I usually make blog entries elsewhere, but figured I'd start doing them here too.
I spent part of the day going to the cemetery where a lot of my ancestors are buried. My father mentioned that it would help research into family history if he also had some pictures of the grave markers around where our relatives are buried because sometimes more distant relatives can be found by looking in the same cemetery. My parents live 13 hours away by car, so I decided to stop by today and take a bunch of pictures and send them to my father.
Since I had to drive out to "the middle of nowhere" to take the pictures, I figured I make it into a fun drive through rural Pennsylvania. I drove past the cemetery and over blue mountain on an unmaintained dirt and gravel road. This is the route I took:
Google Map of the route
A recent exchange of a couple of messages with Kyra reminded me that I rarely spend time checking out local activities and events. I told her that I don't spend a lot of time in the city where I live. After thinking about it for a short time, I realized how stupid that is. There is so much history around here along with some great local music and art galleries. I'm told there are a few small, but good museums in the area too.
Its sort of ironic that I've spent half a day on a plane to go see a historical site in another part of the country, but haven't actually seen much of the local historical things. My family has lived within 50 miles of this area since 1740. I currently live 24 miles away from where my ancestors lived in 1740. That same property was in my family until the late 1990's and I never visited it until this year. I've also never visited the churches where the Liberty Bell was stored in Allentown and Bethlehem. Yet, I've lived not far from them most of my life. I should have made time to see them since one of my ancestors carried the liberty bell on his wagon from Philly to Allentown during the revolutionary war.
I've gone to Philly and New York to see local bands that my friends said were good, but haven't checked out much of the local music scene. One of the guys I knew from my drag racing days has a band and performed at a bar a few miles away from my house last night and I missed it because I didn't pay attention to what was going on locally.
I really should get more involved in what's happening locally and seeing local things. I'm sure I'm missing out on a lot.
I spent part of the day going to the cemetery where a lot of my ancestors are buried. My father mentioned that it would help research into family history if he also had some pictures of the grave markers around where our relatives are buried because sometimes more distant relatives can be found by looking in the same cemetery. My parents live 13 hours away by car, so I decided to stop by today and take a bunch of pictures and send them to my father.
Since I had to drive out to "the middle of nowhere" to take the pictures, I figured I make it into a fun drive through rural Pennsylvania. I drove past the cemetery and over blue mountain on an unmaintained dirt and gravel road. This is the route I took:
Google Map of the route
A recent exchange of a couple of messages with Kyra reminded me that I rarely spend time checking out local activities and events. I told her that I don't spend a lot of time in the city where I live. After thinking about it for a short time, I realized how stupid that is. There is so much history around here along with some great local music and art galleries. I'm told there are a few small, but good museums in the area too.
Its sort of ironic that I've spent half a day on a plane to go see a historical site in another part of the country, but haven't actually seen much of the local historical things. My family has lived within 50 miles of this area since 1740. I currently live 24 miles away from where my ancestors lived in 1740. That same property was in my family until the late 1990's and I never visited it until this year. I've also never visited the churches where the Liberty Bell was stored in Allentown and Bethlehem. Yet, I've lived not far from them most of my life. I should have made time to see them since one of my ancestors carried the liberty bell on his wagon from Philly to Allentown during the revolutionary war.
I've gone to Philly and New York to see local bands that my friends said were good, but haven't checked out much of the local music scene. One of the guys I knew from my drag racing days has a band and performed at a bar a few miles away from my house last night and I missed it because I didn't pay attention to what was going on locally.
I really should get more involved in what's happening locally and seeing local things. I'm sure I'm missing out on a lot.