Established | 1904 |
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Location | 432 West Walnut Street, Allentown, Pennsylvania, U.S. |
Coordinates | 40°36′08″N75°27′57″W / 40.60219°N 75.46592°W |
Type | Historical museum |
Director | Joseph Garrera, M.A. |
Curator | Jill Youngken, M.A. |
Public transit access | LANta bus: 102, 107, 210, 220, 324 (at 5th and Hamilton/Linden streets) |
Website | http://www.lehighvalleyheritagemuseum.org |
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 Lehigh County Historical Society is headquartered in the Lehigh Valley Heritage Museum, a 30,000-square-foot (2,800 m2) museum facility with four galleries and more than 10,000 square feet (930 m2) of exhibition space. [1] Recent exhibits have included exhibits on General Harry Clay Trexler, Native Americans, and U.S. presidents. The museum maintains an exhibit on the Lehigh Valley and an extensive collection of local and regional historical materials with more than 30,000 historical artifacts in its collection.
The Lehigh County Historical Society's library, the Scott Andrew Trexler II Research Library and Archive, houses 200,000 vintage photographs and nearly three million historical documents. [1] Included in its collections are more than 800 volumes of church and cemetery records for Lehigh and neighboring counties, early county records including tax rolls, wills and land deeds, indexed marriage records and announcements, 800 volumes of family genealogical histories, city directories from 1860 through the present, maps, census records, and published histories. [2] The library also maintains microfiche versions of several of Allentown's early German and English-language newspapers. [2] Access to the library is free for Society members; a small fee applies for non-members.
The Lehigh County Historical Society administers six historical sites in the region:
Proceedings, the journal of the Lehigh County Historical Society, was published on a bi-annual basis since 1906 [3] and featured articles focusing on local and regional history. From 1947 to 1994, the publication was bound in a distinctive blue buckram hardcover binding with gilt lettering. In 1994, the journal was published in softcover. Publication of Proceedings was discontinued in 2004.
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.
Allentown is a city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Lehigh County, in the United States. It is the third-most-populous city in Pennsylvania with a population of 125,845 as of the 2020 census and the largest city in the Lehigh Valley metropolitan area, which had a population of 861,899 and was the 68th-most populous metropolitan area in the nation as of 2020.
Fullerton is an unincorporated area and census-designated place (CDP) in Whitehall Township in Lehigh County, Pennsylvania. The population of Fullerton was 16,588 as of the 2020 census.
Whitehall Township is a township with home rule status in Lehigh County, Pennsylvania. The township's population was 26,738 as of the 2010 census.
The Lehigh Valley, known colloquially as The Valley, is a geographic and metropolitan region formed by the Lehigh River in Lehigh and Northampton Counties in eastern Pennsylvania. It is a component valley of the Great Appalachian Valley bounded to its north by Blue Mountain, to its south by South Mountain, to its west by Lebanon Valley, and to its east by the Delaware River and Warren County, New Jersey. The Valley is about 40 miles (64 km) long and 20 miles (32 km) wide. The Lehigh Valley's largest city is Allentown, the third-largest city in Pennsylvania and the county seat of Lehigh County, with a population of 125,845 residents as of the 2020 census.
Henry Clay Trexler was an American industrialist, businessman, and major philanthropist who contributed to the economic development of Allentown, Pennsylvania and the surrounding Lehigh Valley in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He bequeathed the majority of his estate to create the Harry C. Trexler Trust, which has since dispensed more than $150 million in Lehigh County, Pennsylvania.
America on Wheels is an over-the-road transportation museum in Allentown, Pennsylvania.
Pennsylvania Route 222 is a 4.482 mi (7.213 km)-long state highway located in Allentown and its surrounding suburbs in the Lehigh Valley region in eastern Pennsylvania.
Lehigh Parkway is a large, 629-acre public park along the Little Lehigh Creek in Allentown, Pennsylvania in the Lehigh Valley region of eastern Pennsylvania. It is the most prominent park in the city and follows the Little Lehigh Creek southward for three miles from center city Allentown to Cedar Crest Boulevard in neighboring Emmaus.
Cedar Crest Boulevard, colloquially known as Cedar Crest and The Boulevard, is a major north-south highway in Lehigh County, Pennsylvania in the Lehigh Valley region of eastern Pennsylvania. South of Interstate 78 (I-78), the road is part of Pennsylvania Route 29. North of it, the road becomes State Route 1019.
State Route 1002(SR 1002), locally known as Tilghman Street and Union Boulevard, is a major 13.8 mi (22.2 km) long east–west road in the Lehigh Valley region of eastern Pennsylvania. The majority of the roadway is the former alignment of U.S. Route 22, maintained by the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation as a Quadrant Route, and is not signed except on small white segment markers.
The Lehigh Valley Transit Company (LVT) was a regional transport company that was headquartered in Allentown, Pennsylvania. The company began operations in 1901, as an urban trolley and interurban rail transport company. It operated successfully into the 1930s, but struggled financially during the Great Depression, and was saved from abandonment by a dramatic ridership increase during and following World War II.
Egypt is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) in Whitehall Township in Lehigh County, Pennsylvania, United States. The population of Egypt was 2,588 as of the 2020 census.
Cementon is an unincorporated area and census-designated place (CDP) in Lehigh County, Pennsylvania. The town is in Whitehall Township, 7 miles (11 km) north of Allentown. As of the 2020 census, the population of Cementon was 1,657. Cementon 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 2020. It uses the Whitehall Township ZIP Code of 18052.
The culture of Allentown, Pennsylvania dates back to the early 18th century settlement of the city and the surrounding Lehigh Valley, which was then part of the Province of Pennsylvania, one of the original Thirteen Colonies, by German immigrants almost exclusively affiliated the Lutheran, Moravian, and Reformed faiths, three of the most prominent Protestant denominations.
Center City Allentown is the downtown and central business district of Allentown, Pennsylvania, the third largest city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. It has a dense population and is currently undergoing an urban revitalization process.
The Lehigh Valley Zoo is a 29-acre (11.7 ha) zoo located in Schnecksville in the Lehigh Valley region of eastern Pennsylvania. It is located inside the 1,100-acre (445 ha) Trexler Nature Preserve. The zoo is open year round.
Coplay Cement Company Kilns, also known as the Saylor Park Industrial Museum, is an open-air historic site located at Coplay, Pennsylvania in Lehigh County, Pennsylvania. The nine kilns were built between 1892 and 1893 and used for the production of Portland cement.
The Trexler Nature Preserve is an 1,108-acre county park (448 ha) owned and maintained by Lehigh County in the Lehigh Valley region of Pennsylvania. The preserve is situated in Lowhill Township and North Whitehall Township and the land that comprises the preserve was originally purchased between 1901 and 1911 by local industrialist General Harry Clay Trexler.