SPEAKER: Welcome to Our Town.

The Kishacoquillas or Big Valley is located in the heart of Mifflin County, Pennsylvania.

Big Valley offers 27 miles of patchwork farm fields and small-town charm.

Join us as several residents show and tell what makes this valley a great place to live.

Your friends and neighbors welcome you to Our Town, Big Valley.

Support for Our Town, Big Valley comes from Geisinger, committed to making better health easier for their patients in the Belleville and Reedsville clinics and throughout the Juniata Valley.

More information at geisinger.org.

Kish Bank, serving the community with financial solutions for more than 120 years with the belief that they can improve the lives of their employees, clients, and communities.

Information available at mykish.com.

The Dalton Group at Morgan Stanley who believed that goals can be achieved with an in-depth discussion with a financial professional.

Information at 814-861-1706, Morgan Stanley Smith Barney LLC, Member SIPC.

Brookmere Winery & Vineyard Inn, Belleville.

Hostetler Truck Bodies & Trailers, Old Route 322, Milroy.

Juniata River Valley Visitors Bureau, One West Market Street, Lewistown.

MCS Bank, information at mcs.bank.

Reedsville Creamery, 19 South Main Street, Reedsville.

And viewers like you, thank you.

My name is Molly Metz Bourg and I'm the curator here at the Kishacoquillas Valley Historical Society.

There are four townships in Kish Valley, and they are Armagh Township, which has basically Milroy is the big town in Armagh Township.

Then there is Brown Township, which is Reedsville.

And Reedsville is the main town in that one.

And then there is Union, which is Belleville.

And then there is Menno, which is Allensville.

There are other little towns, my favorite being in Armagh Township known as Pot Liquor Flat.

I just think that's a very unique name.

The valley is 27 miles long and only 2 and 1/2 miles wide.

And I'm not sure why it's called the Big Valley when it's not very big.

It is the Kishacoquillas Valley.

It's a beautiful name.

The name was given to us by a man by the name of John Armstrong back in 1761.

It was named for a Shawnee Indian chief, Kishacoquillas, which means the snakes are still in their den.

I do have documentation, which is interesting, in 1761.

We have a paper that says this was called the Great Valley.

I also have documentation from a Civil War letter which was in, of course, Civil War era, 1862, that calls it Big Valley.

So it's been called Big Valley for a long time.

Our valley is unique in that we have three different buggy Amish.

One is the yellow tops which are the Byler Amish.

And the Byler Amish have eight different districts within their group.

The next group is the Peachy Renno which are the black tops, and they have 13 different districts in their group.

And the Nebraska Amish are called the white-toppers, and they are the most conservative, most conservative in the United States, period.

And they have 14 districts in theirs.

District within the Amish is a Bishop has a district, and the districts are basically defined.

Because they drive a buggy, they're not going to go 24 miles to church.

And their churches are held in their homes.

So therefore, their districts are within driving distance of their church.

I am sixth generation born in this valley.

I went to school here.

I went to Kishacoquillas High School.

By the way, we had to have 14 cheerleaders just to spell out Kishacoquillas.

Then I left after I married.

I left the area for 35 years and then came back.

And I have been here since 2000.

And I joined the Historical Society at that point in time, so I've been with the Historical Society for 23 years.

The Historical Society has been around since about 1992.

We have collected things just from the Kishacoquillas Valley.

We feature several different artists.

We feature Sam Plank.

And Sam Plank was known for his salt boxes as well as his butter prints.

And also Isaac Pate who is a calligrapher as well as an artist.

And we feature furniture makers.

Joe Peachey, we have a lot of Joe Peachey furniture.

Now, he's a contemporary Amish furniture maker.

And also Stuart Peters who made furniture a long time ago, we have a lot of his things.

We feature things from the KV Railroad.

We have a whole rath of things from the KV railroad, everything from a stepping stool onto the train to the phone that they used to call to ask for permission to travel on the Lewistown line.

And we feature businesses that are no longer in business here in the valley, things like Hertzler & Zook, which was the precursor to New Holland, and Kennedy Bakery, McNabb Store, all the small little stores here in Belleville.

I like the purity of the valley.

I like the simplicity.

I like the slow pace of the valley.

A lot of people dislike the Amish on the roads and the manure on the roads, but I like it because it slows people down and makes you stop and think about the beauty of this valley.

And I have never known anyone who doesn't think it's beautiful.

Even though they may not want to live here, it's still a very beautiful valley.

Hi.

My name is Jennifer Hartzler.

And my story is about the wild geese sculptures.

The wild geese sculptures are 32 fiberglass sculptures located around the community, and they all have their own art piece.

The wild geese initiative started in 2018, and it was brought to us by Pennsylvania Council of the Arts and Community Partnerships in Mifflin County.

Usually, community partnerships partners with local businesses.

