AARONSBURG TO MARK THE 75TH ANNIVERSARY OF “THE AARONSBURG STORY”
October 26 at 2 pm – Salem Lutheran Church
Event is free and open to the public
“There is but one road to peace and that is the road of human understanding.”
–Ralph Bunche, The Aaronsburg Story, Oct. 23, 1949
Seventy-five years after the Centre County town of Aaronsburg captivated the nation with what is now widely-known as THE AARONSBURG STORY – an historic event that drew a national audience of 40,000 attendees on October 23, 1949 with its resounding message of tolerance in the wake of World War II – local residents will commemorate the occasion with a 75th anniversary celebration
At the Salem Lutheran Church in Aaronsburg (138 E. Plum St.), Saturday, October 26 at 2 pm.
Among the highlights of the 75th anniversary will be the reading of the inspirational speech that Dr. Ralph Bunche delivered that day in 1949. As well, a restored copy of the 1951 short film THE AARONSBURG STORY will be shown, the audience will join in the singing of hymns of peace, and the winner of a $500 prize for an essay on tolerance will be awarded to a Penns Valley High School senior student of history or English. Refreshments will be served following the commemoration, and audience members will have an opportunity to identify their ancestors on enlarged pages of the original program, “The Issue of an Ideal,” a pageant depicting the town’s founding that was written for the occasion by Penn State professor W.R. Gordon and performed by scores of citizens of Aaronsburg and Centre County in 1949.
“The Issue of an Ideal” recalls the generous acts of Aaronsburg founding father, Aaron Levy, a Jewish merchant who established the town and sold land to German immigrants after the 1754 Albany Purchase and 1768 Treaty of Stanwix made white settlement legal in Central Pennsylvania. Levy gave two lots to the German Lutheran settlers to build their church, school and cemetery, as well as a communion set created by the most skilled craftsman in Philadelphia. The communion set will be on view at the 75th anniversary celebration.
Penns Valley Historical Society Museum will be open from noon until 5 pm so visitors may view artifacts from the original pageant.
