Philadelphia in a PHLASH

In 2015 Philadelphia was designated the country’s first UNESCO World Heritage City, gaining parity with other world class cities like, Berlin, Mexico City, Paris and Quebec City. It is widely renowned as an international destination, a historic and cultural mecca with affordable, family friendly sites, accommodations and world class dining venues. The centerpiece of a visit is a tour of “the most historic square mile in the nation”. #visitphilly

            I highly recommend CityPASS in every city where available and Philadelphia CityPASS is a member of the program. Passes are available online and can be printed or saved on your mobile device for use at a selection of eleven attractions. There are three pass choices that offer 3, 4 or 5 attractions at rates from $52 to $79. Savings can amount to 50%. A travel guide is offered containing attraction information including hours of operation, safety protocols and entry guidelines. www.citypass.com/philadelphia

Philly PHLASH operates from May to December and is easily the best bargain in town. These gaily-colored buses visit 18 attractions, departing from a scheduled route. Two additional sites, Please Touch Museum and the Philadelphia Zoo are available with an included PHLASH transfer. Visitors can hop on and hop off, buses at 15-minute intervals. A one-day pass is $5.00 and resident seniors, with a Septa Key Card, ride for free. This is also a great way for residence to show guests the city. RidePhillyPHLASH.com

 Visitors taking the transfer shuttle obtain wonderful views of Philadelphia’s Fairmount Park. The 2,000-acre green park, one of the largest urban parks in the states, features artworks and several colonial homes, one of which, Belmont Mansion, was an Underground Railroad station and is now a museum. The Philadelphia Zoo, nestled within the park, is the oldest zoo in America. It was chartered in 1859 but the Civil War delayed its opening for fifteen years. It opened with 813 animals; today it exhibits more than 1,500 animals.

Philadelphia was the only colonial city that did not begin as a fort. Quaker William Penn realized that the Leni Lenape Native Americans had long inhabited the land and had a prior claim. He learned some of their language, negotiated and purchased a portion of the land between the Delaware and Schuylkill Rivers. Originally the city was 1,200-acres, 1-mile wide, 2-miles long and laid out in an innovative grid system. Land to the west of the city was reserved for later use. That area, including the cultural corridor known as the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, has since become a tourist draw with a vast number of museums, scientific institutions and architectural attractions.

The Philadelphia Art Museum, chartered in 1876 as part of the Centennial Exposition, anchors the parkway. Situated on the highest point in the city the African American architect Julian Abele of the Horace Trumbauer firm designed the building and a marker outside details Abele’s contribution, based on classical Greek temple architecture. The 240,000 object permanent collection and special exhibitions are displayed throughout more than 200 galleries. www.philamuseum.org 

Before leaving the museum visitors love to run up the 72 exterior steps and have their picture taken with the Rocky statue located in a small grove to the right of the steps. The Rocky Tour Experience is newly available on the Bounce app. The immersive tour may be taken solo or with the addition of up to 6 friends on a personal phone. The app includes movie landmarks, cast information and background stories, all set to music from the original soundtrack. With the app you can take the Rocky Step Challenge, racing up the museum steps against Rocky’s time. https://apps.apple.com/us/app/bounce-the-world-is-waiting

Dr. Albert Barnes was born in 1872 in Philadelphia, earned a medical degree at 20 and became a millionaire by 1912. He considered himself both an artist and collector and in 1922 he established the Barnes Foundation and his residence on 12-acres where his art collection was displayed to a limited number of people. In 2012 the foundation moved into a new $150-million museum on the Parkway. The 24-room Barnes Collection houses one of the world’s best Impressionist, Post-impressionist and early Modernist European works, valued at more than $25-billion. His 2,500 objects include 181 Renoirs, 69 Cézannes, 7 van Goghs, 46 Picassos as well as 125 African pieces and additional Native American and metal works. There are more Cézanne paintings than in all the Parisian museums. Barnes was one of the first collectors to amass African objects as pieces of art. 

Away from the parkway is one of the countries most haunted sites, Eastern State Penitentiary, featured on several television shows as well as in movies and music videos. This was another of Benjamin Franklin’s ventures. In 1787 he and a group of citizens met to discuss the deplorable conditions at the Walnut Street Jail where all prisoners, regardless of their crime, age or gender were incarcerated together. Inside crime and disease were rampant. Reforms were instituted but the need for a larger prison, based on the Pennsylvania System of repentance, rehabilitation and spiritual guidance, was constructed.

