[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 108 (Wednesday, July 21, 2010)]
[House]
[Pages H5894-H5895]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




           CELEBRATING 200 YEARS OF HISTORY IN McALISTERVILLE

  (Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania asked and was given permission to 
address the House for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, the first week in August 
there will be a celebration of 200 years of history in the small 
community of McAlisterville in Fayette Township, Pennsylvania.
  Author Tim Varner offers hope that the bicentennial will rekindle a 
spirit of community and give people an opportunity to relive a time of 
less haste and stress. According to the Fayette Sentinel, the 
celebration will include re-enactors and a blacksmith shop that will 
recall a simpler time
  Hugh McAlister purchased a 160-acre plot of land and in 1810 asked 
his son William to lay out a plot for the township. Soon shops, a 
blacksmith, and a tannery filled out the plot.
  In 1855, the town built the Lost Creek Valley Academy to train 
teachers. Professor George McFarland purchased it in 1858, but by 1862, 
Lincoln had issued

[[Page H5895]]

a call for more troops in the Civil War, and McFarland responded along 
with a number of academy teachers. McFarland served at Chancellorsville 
and was injured at Gettysburg.
  The academy became a home for the orphans of deceased soldiers and 
sailors and continued until 1899. The site remains a historic place for 
the town.
  This celebration honors a community, and I congratulate the townsfolk 
for commemorating their history and building their future.

                          ____________________