Affiliates and Links of Interest

Links of Interest

Berks County Heritage Center
Address: 2201 Tulpehocken Road, Wyomissing, PA 19610
Phone: (610) 374-8839
The Berks County Heritage Center is comprised of several different complexes: The Gruber Wagon Works, The C. Howard Hiester Canal Center, Wertz's (Red) Bridge, the Deppen Cemetery, Melcher's Grist Mill, the Salad and Herb Garden and the Reeser Farm House.

Berks County Museum Council, Reading, PA
Email: parks@countyofberks.com

Greater Reading Visitors Center
Address: 201 Washington St (in the GoggleWorks Center for the Arts) Reading, PA 19601 
Phone: (610) 375.4085 or 800.443.6610 
Email: info@readingberkspa.com

Greater Reading Convention & Visitors Bureau Corporate Offices
Address: 2525 N. 12th Street, Suite 101 Reading, PA 19605
The Reading and Berks County Visitors Bureau guides refers travelers to the specific destinations and the information they are seeking. Whether it is accommodations, museums, attractions, tours, sports and recreation, shopping, meetings & conventions or group tours, our team is ready to assist you.

Conrad Weiser Homestead, Berks County, PA
Address: 28 Weiser Lane Womelsdorf, PA 19567
Phone: (610) 589-2934
Email: info@conradweiserhomestead.org
Conrad Weiser Homestead is a Pennsylvania state historic site located in Womelsdorf, Berks County, Pennsylvania, which interprets the life of Conrad Weiser. Weiser was an 18th-century German immigrant who served as an Indian interpreter and helped coordinate Pennsylvania's Indian policy. He played a major role in the history of colonial Pennsylvania. The Conrad Weiser Homestead is located on Rt. 422, within an easy driving distance of Philadelphia, Lancaster, Hershey, and Harrisburg. Come and enjoy this rural countryside dotted with the surviving period stone houses and traditional farms. The Conrad Weiser Homestead includes period buildings, and a new orientation exhibit, on a 26-acre Olmsted-designed landscaped park.

Countryside Farm and Greenhouse Inc. Fleetwood, PA
Address: 439 Krause Road Fleetwood, PA 19522
Phone: (610) 683-8586
Countryside Farm and Greenhouse Inc. offers the unique distinction of being primarily a retail operation with an emphasis on service and an excellent variety of plants. Not only have we constructed all of our greenhouses, but we raise all of our plant material from seeds or from plant cuttings. We take great pride in keeping an organized and clean greenhouse. We use a soilless sterilized material to produce exceptionally healthy plants. The quality of our plants must be seen to compare with others. A strong support of many of our events.

Daniel Boone Homestead, Berks County, PA
Address: 400 Daniel Boone Road Birdsboro, PA 19508

Phone: (610) 582-4900
Email: info@danielboonehomestead.org
The Daniel Boone Homestead, located near Reading, Pennsylvania, is a state historic site which preserves a number of historic structures. The Homestead offers many historic programs and exhibits, preserves 579 acres of open space, and provides passive recreational areas.  

The Free Library of Philadelphia's Pennsylvania German Collection Blog
Phone: (215) 686-5322
This blog will keep you up-to-date on what's happening with the Borneman Pennsylvania German Manuscript Collection. This is a collection like no other, and we'll be previewing extraordinary manuscripts, some of which, thanks to a grant from the prestigious Save America's Treasures program, will soon be restored to pristine condition, and digitized for online access. The Save America's Treasures Program to Digitize and Conserve Pennsylvania German Manuscripts has been made possible in part by a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities: Because democracy demands wisdom. www.neh.gov

Goschenhoppen Historians Inc.
Phone: (215) 243-8953
The Goschenhoppen Historians Inc. is one of the oldest existing Pennsylvania German communities in America. The Goschenhoppen Historians Inc., was founded in order to preserve the folk culture of the area's earliest immigrant settlers, known as the Pennsylvania Germans. Among the many activities in which the historians are engaged are: regular monthly meetings with planned programs, educational seminars, a collection of folklore and folk tunes from the last generation possessing knowledge of the 19th-century culture, the development of youth organizations and youth appreciation of folk culture, continuing restoration of the Henry Antes House and property surrounding it, the establishment of a folk life museum; the creation of a country-store museum, the establishment of a library of prime source materials, the documentation of quilts, the teaching of the Pennsylvania German dialect, and the publishing of a monthly newsletter and of the Intelligencer, a newspaper for its festival.