The co-ed prison, then in the suburbs, was completed in 1829. It was designed around a central courtyard with 7 corridors and 2-story cellblocks arrayed around it and stone exterior walls 20-inches thick. The prison was equipped with central heating, toilets and showers in each cell. Prisoners were isolated from each other with their only personal property being a Bible. They were fed and communicated through a hole in the door. Fifty stop tours are self-guided but include an audio tour narrated by Steve Buscemi. Highlights of the tour are “the Hole” and a replica of the cell occupied by Al Capone complete with Oriental rug, radio and other creature comforts. Women were admitted in 1831 and the cellblocks were desegregated in 1961. Eastern State, a National Historic Landmark, closed in 1970 and reopened as an attraction in 1994. Early tourists included the Marquis de Lafayette and Charles Dickens.

No matter how enthusiastic you are about your visit you can’t do it all in a day and most visitors tour Independence National Historic Park on their first trip. Independence Visitor Center, in the heart of the Historic District, is the best place to begin all Independence National Historical Park tours. Here you can get tickets, make reservations, obtain maps and brochures and watch an orientation film. 

Independence Mall, known as State House Yard in the 1700s, contains Independence Hall, Old City Hall and Congress Hall. This is the area Washington, Franklin, Jefferson, Hamilton and Adams strolled every day.

The President’s House, official residence of Washington and Adams during their presidencies, is reconstructed using exterior beams that allow access to areas of the structure. The home, across from the Visitor Center, also interprets the story of Washington’s nine enslaved workers. During his stay Washington’s black chef Hercules fled. Martha Washington was so upset about the loss of his cooking skills that she asked Washington to send the militia to locate him. He was never found. Adams did not own slaves.

Liberty Bell Center is located steps away. It was a symbol for abolitionists before the Civil War and after the war it was exhibited around the country to help bring the nation back together. Visitors can take photographs and view both the crack and the inscription from Leviticus, “Proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof”. www.uwishunu.com. 

            Philadelphia Savings Fund Society was the first savings bank in the country and in1929, they commissioned the construction of a 491-foot skyscraper that would house their banking and other business activities. The building became the Loews Philadelphia Hotel in April of 2000. Travelers are invited to celebrate this anniversary Sundays - Thursdays in April. Guests will receive 22% off Joseph Anthony Retreat Spa & Salon treatments, off on-site parking and food and beverage en suite or at Bank & Bourbon.

            Philadelphia is where the nation’s history really starts. Begin at the beginning and immerse yourself in the sites and sounds of this international city.

 

“Buffalo Soldier In the Heart of America” The Buffalo Soldiers National Museum in Houston, Texas

There have been no American military engagements in which African Americans have participated at some level. In the 1600s British colonies blacks were used to defend against Indian attacks.  Massachusetts’ 1636 law was one of the earliest documented laws to state that “all able-bodied Negroes” had to report to serve in the militia. Enslaved and freedmen were among the 9,000 African Americans serving in the Continental Army as Patriots, largely in integrated units. During the War of 1812 it is estimated that 15% of the soldiers and sailors were of African descent and General Andrew Jackson called for “free colored inhabitants of Louisiana” to enlist in the US Army on Sept. 21, 1814 with the promise of equal pay. The Civil War witnessed Union enlistment of approximately 200,000 African Americans, an estimated 100,000 once enslaved, resulting in a death toll of nearly 40,000.

The government enacted a law on June 28, 1866 that established 4 segregated infantry and two cavalry Buffalo Soldier units. These regiments were created to “increase and fix the military peace establishment of the United States”. They were stationed in the South to enforce Reconstruction, build and repair infrastructure and protect those engaged in the westward migration. The Buffalo Soldiers enlisted for five years at a rate of $13.00 a month and room and board.

                                                                                

In the years they served they were stationed at nearly all of the Texas frontier forts between the Rio Grande and the Red River beginning with their first transfer to Texas in 1873. It was they who erected forts, accompanied wagon trains, guarded the railroads and mail, brought criminals to justice and fought against Indian attacks. They accomplished all these things while being issued substandard equipment and being victims of unrelenting prejudice. Some white officers refused to lead them, Custer being one of them, and they were restricted to postings west of the Mississippi River because some whites refused to have them in their area. In spite of hardships they completed their jobs and served with honor.