They purchase a goose, and they're kind of the liaison between the artist and the business.

The business, I think, has some say in where the goose goes, but they try to spread it around the area so that there's equal visibility.

We paint fiberglass geese because of Goose Day.

That's September 29, it's a local holiday that has really gained momentum in the past couple of years.

And it's a legend that if you eat goose during Goose Day, you won't want for money the whole year through.

So it's a quirky little local holiday that we celebrate.

The geese are 75 pounds, and they're about 5 foot high.

And there's actually a lot of surface area on these geese, so they take a lot of paint.

But they're really fun.

I teach high school art at Mifflin County High School, so it's a lot of fun getting to do these kinds of community projects in the summertime.

It's important for me to show these kids that a working artist also participates in community-based projects but also puts time into their own work.

You don't want to teach art to a kid but not show them that you can also do it too.

I have so far painted three of the geese around the community.

The geese that I have done thus far, there's one for Lewistown Hospital.

And that came about during the COVID epidemic.

They wanted to recognize the hospital staff, so we did a heroes type goose.

There's also a Kiwanis goose.

That one might be my favorite.

That one really highlights what the Kiwanis Club does for the community, especially with children.

That has a lot of blueberries on it because they do a blueberry sale every year.

The fun part about that one is when I was painting around the goose, I actually needed two more figures just because of the space that I didn't have figures for.

So I had my kids pose, so there's little caricatures of them on the goose.

So that was kind of neat.

And then also, the first goose that I did is in Downtown Lewistown.

And what I wanted to do for that one is just really capitalize on the fact that the river is part of the county.

And there's just so much natural resources around here, so I painted certain landscapes of the river.

I think the most fun part or the most rewarding part about this project is the fact that we do have so many local artists and so many different types of local artists, and that really adds to the sense of community around here.

I think because we're a rural area, people tend to overlook just the talent that we have here.

But seeing these geese really kind of brings that to light.

The thing I love about living in Mifflin County is that it's a great place to raise a family.

I actually moved away from the area for quite a while.

And it was just important for me to get back home because that's where family is.

And I just wanted my kids to have the same experience growing up as I did.

I'm Ted Carothers here representing Stroup-Alexander Post 5935 VFW in Belleville and here to discuss the Memorial Day service for our 77th Memorial and parade.

The parade, it lines through most of main streets, starts at Saint John's Church.

We line them up, and they come down through with the fire trucks, bands, floats, local community floats, and we give out awards for those.

It's kind of a event that draws the community together.

Those that were there saw that the parade grounds were crowded.

Kids from Amish to, as they call them, English lined the streets, a nice mix.

MAN: On behalf of Post 5935, veterans of foreign wars, I present this symbol of our remembrance.

TED CAROTHERS: It's always a somber day because this is the day we come to say we remember.

And in particular, we remember the names that are on our monument in front of our post.

These are names from the local community that keep the spirit going.

These are those that ultimately offered the ultimate sacrifice.

MAN: --of our tribute.

It's our tribute to their duty and their courage by their services on the land, on the sea, and in the air.

They have made us their debtors, for the flag of our nation still flies over the three people.

Detail, parade, rest.

TED CAROTHERS: It starts off with that post.

And our officers that are selected to man the monument for this detail, they will show reverence and respect to those that have gone before us.

MAN: To you comrades who have departed, we render a solid salute.

Detail, present arms.

[trumpet] TED CAROTHERS: For World War I, John C Stroup, he was the first person from Belleville killed in World War I.

And on the World War II plaque, Tenet Commander Hugh Alexander was the first killed in World War II.

That is how the post has gained its name, the Stroup-Alexander Post.

For me, what it means is that the local community gets it-- freedom isn't free, and somebody has to do this.

And that's what these names in this remembrance means.

You'll find from all these different walks of life pull their heritage, and you'll find everything that's represented here in this valley has a connection there.

I'm an implant.

I moved here in 1977.

So all but 12 years of my life, this was a great place to grow up.

It's a wholesome community.

I think some of this goes back to our Amish friends and neighbors.

We still have a good, well-rounded family atmosphere in this valley.

Hi.

I'm Rebecca Harrop, and I'm going to tell you about my family's robotic dairy farm.

The Herd essentially got started when my pap was a boy in 4-H and he had his very first 4-H cow.

And they grew the herd slowly from that, and that's where they got interested in the dairy industry.

In 1972, my dad's parents moved to Mifflin County from Chester County.

And they started with 13 cows and six heifers, and they've slowly expanded from there.

My dad and uncles, they always say that the farm is entirely family-owned and operated.

So whenever they were looking to expand, their options were a parlor or robots.

And they went ultimately with the robots because they wouldn't have to hire outside help that way.

So in 2009, they expanded to a robotic dairy facility, and we've had the robots ever since then.

