Pretzels, Chocolate and The Civil War

A Week in Pennsylvania Dutch Country

05/26/2024 – 06/02/2024

This week finds us in Lancaster County, in the heart of Pennsylvania Dutch Country. For many years I have known this area was rich in Amish and Mennonite culture as well as the home of Hershey Chocolate. What I did not know is that it is also the birthplace of the hard pretzel. Being that it was a long holiday weekend and not having too far to travel from Haymarket VA to Lancaster PA, we decided to stop at the infamous Civil War battlefield, Gettysburg National Military Park on the way.

Gettysburg National Military Park

Over 50,000 men lost their lives in the three days of battle at Gettysburg, making this the most casualties than any other battle on American soil. Today the peaceful, rolling hills, dotted with monuments of all the regiments, pay silent tribute to their sacrifice.

We started our day at the Visitors Center to get the “lay of the land”. The ranger explained there were a couple of films and a museum in the Visitor Center to see but the best way to experience Gettysburg was to get out and see it. I could not agree more!

Before heading out, we took a quick walk through the museum to look at some of the displays. There were a couple of small exhibits with the different buttons and buckles that each division of the regiment wore and the guns they used. I didn’t know each uniforms buttons were different based on their role. That was interesting. I wonder if that is still done today?

The Auto Tour

Map in hand and the NPS app on our phones, we headed out to follow the self-guided auto tour. The NPS app provides a narrated version that you can listen to through the car’s radio with Bluetooth. Now, don’t worry if you don’t have the app or a Bluetooth radio. It is easy to follow the park-provided map and there are placards at each stop explaining what happened.

But…. If you do have a smartphone and Bluetooth, download the NPS app and listen to the audio version as you drive along. The NPS outdid themselves with their storytelling. You truly get a feel for what happened during these three days of battle.

The auto tour is 24-miles long and the brochure advises a minimum of 3 hours to complete it. Friends, it took us almost 5 hours to complete!

Why Gettysburg Happened

Robert E Lee was having tremendous success battling the Union in the eastern theater but is not having success with winning the war. Lee felt a bold move was needed and that was to invade Pennsylvania with the hopes that the Union forces would follow him. If he could win that battle, maybe he could convince the people in the north that this war is unwinnable and that when Lincoln is up for re-election in 1864, they might vote in a new president. A president that will recognize the confederacy and deal with them diplomatically.

July 1, 1863

Gettysburg was chosen because of its roads. There are 10 major roads entering and leaving the city, which allows Lee to move his forces of 75,000 men stretched across south central Pennsylvania easily. Meanwhile, Union forces are moving north from Virginia searching for Lee.

On July 1, 1863, the first Battle of Gettysburg began at about 8AM. The Union cavalry confronted the Confederate army (both surprised that each other were near Gettysburg). Fighting broke out and spread north and south along the ridge. By 3:30PM the entire Union line began to crumble and fell back to Cemetery Hill.

July 2, 1863

Early in the day, the Confederates positioned themselves along Seminary Ridge. The Union forces occupied Culps Hill and Cemetery Ridge, about a mile across the big open fields. Fighting broke out along The Wheatfield, also known as the “Whirlpool of Death”. Over a period of 2 ½ hours, the field changed hands six times. At the end of this battle the Confederates took control of the blood soaked wheat field with an estimated casualty count of 6,000 on both sides.

July 3, 1863

Lee is not discouraged by his inability to drive the Union out. Instead, he is encouraged by the small foothold his troops have gained. His plan was to have his troops to the south attack at the same time as his troops to the north and defeat the Union. Those plans did not work, so Lee had to devise another plan quickly. That plan was to send the troops across the open field and attack the Union’s center line on Cemetery Hill. After a two-hour bombardment, 12,000 infantry troops advanced across the fields, over fences and rock walls. This attack is known as “Pickett’s Charge”. That attack failed. The assault lasted just under 1 hour and 5000 Confederate soldiers died. The Battle of Gettysburg was over.

Memorials are all over the battlefields. These are some of the larger ones; The North Carolina Memorial, The Virginia Memorial and the Pennsylvania Memorial along with a couple of views across the fields where the battles took place.