Hans Herr House and Museum Lancaster, PA
Address: 1849 Hans Herr Drive Willow Street 17584
Phone: (717) 464-4438
The 1719 Hans Herr House and Museum is part of the Lancaster Mennonite Historical Society, which is itself a part of the Lancaster Mennonite Conference. As a part of the Society, the Museum tells the larger story of Mennonite history and faith to the church and to the general public. The 1719 Hans Herr House and Museum, was created in the late 1960s as a result of the restoration of the 1719 House to its colonial-era appearance and the grant of the land surrounding the house to the Lancaster Conference Mennonite Historical Society. The Museum, officially opened to the public in 1974, is administered as a non-profit educational facility by the Hans Herr House Foundation.

Joe Tetz Horse Drawn Funeral Service
Address: 7531 Bausch Rd. New Tripoli, PA 18066 
Phone: (610) 298-3017
Email: jtetz@aol.com
We provide horse-drawn funeral service in many locations. At the farm, there is a museum with many fine antique carriages and accessories on display. In addition to the antique carriages on display, there is also a hearse custom-built for the Heintzelman Funeral Home in Schnecksville, Pennsylvania.

Kutztown Area Historical Society
Mailing Address: P.O. Box 307 Normal Avenue and Whiteoak Street, Kutztown, PA 19530
Phone: (610) 683-7697
The mission of the Kutztown Area Historical Society is to collect and preserve, in a museum environment, material culture artifacts relevant to the history of the greater Kutztown area. We aim to maintain a non-circulating library of publications and manuscripts relating to the local and regional history and to encourage the local conservation of sites and structures of historical and cultural significance to the region.

Landis Valley Museum, Lancaster, PA
Address: 2451 Kissel Hill Road, Lancaster, PA 17601
Phone: (717) 569-0401 or (717) 560-2147
Landis Valley Museum is a nationally significant living history museum that collects, conserves, exhibits, and interprets Pennsylvania German material, culture, history and heritage from 1740 through 1940.

Lehigh County Historical Society
Address: 432 W. Walnut Street, Allentown, PA 18102
Phone: (610) 435-1074
The Lehigh Valley Historical Society administers seven museum sites that date from Colonial America through the Industrial Revolution.

Lower Macungie Township Historical Society
Mailing Address: PO Box 3722, Wescosville, PA 18106
Email: LMTHS@macungie.org.
The Lower Macungie Historical Society's Headquarters is at the Lower Macungie Township Building on Brookside Road, Macungie, Pennsylvania. It is open during Society meetings and by appointment only. The history of Lower Macungie Township, in western Lehigh County, is being preserved today by a group of dedicated local residents who have seen much of the traditional township landscape disappear in recent years. We can still see many barns and old stone homes, often beautifully restored to suit our modern way of life. But the farmsteads themselves are in most cases are no longer active, and housing developments have taken over much of the farmland. The Lower Macungie Township Historical Society was formed in 1989, initially to save a log house built in about 1790 from demolition. The log house, in the village of Wescosville along busy Route 222, a former King's Highway, was moved a hundred yards west into a township park, where it is being maintained by the society. Plans are to restore the interior as funds become available. The society is developing a Historic Structures Inventory and conducts a public lecture series on local history in conjunction with the Macungie Historical Society and Kalmbach Memorial Park.

Mennonite Historians of Eastern Pennsylvania
Physical Location: Mennonite Heritage Center 565 Yoder Road Harleysville, PA
Mailing Address: Mennonite Heritage Center PO Box 82 Harleysville, PA 19438-0082
Phone: (215) 256-3020
Fax: (215) 256-3023
Email: info@mhep.org
Online home of the Mennonite Historians of Eastern Pennsylvania and the Mennonite Heritage Center. The Mennonite Heritage Center tells the story of Mennonite faith and life in southeastern Pennsylvania. Its architecture, with lines modeling the simplicity of traditional Pennsylvania Mennonite meetinghouses, points towards the spiritual center of Mennonite life. The building also suggests rural images of mill, barn and house, while exhibits show the movement toward a more urban society, giving contemporary expression to a deep-rooted heritage. The Mennonite Heritage Center houses a permanent exhibit "Work and Hope," fraktur and changing exhibits, a historical library and archives, and a gift shop.

PA Dutch 101
PA Dutch 101 is a site dedicated to people wanting to learn the Pennsylvania Dutch dialect. This site will house a complete online course on the dialect. The course is broken down into 40+ lessons. Each lesson comprises of a PowerPoint and a Video that covers the PowerPoint Topic.