We have four robot units, and the brand is called Lely.

They were the first brand that actually came out with robots.

And the cows just come in by themselves.

We have to train them, of course, but now they come in by themselves.

They get a little bit of feed while they're in there.

And then there's an arm that swings under the cow, and it automatically attaches to her udder, and then it milks her.

And then when she's done, it lets her go.

And then we don't have to touch the cow at all.

My dad and his three brothers have the farm in a partnership.

And after they had the cows going where we didn't have to be over there as often to train cows, they all joked that they don't know how they got their work done beforehand.

But it does make their schedules a lot more flexible where if there's weddings, or parties, or stuff like that, it's a lot more flexible that you don't have to have two people milking the cows three hours twice a day.

And it'll flag on the computer system if there's an issue.

And it'll call, there's a call list.

Usually, a couple of times a day, we go over there, make sure there's no what we call long-hour cows where the computer system that comes with the robots will put them on a list if they're out over, like, seven hours.

And if there's any that are out longer than 10 hours, we'll go and get them and make sure they get milked.

We were the first in Central Pennsylvania.

And right now, we're milking around 190 cows.

The thing that I think we are so lucky for in our area, beyond just what we have locally, is how close we are.

You know, we have all the state parks that are not even an hour's drive away.

And then if we do want to go to a city, we're not that far away from some major cities.

I just think we're very lucky with the location that we are in here.

Hi my name is Tara Richtscheit and I'm going to tell you about Dayze Gone Bye Carriage Rides and Guest House in Allensville.

[music playing] Dayze Gone Bye Carriage Rides and Guest House are located on Water Street in Allensville.

We have a horse and carriage business.

We specialize in the authentic Amish buggy and offer Big Valley tours.

But we also have a pony wagon for the children.

We have an open spring wagon, which would carry more than the typical Amish buggy.

We have an antique sleigh, which has given us an opportunity to do numerous things.

The countryside here is so beautiful in Big Valley, and on our tour route, you will pass both Amish and Mennonite farms.

You'll pass an Amish school.

MAN: Hey, how you doing?

TARA RICHTSCHEIT: - -which the children like to show off for us because they find us fascinating and we're very good friends with them.

And you would pass a working dairy barn built in 1862.

During our tours, we also-- when in season, we'll stop at an Amish farm where you can buy pumpkins, baked goods, produce, in season.

And that's quite a hit with the tourists.

Two years after moving here, the property next door came for sale.

We needed room to expand at that time.

So that gave us room to put a two-car garage so we could have a carriage house, and that house was in extreme disrepair.

So we began rebuilding and we decided it would be our Dayze Gone Bye Guest House.

So after a lot of work, we restored the building and it is now 169 years old.

It is very clean and well-kept.

It is decorated with relics of days gone by.

People love it because they can come in here and see the white plank painted doors, the crooked ceilings.

But it's updated with modern conveniences, with your stove, refrigerator, microwave, no TV because that's not needed if you're in Big Valley.

And we've had people from four or five different countries, and probably 15 states.

Allensville is so special.

You should see Sunday mornings.

Water Street is like a racetrack for buggies.

Hello, my name is Gay Rodgers, and I'm here to tell you today about Hameau Farm.

I'm a third generation Ayrshire breeder.

My great-uncle, Reed Hays, my dad, John Rogers, and now me, and the plum bottom herd that my father started is now at Hameau.

And so it's a small herd of Ayrshire cows.

They are great grazers and so the whole farm is grass.

I mean, I have some cows in the herd that are over 10 years old, and I have at least six who have milked over 100,000 pounds of milk in their lifetime.

In addition to the herd, there are other animals at the farm.

And the other animals are at the farm because there's another enterprise that happens during the summer.

The barn doors just open a little bit wider and we welcome girls ages 8 to 14 to the farm.

30 of them come for a two-week session, and I have three two-week sessions throughout the summer.

While the girls are there, we do chores.

Every morning, the girls do a rotation of chores-- feeding the calves their morning bottles.

They also feed the sheep, the goats, the pigs, and gather the eggs, take care of the chickens, clean the barn, and then there's another group that actually does a little bit of dishwashing every morning.

This is farm camp.

And so the girls come from major metropolitan areas.

It is an empowerment thing.

That's part of our mission statement-- to empower young girls.

In addition to the chores in the morning, activities in the afternoon are a little more traditional camp.

We sometimes go hiking, biking.

There's feed bag fashion.

I mean I have a stack of old feed bags that are gathered throughout the year.

And so then the girls make dresses and hats and come to dinner dressed up.

The ultimate goal for these girls is that the last day of the session, we have a farm show.

And so there's a judge that comes in that they have never seen.

Throughout the two weeks that they're at the farm, they work with an animal of their choosing-- a calf, or a heifer, a goat, a sheep, or a pig.