Soldiers National Cemetery

The auto tour ended at the Soldiers National Cemetery. After the battle, approximately 7500 soldiers were hastily buried in shallow graves on the battlefield. The Pennsylvania governor worked with a local attorney to establish a proper burial ground for the Union dead. Reburials began in October of 1863 and the Soldiers National Cemetery was dedicated on November 19. President Abraham Lincoln was invited to the dedication ceremony and it was here that he gave his most famous speech.

Gettysburg Today

At the July 1 battlefield site now sits the Eternal Light Peace Memorial. The memorial was constructed of limestone from the south and granite from the north and burns an eternal flame. The memorial was built to honor all those who fought in the war and to pledge peace for a now united country. President Franklin D Roosevelt dedicated the memorial on July 3rd, 1938, the 75th battle anniversary. Present for the ceremony were 1,800 Civil War veterans. This would be the last reunion of surviving veterans to take place at Gettysburg.

The epitaph at the base of the memorial reads, “Peace Eternal in a Nation United”. Something I think we need to reflect on today.

The Gettysburg National Military Park should be on everyone’s “Places to Visit”. I am not a huge Civil War buff, but this battlefield was eye opening. As we drove around the battlefields, we couldn’t count all the memorials placed around honoring the regiments and infantries of all the men who battled here. It was very sobering.

Alpacas and Dairy Cows

The Painted Spring Alpaca farm was home for the night. We visited this Harvest Host on our way to Lancaster. The farm is home to over 30 alpacas and has a beautiful barn that was built in 1876. We enjoyed our evening visiting with our hosts and the alpacas. I even picked up some spun fleece to begin a new project. My oldest son has asked me to crochet him a blanket with alpaca yarn. 😊

Being only an hour from our next campground and not being able to check in until 2:30, we had some time to kill. Our hosts told us about Perrydale Farm and Dairy. They said that they had really good ice cream 😉 Twist my arm…

We took a short walk around the farm and got to visit with about 10 baby calves. One was only a week old! They were so stinking cute! After we got our fill of cuteness, we went to check out the country store and picked up a few goodies; some fresh milk and cream and of course, some homemade ice cream. Bill and I both agree, this is some of the best ice cream we’ve ever had!

Pennsylvania Dutch Country

Home for the week is Country Acres Campground, a few miles outside of Lancaster PA in Amish country. I couldn’t wait to get out and start exploring. We rode around several backroads and admired the beautiful farms and countryside. Those backroads led us to some covered bridges, cute towns, a huge farmers market, a bike trail and … you guessed it, some great food!

The Bridges of Lancaster County

Not to be confused with the Bridges of Madison County. 😉 There are over 25 covered bridges in Lancaster County. The “Discover Lancaster” website does an excellent job creating several different routes to view some of these historical bridges.

We chose to go see the bridges closest to us on the “Lititz and its Countryside” tour. This route took us through five bridges: Erb’s Mill, Keller’s Mill, Zook’s Mill, Pinetown and Hunsecker’s Mill. These bridges were built between 1849 and 1887 and all can still be driven across.

Pretzels

The end of the bridge tour dropped us off in the charming little town of Lititz. Located in this little town is a great piece of American history. Julius Sturgis created the hard pretzel in Lititz way back in 1861.

When we arrived in Lancaster, we quickly found out that pretzels are a very big deal here. You see, back in the late 1700s Swiss German immigrants introduced German baking traditions to settlers in the US, Pennsylvania specifically. These immigrants became known as the Pennsylvania Dutch and fresh baked pretzels became a popular food item.

Julius Sturgis worked in a bakery as a young man. One evening, they forgot to take the fresh baked pretzels out of the oven and there they sat overnight. The next morning the pretzels were hard. The head baker thought they were awful and threw them out, but Julius thought otherwise.

In 1861, he purchased a house and opened the first commercial pretzel bakery in America. He made both soft and hard pretzels in this house. This historic location was built in 1784 and is one of the original structures in Lititz. Today, Pennsylvania produces 80% of the nation’s pretzels!

Pretzel Making

For a $5 ticket, Bill and I took a tour of the original pretzel bakery and learned how to roll and twist our own pretzel. During the 1800’s and early 1900’s all the pretzels were hand rolled and twisted. The average worker could twist approximately 100 pretzels a minute. A MINUTE! It took me at least 30 seconds to get mine rolled out to the right length and several tries to get the twist just right! LOL!

