Pennsylvania Holiday - Part III

Okay--are you tired of the Pennsylvania tour yet?! If you are, might want to skip the next few posts as there's more to tell about!
As with most of the eastern seaboard, there is such a wealth of  'old, cool stuff' compared to our western, newer world. We were staying more local to our Gretna home base & getting the opportunity to see places new to us.

One of those was the Cornwall Ironworks, one of many iron works in the area at the time, but one of the few that survived relatively intact. It started operation in the early 1700's & continued until the late 1800's--with some modifications made to convert to steam. We learned a lot during the tour--including a renewed appreciation for the difficult, hot & often dangerous work.

We also toured the Wright's Ferry Mansion in Columbia, built in 1738 by John Wright, a Quaker taking an entrepreneurial risk of settling early in a remote location with the intent of establishing a ferry crossing at the Susquehanna River. A bold move!
Susanna Wright, his daughter, was the consistent resident & an amazing woman--a friend & contemporary of Ben Franklin--well educated, fluent in several languages, with a great business sense.
The modest mansion by today's terms is wondrously intact & filled with furniture, art & utensils of life from that period. It's such a rich collection of period pieces that a two-volume catalog of the collection has just been published. The home stayed 'in the family' until the 1920's or so--and during the next 30 years before being taken up as a historic location, was changed very little. Definitely worth the tour...