22 July 2010

Another Place Off My Bucket List

Last week I took a one-over night trip to Pennsylvania with some ladies from our ward book group. The main reason we went was to see this house, "Falling Water" designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. It's probably one of the most famous houses in America, and I studied about it in college.
The house is built in the middle of nowhere of Pennsylvania. It's built over a waterfall, uses only natural building materials, and was built to blend into the surrounding hillside. We were surprised to learn that an average of 700 people a day tour the house, even though it's off the beaten path. It's on the Smithsonian's list of 28 places to see before you die.
Coincidentally, Falling Water is located about an hour away from the crash site of flight 93, from September 11, 2001. There isn't a memorial yet--it's in the process of being built-- so all there is is this corrugated tin building with information and displays.


The last stop of the day was the sight of a devastating flood in 1889. Our book group read the David McCullough book about the Johnstown flood, so it was especially interesting to go to the museum and the site of the dam that burst and destroyed the town of Johnstown.

When we read the book about the Johnstown flood in our book group, we were surprised we hadn't learned about it when we studied American history.
Here's our traveling group, all of us from our ward book group. Not pictured is Jessica, the lady on the left's daughter. She took the picture for us.

3 comments:

Jason and Lissa said...

Looks like you had fun! You sure get to do a lot of cool things.

Jane said...

You and your friends are so cool!

Adri and Russ Lee said...

I wouldn't mind seeing the Frank Lloyd Wright house before I die.

And ditto what Lissa said because she stole what I wanted to say.