My friend Joan and I went on a roadtrip to PA and W VA. We just had a great time! Our main focus of this trip was to get to Wissmach Glass in Paden City, W Va, and also to Youghiogheny Glass in Connellsville, PA. But of course it's not a road trip if you don't manage to fit just about everything into it. So we also stopped at the Flight 93 crashsite in Schencksville, PA,(very sad..let us not forget their heroism that day.) We went to Pittsburgh and had a very nice dinner at the Church Brew Works, which is a very old church in Pittsburgh that was going to be torn down until someone bought it, had it desanctified and made into a brew pub. We didn't manage to get there during the daylight hours..so sadly we got no pics of the stained glass windows. All the same it was a nice place to visit. And we got out of Pittsburgh just in time..we found out that evening that the G20 Conference was going to be held in the Convention center (which we drove by that night.) Imagine, a couple of days later and we'd have missed that opportunity.
We also visited Fallingwater, which is a Frank Lloyd Wright designed home built over a stream. Fallingwater is located in Mill Run, PA and is well worth the visit. It is just beautiful there. The Pennsylvania Conservancy now owns and operates the tours of the home. It was built for the Kaufmann's who owned the largest department stores in Pittsburgh (which later became Macys)but I digress. Mrs. Kaufmann also was a Tiffany collector and there are many pieces of Tiffany on display in the house. I was in awe, as during my genealogy search I found that I am distantly related to Mr. Wright (7th cousins)so it was truly an honor to be able to see one of his houses.
Last but definitely not least, we did get to Wissmach and met some extremely nice people, including Mark, the owner of Wissmach Glass. They were kind enough to show us the way to the glass they had available for sale and we even received an impromptu tour of the glass making. All together a wonderful visit and that we enjoyed very much. I wanted to take it all home with me..but sadly there's only so much you can fit into the back of a Jeep Liberty.
We also visited Youghiogheny, unfortunately we were in such a hurry most days we forgot (I forgot) to call and reserve time for a tour, but we did get to see the Youghiogheny store and purchase glass there. Such beautiful glass, many beautiful and reasonably priced items in their gift shop. I'm ready to move there just to be closer to all of this absolutely lovely glass!
Needless to say we were in glassers heaven. I'll post pictures of what I bought soon.
De