And then the last day, there's a farm show.

A lot of Kodak moments, and the girls go home on a high note.

In addition to the camp, I work with a local artist.

Susan Nicholas Gephart is from Bellefonte, Pennsylvania.

She hosts an artist retreat on the farm.

So artists come and they set up their easels all around the farm, paint the cows, paint the views, paint the vistas.

[music playing] I worked for a while away from the area.

I worked in Washington D.C. and I came back to the area when the program that I was working for ended.

So I was out and I was driving tractor, taking care of animals, milking, and as you drive along on a tractor, you think, why was it I wanted to leave?

This place is beautiful.

And these people are-- these people are my family.

And so that's what brought me back, and that's what keeps me here.

Hi, my name is Forest Fisher I'm here today to tell you a little bit about Big Valley artist, Anne Kepler Fisher.

[music playing] She was my mom, and has portrayed the Big Valley Amish of the Nebraska Old Order Amish, what we might call the White Toppers.

In addition to her Amish work, she's also well-known for historical and other locations, sites, and people of the Kishacoquillas Valley.

Some of my specific favorite works of art Hi, my name is Forest Fisher I'm here today are her depictions of local historical events, from the Chief Logan of Logan Springs fame, to the mural at the former Kish High School, Kishacoquillas, the Spirit of Kishacoquillas.

The Kishacoquillas painting, in particular, the origins began in a student council meeting in 1965.

It turned out to be somewhat of an allegorical image of the spirit of Kishacoquillas over the high school itself.

It was donated to the high school and hung in the lobby outside of the auditorium through the course of the high school until it no longer was Kish in 1988.

Anne Fisher's public art is perhaps a bit more limited.

However, she did a series of prints for the Kishacoquillas Valley National Bank that highlighted the people, the places and customs of Big Valley.

Those frequently hang in public buildings, they may also be in many private collections as well.

Anne Fisher was able to capture the life and times of the Nebraska Amish because she kept a series of diaries, that after interactions with friends and neighbors, she would go home and pore over the events and record them in her diary, with illustrations.

She would focus on particular specifics of dress.

For example, take the men's straw hats.

She would focus upon those.

She would talk to our Amish neighbor about how she made the hats for her husband and boys, and then she'd go home and record this in her diary and sketch it.

I think one of the most rewarding aspects she found was that when her Amish neighbors would come down to use the phone, see if they could get a ride to town, they'd stop in to her gallery where she was working, to her studio, and they'd want to know, hmm, who's this?

How do you do that?

And then another, maybe the son would come along and then they would play this game, who is that Amish person?

We know them.

We think we know them.

She would even get into, sort of, where do you think this was painted?

And then they would muse about, well, that's probably Eli's in the back road, and those are his girls in the field digging potatoes.

It was quite an illuminating-- actually interactive experience between Anne and her Amish neighbors.

Growing up in Reedsville and Big Valley has been very rewarding.

One of the recent events that brought myself and my two brothers together in downtown Reedsville was the Kishacoquillas Goose, where local artist Daphne Krepps Marthouse recreated in what our family is honored to say is a recreation of the Kishacoquillas image mural from the former high school.

It's a point of pride that we believe mom would be honored to know that that's part of her legacy.

Hi, I'm Vicky Hamilton and I'm here to talk about two historic places in Big Valley.

[music playing] The Hill Store was opened in 1853 by John McNabb, who used to be a blacksmith in the area, and then started up the store.

At that time, that was the place to get everything that you would need.

There were three floors worth of merchandise.

The store changed hands several times, and was many different kinds of stores up until 2004 when the current owners, Tom and Ann McNabb, purchased the building and the house next to it.

They, at first, were told by some other people, you just need to take the whole thing down.

It was falling apart it needed a ton of work and they really had this vision of what they wanted it to look like, to revive it again, and they found so many treasures within it that they just couldn't bear to throw away.

They are always happy to give tours when you go through, and it's like walking into a museum, even though it's an event place now.

When you walk into the store, there's actually a desk that was part of the original post office in Belleville.

The counters and the shelves from the original store are still there and used as decor.

A lot of the decorations that were originally there are still part of what they're using today.

My favorite part of it is that there are doors and walls with writing on them from back in the 1800s.

They would write measurements for maybe rope that they were getting ready to cut, or nails that they were getting ready for somebody.

There's names written everywhere from the 1800s.

There's even poetry written on some of the walls.

And instead of painting over it, they've left it there so it kind of adds to the charm of just being there.

In addition to it being a place where you can have an event, they actually rent rooms that you can stay there as well.

The rooms look very much like you're walking back into an 1800s bedroom.

When you sit there, you're kind of getting these mixed messages of old and new, even hearing cars going by outside followed by buggies at the same time.

It's just a really cool place to visit, and just kind of touch base with that what it used to be like here.