                                                                            

The Buffalo Soldiers National Museum and The Center for African American Military History are in Houston, Texas serves to maintain and promulgate their history and legacy. It was established in 2001 by Captain Paul Matthews and meticulously showcases his astonishingly large private collection. Matthews began his collection in the 1960s after learning of their exploits. The 28 galleries are thematic and interpret the history of the Buffalo Soldiers and the African American military experience up to the present. An orientation movie is offered before embarking on the self-guided tour.

                                                                                

Gallery 12 is the Westward Expansion.  It is believed that the Buffalo Soldiers received their name from the Plains Indians because their hair and ferocity resembled that of the buffalo. The name was a term of respect and the soldiers themselves embraced it and incorporated the animal on their regimental insignia. Former slave Lt. Henry Ossian Flipper’s story is told here. In 1877 he was the first black West Point graduate and served with the 10^th Cavalry as the first black officer to command in the regular US Army. He was targeted, court martialed and dismissed in 1882. In 1999 he received a presidential pardon.

Native Americans, Seminole Indian Scouts and the Indian Wars introduces visitors to the Black Seminole scouts. The Seminoles were asked to relocate to Texas, serve as scouts, and promised, land, rations and pay. They served valiantly but the US kept none of the promises even going so far as to stop rations for their families. The unit was disbanded in 1914 and by that time they had earned Medals of Honor. Four of the honorees are buried in the Seminole Negro Indian Scout Cemetery near Fort Clark, Texas.

                                                                                

President Theodore Roosevelt, after banding together a group known as The Rough Riders, garnered a reputation as a military tactician and leader during the Spanish American War. History tells us that they charged Cuba’s San Juan Hill on July 1, 1898 but somehow omits, or downplays the fact, that all four of the then existing regiments of the US Colored Troops also made the charge. The Rough Riders and the 9^th and 10^th were the first to charge. Gallery 14 returns them to the narrative.

William Cathay became a Buffalo Soldier on November 15, 1866. Numerous illnesses resulted in visits to the post doctor and the discovery that William Cathay was actually Cathay Williams, the only woman to ever serve as a Buffalo Soldier. She was honorably discharged. A short video and additional information is located in Gallery 15.

The remaining galleries are filled with artifacts, art and memorabilia on the World Wars, Vietnam, Persian Gulf, Pearl Harbor, Women in the Military and the Camp Logan Race Riot.  The tour ends at the Medal of Honor Wall with information on the Medal of Honor recipients.

Ultimately the Buffalo Soldiers were deactivated and integrated into a racially integrated US Armed Forces as mandated in Truman’s Executive Order 9981. The Twenty-fourth, the final segregated unit, remained so until the Korean War in 1951.

One of the highlights of the museum is a Buffalo Soldier Mardi Gras costume. It is located in the lobby and one should examine the details closely.

            This museum is a gem and not to be missed.

            Note: Arlington National Cemetery’s Section 22 features a Buffalo Soldier marker and memorial tree. The Rough Riders Marker is nearby.

www.buffalosoldiermuseum.com

#Buffalosoldiers

#Blackseminoles

#VisitHouston

#HenryFlipper

 

  

Experience Southeast Texas 

                                                          

Native Americans settled along the shores of Sabine Lake in what was to become East Texas more than 1,500-years ago. In 1528 Spanish explorer Cabeza de Vaca and three of his men, including Estevanico an African, became the first Europeans to travel into the interior of Texas. They were followed, nearly 200-years later, by transient Spanish, French and Englishmen. In the 17^th-century the lake became a draw for traders of legal and illegal goods, settlers and pirates like John Laffite. 

Some settlers moved from the southern states to SE Texas to establish plantations. They brought their slaves with them. By 1860 25% of Texas families owned slaves, usually fewer than a dozen. The largest slaveholder held 300 people in bondage. Free blacks were discouraged from living in Texas by an 1840 law stating that any free black caught attempting to enter Texas would be captured and required to post bail. Failing to do so would result in one year of enslavement. At the end of the year continuing not to post bail he would result in lifetime enslavement. Free blacks already residing in Texas were given 2-years to leave or the 1840 law applied. 

