 32 miles south of Toronto along the shore of Lake Ontario.  The waterfront village of Port Dalhousie, which was incorporated into St. Catherines in 1961, is where Rush drummer Neil Peart grew up – hence our first Rush connection. We didn’t get to spend much time exploring the outskirts of the downtown area during our brief visit, unfortunately, but I learned that “The Garden City” garnered its nicknamed from the beautiful gardens and parks that are found within its boundaries.  St. Catherines is also considered the metropolis of the Niagara Region and lies along a major telecommunications route between the United States and Canada.

I’d love to go back and see more of the city now that I’ve learned a bit about its history, which dates back to the late 18th century (1760s perhaps), when the area was settled by United Empire Loyalists. Since its inception as an agricultural settlement over 250 years ago the character of St. Catherines has evolved into the thriving city it is today.  First an agricultural community called “The Twelve,” the settlement was later known as Shipman’s Corners and became populated by sawmills and gristmills, leading to its establishment as the principal milling site of the eastern Niagara Peninsula.

By the first quarter of the 19th century, the area was renamed St. Catherines, probably after the wife of a prominent businessman, the Honorable Robert Hamilton.  Thanks to the completion of the Erie Canal in 1825 and businessman William Hamilton Merritt’s canal system connecting Lake Erie and Lake Ontario, St. Catherines transformed into an industrial hub.

The town of St. Catherines, incorporated in 1845, continued to grow and develop throughout the 19th century thanks to farming and industry, but it also became renowned as a health spa due to salt springs that had been discovered earlier in the century.  It was also a critical location for fugitive slaves and abolitionists after the American Fugitive Slave Act was passed in 1850 and served as the home base for Harriet Tubman for a period of time.

In 1876 St. Catherines was officially designated as a city and became increasingly urbanized thanks to the introduction of manufacturing and the expansion of business throughout the city.  The city’s boundaries grew with the absorption of surrounding towns and villages, including Port Dalhousie, in the latter half of the 20th century.  As mentioned before, St. Catherines functions today as a major city in the Niagara Region, which is distinguished by the vast number of local wineries that benefit from its fertile soils and streams.

Anyways, getting back to our journey, we enjoyed some wonderful local beers brewed on site at the Merchant Ale House Brew Pub and Restaurant, which was an adorable brew pub recommended to us by friends who had discovered it during a previous trip to Canada.  I’ll elaborate more on our experience trying the beer at the ale house, plus some additional information on the Niagara Region in a later post. Needless to say we had a very lovely afternoon filled with sunshine, beer and appetizers, even thought we tried to order fried pickles and our waitress somehow misconstrued that to mean we wanted fish and potatoes (still yummy, though).

If we had more time, I would have like to stopped at Port Dalhousie and checked out Lakeside Park, immortalized in the Rush song of the same name.

Bass-ball

Thanks for indulging my historical ramblings while in St. Catherines.  Continuing along our journey, once we arrived in Toronto, we headed over to the CN Tower to have a drink and see the city from the clouds.  Rogers Centre – the home of the Toronto Blue Jays – stands right next door to the tower.   Rush bassist Geddy Lee is a huge baseball fan and so it was neat to see the home of his beloved team, even though I am a die-hard Pittsburgh Pirates fan.  If we were in town longer we might have been able to grab a pair of tickets to the April 2 home opener, where Lee threw out the first pitch.

Nightlife(son)

Another friend recommended dining in the quaint Little Italy section of town that evening.  After wandering along the main drag, College Street, we finally chose the small yet classy Trattoria Taverniti.  Our choice of restaurant was an example of what I picture as the quintessential Italian restaurant – warm brick interior, red and white checkered tablecloths and the Italian grandmother (executive chef Rosina Taverniti) slaving away in the kitchen creating our delicious margarita pizza and fried calamari.  Anyways, it turns out that we planned on heading to that area anyways to check out a small music club with our third Rush connection.

After dinner at Taverniti, we hopped right across the street and grabbed a drink at The Orbit Room, a music club that was co-founded in 1994 by Rush guitarist Alex Lifeson and features live local bands every night of the week, including classic rock, blues, reggae pop, funk and soul and Stax groups, even a Steely Dan tribute band.   I really liked the cool vibe of the small, dimly-lit dive bar located on an upper floor in the building, which wasn’t indicated by the narrow, nondescript entrance.  If it wasn’t for the sign outside we would have passed the place right up.  In fact, it actually looked closed and abandoned!  We tried to get in earlier before dinner to have a drink but found out that the club didn’t open until 9:00p.m.  The Dave Murphy band, the featured band on Friday nights, didn’t take the stage until 10:30p.m. After already being up for twelve hours and traveling for over six of those, we were too exhausted to make it to see the band.  Another time!

“Ligonier Valley Vignettes” is here!

I came home today to find a nice surprise waiting for me at my door…

Thank you to The History Press for sending me copies of my book, plus some promotional materials! My dream of publishing a book-length work has become a reality! Ligonier Valley Vignettes: Tales from the Laurel Highlands is here!