[auctioneer chant] The Belleville livestock auction started as just people from the area going together to buy your cows and chickens, and over time, because that was a meeting place, vendors started to become interested in the area, and they would start setting up.

Now, it's the place to visit.

From early in the morning, around 6:00, there were vendors set up on this 10-acre spread.

And you can get everything that you can think of-- antiques, produce, I usually leave with my arm full of bags of just fresh produce and bread.

I remember, as a kid, going there and there was my parents called it junk.

We thought it was treasures.

But just little plastic toys, so we would get something and walk around and think that was just the best.

[music playing] There are indoor vendors.

Some of the vendors-- I'm 41 years old, and I've been seeing those vendors since I was there as a little kid.

They're still coming back.

One of the coolest things about the Belleville sale is that it's a mixture of cultures, where you're walking around and you're hearing the Amish and their Pennsylvania Dutch, and then us walking around, children and dogs.

It's just the atmosphere itself is what really makes that.

I think my favorite thing about Big Valley is just that combination of the old things, the history in our valley, and then a lot of the new stuff with people with new ideas for businesses, and just how to keep that awesome combination of old and new.

My name is Fred Brown, and I want to talk to you today about how Big Valley is a living museum of agriculture.

Within the 30 miles of Big Valley, we have Amish communities that still farm in the old traditional ways as well as modern equipment being used in similar fields, or fields right beside it.

Hay is really different methods, whether you're Amish or non-Amish.

At the north end of the valley, it's farmed as loose hay loaded onto a wagon, and then hauled into the barn and emptied in the barn in a loose form.

Then the next progression, you get to see non-Amish farmer using a tractor to power his equipment, which would be a baler and that baler throws the bales onto a wagon.

Then the last method that we see in baling hay is a large bale being built in a baler and then dropped on the ground to be loaded on a wagon later.

Corn is planted a lot the same way whether you're Amish or non-Amish, but the harvesting of corn is different.

Green corn, the Amish harvest the corn by a corn binder pulled with horses.

It's loaded onto a wagon, and then the wagon is taken to the silo, and it's unloaded by hand, and it's chopped up and blown into the silo.

The non-Amish community usually has a tractor to power the chopper and blow it into a wagon, and then that wagon is taken to the silo and loaded into a blower.

The method used by large farmers is hiring a custom operator to come in with a self-propelled chopper and blow it in the wagons.

Now on dry corn, the Amish still hand pick their corn and throw it in a wagon.

The corn stalks are then cut off with the corn binder, and put into shucks, which are often seen in the fall.

The non-Amish farmers have power equipment run a tractor and a mechanical picker and drops it into a gravity box wagon.

Grain is also a commodity that's handled differently by the Amish versus the non-Amish.

The Amish still use a grain binder.

My grandfather used to bind wheat with the help of his brothers.

That same method is being used by the Amish now with their binders.

They bind the grain into bundles called sheaves, and then they're put in rows called shucks, and then they're to be loaded onto a wagon to take to a threshing machine where thresher will separate the straw from the grain, and then put the grain into a wagon.

Now the English, non-Amish use a combine, which is powered by a tractor.

My dad had one back in the '50s.

And then, today most of the combining is done with a self-propelled combine that does it all in one operation in a very short time.

I grew up on a farm, my children are on a farm.

They're the fifth and sixth generation on a farm.

It's just a good way of raising family and good community involvement, and a different lifestyle that we enjoy having.

My name is Beth Reifsnyder, and I'm here to tell you about Mifflin County Airport.

[music playing] The airport is in Reedsville, Pennsylvania, designation as pilots would call it is KRVL.

I am the chairman of the Mifflin County Airport Authority.

We are there to serve all the population and businesses, especially, that come in and out.

The fly-in breakfast happens every second Saturday, monthly.

If it's a good weather day for pilots, we have lots of airplanes, usually somewhere between 50 and 100 people come flying in.

People in the community attend.

Everybody's welcome, and it gets very crowded.

Every year there is a glider contest and the community loves when the gliders come in.

They're beautiful, first of all.

The wingspan is so wide and they love our airport and it's because of where it sits between the mountains.

It does shut down the airport for a little while every day while they launch because they have to grid up on the runway, and it's just beautiful to see them out there and launching.

So we hope they continue to come to our airport for another 25 or 30 years, at least.

Who doesn't want to learn to fly?

[chuckles] Once our children were out of college, I looked at my husband one day and said, wouldn't it be fun to learn to fly?

So that's what we did.

We came out to the Mifflin County Airport.

We used, at first, a club airplane that is there and a local instructor, and we started learning to fly in our 50s.

And it was wonderful.

After the first lesson, I said, this is so much fun.

Let's buy an airplane.

And that's what we did, bought an airplane.

This area is best.

We've flown a lot of places.

And we still think this is the best area to fly.