                                                                               

The region generally remained sparsely settled until 1840 when a community named Aurora was settled. Aurora failed but in 1895 Arthur Stillwell, a railroad entrepreneur, founded Port Arthur. Stillwell created the Port Arthur Channel and Dock Co. opening a channel to the sea in 1899 and precipitating an influx of colonists and businessmen. Spindletop Gusher in 1901 jettisoned Port Arthur into a new era. Large petrochemical companies moved to the city and it quickly became an international hub for oil refining. The Port of Port Arthur is 19-miles from the Gulf of Mexico and has the ability to handle both civilian and military cargo. 

                                                                             

Situated on the Central and Mississippi Flyway migration routes, Port Arthur is a prime location for birdwatching. Spring Migration: March 1-June 15; Peak: April 19-May 7. Fall Migration: August 15-November 30; September 5-October 29. #birdportarthur

                                                                               

The nationally renowned Museum of the Gulf Coast should be your first stop in Port Arthur. This 2-story museum manages to completely capture the story of Southeast Texas. The 1^st-floor displays the area’s history from prehistoric times. The 2^nd-floor features the Music Hall of Fame and the history of the music and the artists of the Gulf Coast. A 125-ft. mural, the largest in the region, is showcased in the first gallery and should be closely examined.

The second level is a music lovers’ wonderland. A self-guided tour filled with 55” touchscreen audiovisual stations, interactive displays, sculptures, memorabilia and artifacts winds you through the history of Gulf Coast music and its incorporation of blues, Cajun, country, gospel, jazz, rock, soul, western swing and zydeco. Port Arthur is located 30-miles from Louisiana and is musically influenced by being a cultural crossroads. Nearly 100 musicians are showcased in the Music Hall of Fame. 

    

One of the most notable showcases contains the ‘Vest Frottoir” owned by Cleveland Chenier. He and his brother Clifton Chenier, “King of Zydeco”, created the metal instrument because they felt the washboard on a rope instrument that hung around the neck was heavy. It has the distinction of being the only North American created instrument.

The museum honors the life and legacy of Janis Joplin, a Port Arthur native.  The display includes an outstanding sculpture, personal items, photographs and a replica of her 1964, mural-painted, Porsche 356C Cabriolet. She originally paid $3,500 for the gray car and then $500 to add the mural, The History of the Universe, painted by an artist. It sold to a private owner for $1.76 million in 2015.

Janis was born here on January 19, 1943 in the city. A driving tour begins at the museum and includes 15 sites. Her birth home, childhood home and schools are on the route. Tour brochures are available in the museum.    

Westside was the city’s African American community that flourished during segregation as a self-sustaining neighborhood. Blacks entered the area from the rural surroundings, some descendants of the enslaved from area plantations, to find work.

The Varner-Hogg plantation, the oldest in the state, is located in Southeast Texas and is a State Historic Site. The plantation features the main house, slave cemetery and several outbuildings, including slave quarters that interpret the lives of those who lived and toiled there. Visitors can rent a cottage for longer stays. 

Stephen Austin granted 4,428-acres to Martin Varner in 1824. Varner, a Virginian, brought several slaves with him to help establish a farm and distillery. Ten years later he sold the homestead to the Pattons of Kentucky. They founded Patton Place Plantation. Their 40-60 enslaved workers built the plantation structures, house, sugar mill and their own homes, with bricks made on-site.

 

Columbus Patton, a successful sugar mill owner, openly lived with an enslaved woman he brought with him from Kentucky. Rachel was treated as the mistress of the house, had servants of her own and charged her clothing and accessories to the Patton account. She was well dressed and acted as a “white woman”. The family and community were outraged that they lived in “disgraceful intimacy” and in 1854 the family had him declared insane and removed to a South Carolina asylum where he expired 2-years later.

In his 1853 will he singled out 4 enslaved individuals, Rachel being one of them. She was to receive an annual income and the freedom to live where she pleased. His family contested the will and probate lasted until the 1870s. In the end Rachel was granted an annual payment of $3,205 ($109,555 in 2022) and freedom to move among Patton properties. By 1860 she had been persuaded to move to Cincinnati for the plantation’s morale but in 1869 she returned to the area. She is listed in the 1880 census as Rachel Patton, a 60-year old Black female widow. The plantation was sold in 1869.

The plantation museum features photographs, artifacts, oral testimonies and legal documents to enhance the story. 

A road trip through Southeast Texas is a unique experience you don’t want to miss!

#PortArthurTexas   #Varner-HoggPlantation   #MuseumoftheGulfCoast   #JanisJoplin