Joseph Garrera is an American historian, Abraham Lincoln expert, and museum professional. In 1997 Garrera concluded a year-long study of the Lincoln assassination flags. These are the American Flags that decorated the Presidential Box in Ford's Theatre the night Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. He concluded that one of the flags, a 36-star American Flag, was in the collections of the Pike County Historical Society in Milford, Pennsylvania. The story was carried by The New York Times on February 9, 1997. [1]
Garrera was named Executive Director of the Lehigh Valley Heritage Museum in 2006, a position he held for eighteen years, concluding in 2025. [2] Under Garrera’s direction, the Lehigh Valley Heritage Museum launched a series of exhibitions including “Abraham Lincoln and the Promise of America,” which was endorsed by the federal Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission, as well as “Remembering World War II,” and “The American Spirit: The Paintings of Mort Künstler." [2] [3] [4] . Garrera inaugurated the Heritage Museum’s extensive work with school cyber programs, a service the Museum introduced in 2020 because of the pandemic that is now a permanent part of the Museum’s portfolio of programs. [2]
Garrera earned a Master of Arts in History from East Stroudsburg University (2006) and a Bachelor of Arts in History from Thomas Edison State University (2004). [5] He studied philanthropy at “The Center on Philanthropy” at Indiana University (2005).
Garrera was elected to the Abraham Lincoln Association Board of Directors in 2010, a position he continues to hold. From 1999 until 2010, he served as President of the Lincoln Group of New York in Manhattan, a nonprofit historical society that studies the life and times of Abraham Lincoln. [6]
Lehigh County is a county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. As of the 2020 census, the county's population was 374,557. Its county seat is Allentown, the state's third-largest city after Philadelphia and Pittsburgh.
Upper Saucon Township is a township in Lehigh County, Pennsylvania, United States. It is part of the Lehigh Valley metropolitan area, which had a population of 861,899 and was the 68th-most populous metropolitan area in the U.S. as of the 2020 census. The township had a population of 16,973 as of the 2020 census.
Independence Hall is a historic civic building in Philadelphia, where both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States were debated and adopted by the Founding Fathers of the United States. The structure, which is the centerpiece of Independence National Historical Park, was designated a World Heritage Site in 1979.
The following is an alphabetical list of articles on people, places, and things related to Pennsylvania in the United States.
The Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum documents the life of the 16th U.S. president, Abraham Lincoln, and the course of the American Civil War. Combining traditional scholarship with 21st-century showmanship techniques, the museum ranks as one of the most visited presidential libraries. Its library, in addition to housing an extensive collection on Lincoln, also houses the collection of the Illinois State Historical Library, founded by the state in 1889. The library and museum is located in the state capital of Springfield, Illinois, and is overseen as an agency of state government. It is not affiliated with the U.S. National Archives and its system of libraries.
Morton Künstler is an American artist known for his illustrative paintings of historical events, especially of the American Civil War. He was a child prodigy, who, with encouragement from his parents, became a skilled artist by the time he was twelve. Today he is considered the "best-known and most respected historical artist in the country."
The Rivalry is an American college football rivalry game played by the Lafayette Leopards football team of Lafayette College and the Lehigh Mountain Hawks football team of Lehigh University. It is the most-played football rivalry in the nation and is the longest uninterrupted rivalry game.
The Lincoln assassination flags were the five flags which decorated the presidential box of Ford's Theatre, and which were present during John Wilkes Booth's assassination of U.S. President Abraham Lincoln on April 14, 1865. Lincoln and his wife, Mary Todd Lincoln, were in this box watching a production of Our American Cousin. Booth's spur was allegedly caught by one of the flags when he began his escape from the theatre and broke his leg; this part of the story, however, is disputed. Three of the flags were American flags and the other two were Treasury Guard flags. According to Civil War historians, three of these five original flags are currently accounted for.
The Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission (ALBC) was the congressionally created, 14-member federal commission focused on planning and commemorating the 200th birthday of the United States' 16th president on February 12, 2009. The commission served for ten years, from 2000 to 2010. Its official successor organization, announced in 2011 with an expanded board and broadened mission, is the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Foundation.
The history of professional baseball in Allentown, Pennsylvania dates back 138 years, starting with the formation of the Allentown Dukes in 1884 and continuing through the present with its hosting of the Allentown-based Lehigh Valley IronPigs, the Triple-A Minor League affiliate of the Philadelphia Phillies of Major League Baseball, who play at Coca-Cola Park on the city's East Side.
Lehigh County Historical Society is a nonprofit organization, founded in 1904, dedicated to collecting, preserving, and exhibiting the history of Lehigh County, Pennsylvania and the Lehigh Valley region of eastern Pennsylvania. The Historical Society and Lehigh Valley Heritage Museum are located at 432 West Walnut Street in Allentown.
The Liberty Bell Museum, also the Liberty Bell Shrine Museum was a non-profit organization and museum located in Zion's United Church of Christ, formerly Zion's Reformed Church, in Allentown, Pennsylvania in the Lehigh Valley region of eastern Pennsylvania. The museum was located in the basement of the church, where the Liberty Bell, an iconic and globally-recognized symbol of America's independence and freedom, was hidden from the British Army by Allentown-area American patriots during the American Revolutionary War from September 1777 to June 1778.
The Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Foundation is the successor organization of the U.S. Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission (ALBC), which was created by Congress and the President of the United States to plan the commemoration of Abraham Lincoln’s 200th birthday in 2009. The Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission sunset on April 30, 2010
Zionsville is a village mostly in Upper Milford Township in Lehigh County, Pennsylvania with parts of the village located in Lower Milford Township. The West Branch Hosensack Creek forms its natural southeastern boundary and drains it via the Hosensack Creek to the Perkiomen Creek.
David Bustill Bowser was a 19th-century African-American ornamental artist, portraitist, and social activist. He designed battle flags for eleven African-American regiments during the American Civil War and painted portraits of prominent Americans, including U.S. President Abraham Lincoln and abolitionist John Brown. Politically active throughout much of his adult life, he was a contributor to the Underground Railroad and also helped to secure the post-war passage of key civil rights legislation in Pennsylvania.
The Jacob Arndt House and Barn is a historic home and Pennsylvania barn located at 910 Raubsville Road in Williams Township, Northampton County, Pennsylvania. The land on which the home sits was inherited by Jacob Arndt from his father, Abraham, in 1795.
The commemoration of the American Civil War is based on the memories of the Civil War that Americans have shaped according to their political, social and cultural circumstances and needs, starting with the Gettysburg Address and the dedication of the Gettysburg cemetery in 1863. Confederates, both veterans and women, were especially active in forging the myth of the Lost Cause of the Confederacy.
Phillipsburg Union Station is an active railroad station museum, in Phillipsburg, New Jersey, United States, at 178 South Main Street. Opened in 1914, Union Station was built by the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western Railroad (DL&W) and shared with the Central Railroad of New Jersey (CNJ) and was situated where the lines merged before the bridge crossing the Delaware River. Designed by Frank J. Nies, the architect who produced many of DL&W stations now listed state and federal registers of historic places, the 2+1⁄2 story, 3 bay brick building is unusual example of a union station and a representation of early 20th century Prairie style architecture. The Phillipsburg Union Signal Tower, or PU Tower, is nearby, also restored to its original form, and available for tours.