A Walking Tour of Indiana, Pennsylvania

By Doug Gelbert

There is no better way to see America than on foot. And there is no better way to appreciate what you are looking at than with a walking tour. Whether you are preparing for a road trip or just out to look at your own town in a new way, a downloadable walking tour is ready to explore when you are.

Each walking tour describes historical and architectural landmarks and provides pictures to help out when those pesky street addresses are missing. Every tour also includes a quick primer on identifying architectural styles seen on American streets.

One of the few founding fathers to sign the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation, and the Federal Constitution, George Clymer was orphaned in 1740, only a year after his birth in Philadelphia. Apprenticed to the mercantile business by a wealthy uncle, he became a leading Colonial merchant after marrying his senior partner’s daughter, Elizabeth, in 1765.

Like many other contemporaries, Clymer also speculated in western lands, and donated the land upon which the town of Indiana was laid out in the early 1800s after the county was formed on March 30, 1803 from Westmoreland and Lycoming counties. Its name memorializes the first inhabitants.

The county’s first major industry was the manufacture of salt, made from evaporating salt water pumped from wells. The salt boom in the southwestern part of the county accounted for the name of the town of Saltsburg. Coal mining soon rivaled farming as the backbone of the region’s economy.

Today, Indiana is known for two things that are indispensable at Christmas time: the Christmas tree and Jimmy Stewart. It seems that growing pines and spruces as a farm crop started in Indiana County in 1918. In 1944 a group of growers organized the Pennsylvania Christmas Tree Growers Association and by the 1950s an estimated 700,000 trees were being cut each year around Indiana. An Associated Press news story tagged Indiana County as the “Christmas Tree Capital of the World,” a title it guards ferociously. Shortly after Indiana began receiving nationwide publicity the state of Washington tried to appropriate the title and an Indiana nurseryman produced an order he had for 15,000 trees to be shipped to Tacoma, Washington.

James Maitland Stewart was born in his parent’s home at 975 Philadelphia Street in Indiana on May 20, 1908. The Stewarts trace their roots in Indiana County back to 1772 when Jimmy’s third great-grandfather Fergus Moorhead first arrived and was captured by Indians. The Stewart family hardware store, known locally as the “big warehouse,” was a fixture in Indiana since 1848. After experiencing an All-American childhood in Indiana (he was an enthusiastic Boy Scout) that imbued him with the values that would later show up on the silver screen, Jimmy Stewart left for his father’s alma mater, Princeton University, in 1928. His on-stage performances attracted enough attention that he would not return after school to take up business in the family store.

Jimmy Stewart never forgot his roots In town and our walking tour will begin at a life-size statue that the actor himself dedicated on the occasion of his 75th birthday...

• Language: English
• Publisher: Doug Gelbert
• Release date: Feb 8, 2011
• ISBN: 9781458014108

Book preview

A Walking Tour of Indiana, Pennsylvania

a walking tour in the Look Up, America series from walkthetown.com

by Doug Gelbert

published by Cruden Bay Books at Smashwords

Copyright 2010 by Doug Gelbert

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system without permission in writing from the Publisher.

One of the few founding fathers to sign the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation, and the Federal Constitution, George Clymer was orphaned in 1740, only a year after his birth in Philadelphia. Apprenticed to the mercantile business by a wealthy uncle, he became a leading Colonial merchant after marrying his senior partner’s daughter, Elizabeth, in 1765.

Like many other contemporaries, Clymer also speculated in western lands, and donated the land upon which the town of Indiana was laid out in the early 1800s after the county was formed on March 30, 1803 from Westmoreland and Lycoming counties. Its name memorializes the first inhabitants.

The county’s first major industry was the manufacture of salt, made from evaporating salt water pumped from wells. The salt boom in the southwestern part of the county accounted