Pennsylvania Artist Blacksmith Association
Mailing Address: P.O. Box 571, Willow Street, PA 17584
Pennsylvania Artist Blacksmith Association is an organization devoted to the craft of blacksmithing and related metalworking. Founded in PABA is a regional chapter of the Artists- Blacksmith Association of North America (ABANA). Members include both professional and amateur metalworkers from across the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.

Pennsylvania Dutch Hex Tour Association
Pennsylvania Dutch Country 1-800 HEX TOUR. A trip through Northern Berks County, the land of the "Fancy" Pennsylvania Dutch, will take you through the fertile countryside where hundred-year-old Pennsylvania German barns are decorated with a unique folk art design, referred to as hex signs. Also called Barn art, the hex sign area includes all of Berks and Lehigh, and portions of seven adjacent counties. The heaviest concentrations are found in the area of Old Route 22-The Hex Tour Highway. Pennsylvania German Friends
Phone: (610) 264-2979
The Pennsylvania German Friends (Pennsilfaanisch Deitsch Freind) holds regular meetings on the third Thursday of most months at St Peter's Lutheran Church, 1933 Hanover Avenue, Allentown. The gatherings are free and open to the public. Various aspects of the heritage and dialect of the Pennsylvania Dutch people in the Lehigh Valley are highlighted. The ability to converse in the dialect is not necessary, although some familiarity is helpful.

Pennsylvania German Society, The - Kutztown, PA
Mailing Address: P.O. Box 244 19530-0244
The Pennsylvania German Society is a nonprofit, educational organization devoted to the study of the Pennsylvania German people and their 300-year history in America. The society is for anyone interested in helping to preserve, advance, and disseminate knowledge of the culture of the Pennsylvania Germans.

Quiet Valley Living Historical Farm
Address: 1000 Turkey Hill Rd., Stroudsburg, PA 18360
Email: farm@quietvalley.org
Quiet Valley Living Historial Farm is a non-profit, educational corporation dedicated to the preservation and presentation of Pennsylvania's agricultural heritage. At Quiet Valley history comes to life on our 19th-century farmstead. Quiet Valley conducts school and special tours from Labor Day until June 20 and is open to the general public from June 20 to Labor Day. Period-dressed "family" members reenact the life of the original Pennsylvania German farming family who lived on the farm 1780 to 1913. The farm also hosts a number of special events throughout the year.

Reading Public Museum
Address: 500 Museum Road, Reading, PA 19611
Phone: 610-371-5850
Fax: 610-371-5632
Reading Public Museum is a private, non-profit foundation. With the Foundation's leadership and partnership with the County of Berks, Reading School District, and the City of Reading, there has been a rededication to the Museum's Mission. As a result of this restructuring, the Reading Public Museum is enjoying a renewed vitality. The Museum has a rich tradition of using the collections for teaching and research. Every year, thousands of elementary and secondary school students from Berks County's eighteen school districts visit the Museum. Recently, the Museum has extended its outreach to include both school and college students and other interested visitors from within a fifty-mile radius of our location. The Reading Public Museum is now a regional resource providing an artistic and educational venue serving South Central and Southeastern Pennsylvania. Today, the Reading Public Museum together with its Planetarium provides educational and cultural programs which reach hundreds of thousands of people annually.

Rough and Tumble Engineers Historical Association Kinzers, PA
Phone: (717) 442-4249
Rough and Tumble Engineers Historical Association is a unique museum. When Rough and Tumble is not having a show, you can still find its members on the grounds - working and fixing something up so that it can be used. Some of our members 'remember when' the piece of machinery they are restoring was used daily - a wonderful improvement over doing the same job by hand. Some of our members are younger and love Rough and Tumble as a place to come and get involved in reliving the history of the Good Old Days.

Schwenkfelder Library & Heritage Center
Address: 105 Seminary St. Pennsburg, PA.
Phone: (215) 679-3103
The Schwenkfelder Library & Heritage Center is dedicated to preserving and interpreting the history and culture of the Schwenkfelders and of the Perkiomen Valley. They offer many events and programming throughout the year.

Toad Creek Music 
Phone: (484) 336-9639
Email: keith@hometownu.com
For all of your PA German Music and Folklore needs.

Troxell-Steckel House & Farm
Address: 4229 Reliance St. Whitehall, PA
Hours: May - September, Sat. and Sun., 1-4 p.m.
The region's only authentically complete Pennsylvania-German farmhouse, built in 1756, resembles its medieval ancestors and gives a captivating glimpse of the area's farm history.