#connoquenessing

New Post has been published on https://pjneyman.com/?p=1398

Cycling on the Old Routes

Cycling around Wampum along the Beaver and Connoquenessing, using some of my childhood routes.

View details and stats at Strava

Ride Map, Elevation, Speed

Wampum Improvement Center, smalled-down

Lake at the end of Darlington Road

Farm on Wampum Mt Air Road, with smokestack in background

Farm & Field on Wampum Mt Air Road

Wampum Mt Air Road westbound, racetrack style

~ Photos by Patrick Neyman

Photo courtesy of the Western Pennsylvania Conservancy 

Stream Sentences

By Patrick McShea Among the joys of working as a museum educator are times when the traditional learning flow reverses. A memorable example occurred a few years ago during a writing exercise for high school students participating in the Allegheny College Creek Connections program.

Each student had been studying a stream near their school. My task was to motivate them to share their findings and impressions through writing.

I asked participants to write the name of their stream in the sentence: “________ ________ is far older than the road that shares its valley.” Then they had three minutes to compose the next narrative line.

A Butler County student had less work time than her peers, owing to the fifteen-letter Indian name “Connoquenessing” for the creek waters bordering her school’s campus. 

Still, when she later recited a sentence that beautifully referenced horse-drawn wagons and steam locomotives to note differences in travel time between creek valley towns during the previous two centuries, I involuntarily said aloud, “I wish I wrote that sentence.”