It's beautiful.

The Big Valley is beautiful.

It's like flying over a patchwork quilt when you look down on the fields and farms and see all the different colors.

It's unique where it sits between the mountains, the seven mountains, and Jack's mountain.

It's something that you can recognize from miles away and we just-- we love it.

Hi, my name is Cole Cullen and I'm going to tell you about the glider races at the Mifflin County Airport.

[music playing] I live in Reedsville, adjacent to the Mifflin County Airport, and every May, there are glider races.

So I figured I would take my camera over to the airport and meet some people and do some interviews and learn about the races.

The race itself takes place over 10 days.

I was able to interview Marshall McClung.

He's actually the race director and he comes here from Virginia.

We establish a different task every day that will have turn points that the gliders have to touch, meaning that there's a vertical cylinder that they have to fly in and get a GPS fix in that cylinder.

And at the end of however many competition days we have, then they add up the points and the guy that had the most points gets a pat on the back and an attaboy, and a picture of him on a podium, and that's it.

There's no money, nothing other than the self-satisfaction of I flew against some of the best pilots in the United States.

And we have pilots here from-- one lives in Alaska, there are a couple from California.

I mean, it's all over the United States.

This is a very, very small group of folks and they're very dedicated to the art and science of soaring.

Well, first of all, this is a national contest and this is the best place to get a good ranking within all of the different soaring society of America pilots.

But most of all, this is a wonderful place to do soaring.

All the mountains come together in all the valleys.

The winds come out of the northwest.

We can just ride up and down the mountains and have hours and hours of entertaining high speed flight.

MARSHALL MCCLUNG: This is one of the most well-known soaring areas in the world.

And it is primarily because of the locations of the mountains, which in certain weather conditions, produce what we refer to as ridge lift.

And it's like water that travels over a log.

If this is a log and the water hits the log and goes up, but it only goes up for 400 or 500 feet.

Well, if you can keep a glider in that upstream, you can go for hundreds of miles and we've had contests days where we've flown over 600 miles.

There are only a few places in the world that you can do that.

The airport and my home are in Reedsville, which is on one end of the valley.

I actually grew up here in Allensville, which is on the other end of the valley.

Allensville is a very small town, but a very special town.

When I was a kid, my dad had some medical issues and I really should have had a challenging childhood because of it.

But our neighbors and the people of this town really helped me and my sister have a normal life.

I'm thankful to have grown up in this tiny little town of Allensville because it really helped make me who I am.

Hi, my name is Cynthia Totura, and I'm here today to talk about James Alexander and his family.

[music playing] James Alexander is considered the first settler in the area.

He arrived here in 1755.

He wanted to make a settlement, that was his goal in life, and he, I guess he ended up farming.

One of his quotes that he's noted for is, "No man should ever desire a soil as this."

So he really liked the fertility of the area.

He built a permanent structure somewhere between 1755 and 1765.

It is located in Alexander Springs, between Belleville and Reedsville.

Alexander Springs is off Spring Run Road which is along 655, and we're about maybe a mile in from Spring Run Road.

The building was structured so that the logs were dressed down.

The exterior is restored.

There was also a gun port in the gable end of the log home that was 11.5 inches square.

It's now hidden inside by the circular fireplaces that are inside, but the original fireplace was at the other end of the log structure.

When we did the restoration of the house, we chinked over part of that gun port.

I don't have any current plans, I would like to live in it.

But right now, we just want to have it restored.

My husband and I put a roof on the house in the 1980s, and that probably saved the house.

And then my mother, who owned the property at the time, she had some builder come in and they did a little work at that time.

But then after that, nothing was done until 2020.

The builder who is working on the restoration of the house is an eighth generation James Alexander descendant.

I'm a seventh generation James Alexander descendant.

So it's special to him as well as to me.

I lived for 25 years in Illinois, and we didn't see the songbirds that are around here.

We didn't see the wildlife as much.

And so it's nice to come back to the mountains and see all the wildlife and the farming, and how pristine the area is and how everybody takes pride in their community and building up the community and the businesses here.

Everybody is just so friendly.

Hi, my name is Betsy Knarr.

I'd like to share with you all the schools of the Kishacoquillas Valley.

[music playing] All within the valley, we have one public school, grades 1 through 5-- Indian Valley Elementary Center.

All the kids in the older grades are bused into a different valley.

We have five Mennonite schools, three of them have classes up through 12th grade 2 of them are more conservative and have grades 1 through 8.

And then we have 29 one-room schoolhouses that the Amish run, and they are all throughout the Valley.

My sister Melody and I traveled all through the valley to get all these schoolhouses.

We had no idea there were that many.

We knew there were a lot, but 29 one-room schoolhouses, that was pretty impressive.

There are so many Amish schools in the Valley because they're all built close to where the students live.