The original storage containers that used to hold the flour, water, yeast, sugar and salt are on display today. After that we saw the original ovens where the pretzels were baked and the trays that were used to dry them out, creating the hard pretzels. Our guide explained how the dough was made, kneaded, rolled, twisted and baked. She was pretty entertaining. Great stop!

Wilbur Chocolate

Just down the street from Julius Sturgis Pretzel Bakery is Wilbur Chocolates. Wilbur Chocolate got its start in Philadelphia in 1865. Over the years, the company grew and expanded its operations to Newark NJ and Lititz PA.

Wilbur’s most popular candy is the Wilbur Bud. This small morsel of chocolate candy looks a lot like a competitor… The Wilbur Bud was introduced in 1893, while the Hershey Kiss didn’t come along until 1907. There are a couple of differences between the bud and the kiss; the bud is not individually wrapped and it has the word WILBUR molded in the bottom.

I think maybe Wilbur felt threatened when the Hershey Kiss was introduced. Hanging on the wall was this letter of warning and a copy of the patent:

Have you ever heard of a Wilbur Bud? We haven’t but we can tell you without a doubt, the bud tastes 100x better than a Kiss. We’ll talk a little more about the Hershey Kiss soon.

The Green Dragon

Towards the top of all the “must do’s” when visiting Lancaster County is going to the Green Dragon Farmers Market & Auction. It is open every Friday from 8AM to 8PM, year-round. The market is over 60 acres and has been in operation since 1932.

It’s a bright sun-shiny day, perfect for treasure hunting! We found a couple of treasures and lots of treats!

Whoopie Pies

Oh! The Whoopie Pie battle between PA and ME… Remember when we were in Maine for the eclipse and tried their whoopie pies? And remember me mentioning there was a debate as to who had the better whoopie pies? Maine or Pennsylvania? And I was going to let you know which we thought were better?  Well, here are the results! We picked up two whoopie pies at the dairy we visited earlier in the week; they were very dense and dry and just not very good. Later in the week we were at an Amish grocery store and saw some “fresh baked” pies there, gave one of those a try (no pic) and were sadly disappointed. Not quite as dense but just not good. We were starting to give up hope.

While at the Green Dragon, I saw all these people gathered around several tables loaded down with pies, apple dumplings, breads, donuts and… whoopie pies. Not wanting to be disappointed again, I almost walked away without buying one. But I turned around and purchased one. Bill and I stepped off to the side to give it a try. Ding Ding Ding!!! We have a winner! This one was sooooo good, the cake was soft but chewy and the filling sweet but not too sweet. Sunnyside Pastries wins “The Best Whoopie Pie” for Pennsylvania but we both agreed “The Best Overall Whoopie Pie” goes to Maine! Maine gets the win for two reasons; we like the cookie/cake/brownie like consistency of the cookie and Maine uses a marshmallow cream in their filling.

Lapp’s Pretzels Plus

Now that we’ve had our Whoopie Pie fix, we stumble upon this pretzel sandwich hot pocket thing. OMG, it was delicious! Fresh pretzel dough, filled with meat, cheese and other toppings, rolled up and baked then brushed with butter and salt. And they were only $5.50!! That’s a bargain these days!

Rails to Trails

It’s time to work off some of these calories we’ve consumed! Bill found us a bike trail that ran along the former Reading and Columbia rail lines. We enjoyed an 8-mile ride and saw some nice sights. There was even a large mural reminding us to SMILE! 😊

Central Market

Our last sight to see in Lancaster County was the Central Market in Lancaster city. The Central Market is the oldest publicly owned, continuously running farmers market in America. It was established in 1730 and is open Tuesday, Friday and Saturday from 6AM to 3PM.

This is a great place to shop for fresh meat, produce, baked goods and flowers. Everything was beautiful! The fresh goodies and the building itself! Check out the rafters! We walked away with a small strawberry pie. 😊

Hershey Pennsylvania

A short 45-minute ride northwest of Lancaster is Hershey Pennsylvania, home of HERSHEY chocolate! What a cute little town! I mean the light poles are Hershey Kisses! I couldn’t wait to get to Chocolate World and learn all about Milton Hershey and his chocolate factory!

Chocolate World

This place is like a candy themed Disney World. There is an amusement park and water park which require a $65 admission ticket. Sadly, I think my roller coaster riding days are behind me, so today we are just going to take a trolley ride.