The students can walk or ride their scooters or bicycles, and they only go through eighth grade.

The buildings are built by the Amish, and they are paid for by the Amish churches.

The buildings have no electricity.

They are heated by wood stoves in the winter time, and they don't have restrooms inside.

They are outside with individual outhouses for the boys and girls.

Every school has to register with the Department of Education, but they are basically self-governed.

These schools are operated by Amish parents and there is a local board of several Amish fathers who have the oversight.

They hire the teacher, they choose the curriculum, they're totally in charge of what happens at the school.

The teachers are most always Amish women who have gone to Amish schools.

They haven't gone beyond eighth grade, but they are chosen for their teaching ability, and for their embracing of the Amish values.

The children have a curriculum that emphasizes the basic skills.

They also are taught English and German.

Each school day begins with scripture reading and reciting the Lord's Prayer, but they do not have formal education in religion.

They think that's best left up to the individual family unit and to the churches.

Eight generations of my family are from this valley.

I had to go down to the Harrisburg area looking for work, but this is always home, and this will always be home, no matter where I've lived.

When I tell people at work I'm going home for the weekend, I'm not going to my house.

I'm coming to Kishacoquillas Valley.

Hi I'm Kay Semler and my story is about the downtown revitalization of Reedsville.

[music playing] Reedsville, on its own, has two very attractive properties that are owned by the township-- a vendor park, and a playground.

and a playground.

Those inspired more maintenance and projects that have been taken on by the government of the township.

The downtown revitalization was started with a grant for a streetscape and since has grown through volunteerism and the property owners stepped up because they saw what was happening with some fabulous sidewalks, great lighting, planting about the downtown revitalization of Reedsville.

of trees, and general beautification.

[music playing] Once the appearance improved, then that brought businesses.

that are owned by the township-- a vendor park, We moved in the end of March and everything has just been going fantastic.

People are very interested in our merchandise.

Hi, I'm Michelle Lasher.

I own Michelle's Restaurant Pizzeria here in the great little town of Reedsville.

Come try us out sometime.

We serve breakfast, lunch, and dinner and do a great pizza.

Hi, this is Bill from Bill's Bikes.

Everything you see here is for sale.

We're part of the great community of Reedsville.

KAY SEMLER: Businesses bring more people.

So all of these piggyback on one another.

Now we have vibrancy.

We have excitement.

We have planned events.

We have a food truck Tuesday, a third Friday, an apple festival where we make homemade Apple butter and things like that.

So all of these things inspire.

The inspiration brings something else and creative ideas, and thoughtfulness that we didn't have before on our own because of the people that have joined the projects.

Just in the past couple of years, it's been really cool to see Reedsville kind of come alive and blossom into this cool community where there's businesses of different types, and people out all the time.

Reedsville has been very welcoming.

We love it here it has been an amazing experience and we love that we moved our location here.

We offer women's and children's clothes, and accessories.

So if you're looking for a special gift, stop on in and see us.

One of the reasons that we feel we've done well here is because we have a very involved township.

They've done a great job here in Reedsville.

They keep things looking very beautiful.

We have some great sidewalks and they're constantly looking for ways to improve and make it nice for the public.

KAY SEMLER: We have other great retailers that have been there a longer time.

I have a coffee club of guys that come in.

They've been coming in for years.

They are here when I open up, and they're here about two hours, and I look forward to seeing them every day.

KAY SEMLER: We have Stonefly Cafe and Wine Bar, we have a couple of small boutiques, and now people not only drive to town, they're walking to Main Street, to the businesses there.

[music playing] We're rural but we have access to great highways that get us to State College, to Harrisburg, to Huntington, wherever you need to go for your work.

You still have the farmers markets, you have local produce, you can go get brown eggs on your own without needing to travel very far.

So it's all of these things that come together to make Reedsville just a wonderful place to be.

Hi, my name is Brian Ketchem and I'm going to tell you about the Central Pennsylvania Clinic, a medical home for special children and adults.

[music playing] It's a clinic that was founded in 1989 by Dr. d. Holmes Morton and his wife, Caroline.

They founded it in Lancaster to help the plain community, which is the Amish and Mennonites, with their health care needs but then also to study genetic disorders that are inherent in those populations.

And in 2011, a branch here was opened and that's the branch that I had the privilege of going and visiting.

It's a medical clinic, a pediatric and adult medical clinic for patients who have unusual health care problems, most of which are related to genetics.

I've always been really interested with how genetics work in specific cultural groups.

And so this just seemed like the perfect fit.

BRIAN KETCHEM: What makes it unique is that they focus on the genetic disorders and they've done research there, and unlike large research institutions where they do the research, and then it might trickle out and be applied to real-world cases, here they apply and do the research simultaneously.

It is unique in that there's an emphasis upon delivering health care and through delivering health care, learning more about these disorders and their treatment.