Inside Chocolate World is Hershey’s Largest Candy Store which sells the World’s Largest Chocolate Bar weighing 5 pounds! There is also a chocolate factory tour ride that tells the story of how a cocoa bean becomes a candy bar. It’s kind of cheesy but it’s free! LOL

Did you know it takes 270 cocoa beans to make 1 pound of chocolate? Did you know Hershey’s is one of the only major chocolate makers in the world that uses fresh milk?

There are other activities in Chocolate World you can do… for a fee… a pretty big fee in my opinion. Like for $30 you can create your own candy bar or stuff your own Reese’s cup for $20. No thanks.

We bought our pin and split for the trolley ride.

Trolley Works

We boarded our historical trolley tour for a 75-minute ride around the town of Hershey. Our conductor was a recently retired educator. He had some great stories to tell peppered with a few jokes here and there. We learned about the life of Milton Hershey as we visited all the sites in town including the original chocolate factory, his Highpoint Mansion, his place of birth and the Milton Hershey School. All while sampling different pieces of Hershey chocolate. 😊

I walked away with a lot of respect for this entrepreneur. These are some reasons why:

• He tried and failed four times to start his candy business. He did not give up, worked hard and persevered.
• After being turned away from Swiss chocolatiers, he created his own formula for milk chocolate.
• Hershey and his wife were unable to have children of their own. They founded what would become the Milton Hershey School for orphans and the underprivileged.
• Upon his death all assets were transferred to the Milton Hershey School Trust.
• He was true to his wife. Upon her death, he always kept a picture of her in his breast pocket. It was the first thing he saw in the morning and the last thing he saw at night.

Loved the trolley ride!

Tragedy Diverted

We also learned that Milton Hershey and his wife were on a trip to England and their return passage was booked on the RMS Titanic. Due to some problems with business matters in the factory requiring Hershey’s attention, he had to return early and cancelled his passage on the Titanic. Can you imagine? If he had travelled on the Titanic, Hershey might not be what it is today. No Hershey bars or Reese’s Cups for smores? That would be a tragedy!

Milton Hershey School

I just wanted to share a little about Hershey and the school he created as it really touched me. As I said earlier, Hershey and his wife were unable to have children. When the school began in 1909, they signed over 486 acres of farmland and formed the Hershey Industrial School. The school was created to educate low-income male orphans.

Upon his death, with no heirs, Hershey put his assets into a trust for the school. Today, the school houses over 2000 students, grade K-12. Students are admitted on five criteria; come from a low-income family, be between 4-15 at time of enrollment, have the ability to learn, be free from serious behavioral problems that disrupt classroom or home life and have the ability to participate in and benefit from the school’s program.

Priority for admissions is given to children who do not have a biological parent available to them and per the Deed of Trust, preference is given to children in the tri-county area (the area around Hershey). Then children from the rest of Pennsylvania are considered and after that qualified children from the rest of the United States are considered.

Students live on campus in a house with 8-10 other students of the same age and sex. Each house has a set of house parents. During their senior year, they will move to an apartment and given a budget of $900 a month. They are responsible for budgeting their money and providing for all their needs; groceries, clothing, rent and utilities. I think that is a life skill every senior should be taught in school. At graduation, each graduate is presented with a laptop and a $110,000 scholarship to college, if they choose to attend. Pretty sweet (pun intended), if you ask me.

Ride Around Town

Our trolley ride did not allow us to really get any good pictures, so after we left Chocolate World we took a drive around town on our own. Here are pics of the first chocolate factory and the current Kisses and Hershey Bar factory. Reese’s and Kit Kats are made in a different facility. This factory produces 3 million pounds of chocolate a day and 70 million kisses. 70 MILLION KISSES A DAY! Wow! And the air has the sweet smell of chocolate. (happy sigh)

The visit to Hershey was great! There is a lot more to explore in this little town but we will save that for another time. It’s time to get back to camp and get ready to move on down the road.

Wrapping Up

Overall, we thoroughly our time in the Pennsylvania Dutch area of Pennsylvania. I will say I was a little disappointed with the Amish aspect. After visiting Holmes County, Ohio I was expecting so much more. If you truly want to experience the Amish way of life, visit Holmes County. Click here if you’d like to read about our adventures there. 😊

What’s Next?

Next up, we are headed west to the Alleghany mountains for a week in Altoona. I hear there is some train history that way.