BRIAN KETCHEM: A lot of the genetic research is on the children because there's a lot of inherited diseases that present in childhood.

They're all very important to study and they found ways of therapeutically treating them, and also screening for them.

In fact, one of the services they offer is that couples can come in with their thinking about having children to do a screening test that is specific for genetic diseases that are prevalent in this community.

And that genetic research, they've written hundreds of papers and it's helped people throughout the world, not just in the Plain Community, but the research they're doing in the Plain Community is really driving that.

This is community-supported.

The board of directors are 80% from Amish and from the Mennonite community.

The brand new building that was built, which is a very large and nice building was built with the help of the community members.

It's made in a barn-raising style.

In fact, it was put up like a barn, traditional to the Amish community.

And they have several more spaces that are still under development.

They're planning on doing a dental office a vision office in addition to what they already do.

So they're really trying to have a central hub of services for everyone in the community.

Everybody there has passion with what they're doing.

My family has been in the valley for a long time.

The clinic here is a great example of resiliency and self-sufficiency of the valley.

I've heard many stories from my grandmother over the years of how the valley and the people in the valley have come together to help one another in the past.

And I think a little bit special in the valley because I haven't witnessed it to that extent and to the things that have happened in this valley and the history in other places.

I'm Carolyn Donaldson.

I'm excited to bring you the story of Kish bank and the Big Valley and to best tell you that story I go right to the source our historian and CEO, Bill Hayes.

Kish's roots go back to 1900.

One of those ancestors was A. Reed Hayes senior who helped to co-found the Belleville Depository Bank.

And during the Great Depression, of course, there was the bank holiday.

The stockholders had to decide whether or not they were going to open up after the bank holiday.

My grandfather pledged his assets so that the bank could reopen its doors, but at the same time, they acquired the Belleville National Bank.

And together, they opened their doors as the Kishacoquillas Valley National Bank.

That was in 1934.

And then my father came back from the Second World War, and joined the board of the bank.

He passed away in 1977.

The board came to me and asked me if I would be interested in joining the bank.

And here we are, 45 years later.

So from 1980 until today, we've been a very fast-growing bank.

We were about $10 million in assets when I joined in 1977.

And today, we're about $1.4 billion.

CAROLYN DONALDSON: In 1992 an arsonist set fire to eight Amish barns in the valley all in one night, six of those barns were destroyed.

Kish Bank helped to collect monetary donations from the community.

BILL HAYES: We had these small checks coming in by the bagful every day, seven, eight, nine, ten duffel bags full of $5 checks from children all across the country.

When we were done, we had over $1 million.

It was one of those time periods when the community came together, and it only helped to strengthen the bond that existed between Kish and the Valley, and the folks who are such an important part of our society here.

The nature of the Hayes family and the Valley goes back to 1740.

The Hayes homestead on the Back Mountain Road is a place where my grandfather had proposed to retire before he passed away.

And then my father settled, had six children.

Connie and I returned here after the service and settled there as well.

The culture at Kish is very much a people culture as is the culture of the Kishacoquillas Valley and it's enabled us to take what we value and have it become successful.

We want to make sure that our communities benefit from our well-being.

My name is Kimanzi Waller and my story is about coming to Mifflin County, starting a food stand.

[music playing] I came up here in 2021 and started cooking at Big Valley Antique Center.

I probably knew a few people up here that I've been visiting over the years.

And I just rolled the dice.

It was nothing to lose.

How's it going?

Nice to meet you.

I stayed up here staying with friends for my entire first year.

It brought me here, they made sure I stayed here.

I started getting more parties and it was different know people really embraced you.

[chuckles] [chatter] KIMANZI WALLER: I love to cook.

My mother was a cook in New Jersey.

She was a teacher, but she cooked on the side.

She did wedding cakes and did a lot of decorating.

Right now, I'm doing barbecue.

I do a sliced sirloin, I do mac and cheese, but I'm able to do anything.

I get people from all of Mifflin County because I travel around.

My stand isn't just in one place.

I go all over the county.

And I can name most of them by name.

If they come to the stand or I've seen the face.

When I started, I probably had less than 1,000 followers on my social media and now I'm over 4,000.

The community's been a big help.

They've supported me.

I had guys that said, I will be here every week once a week just to make sure that you stay around here, and that was the whole first winter that I was up here.

Completely different place.

I'm from Newark, New Jersey.

So you're talking straight city to straight country.

[chuckles] It's different, for sure.

But I like the peace.

And this is the one place where you can get all of the seasons.

You can meet some of the friendliest people and definitely come.

[chuckles] I'm Pastor Ela J. Robertson, and I'm going to be talking about stories we don't often hear, stories of the unheard in this community.

[music playing] So by unheard, I mean people who we don't see around the community as much anymore.

They just can't get around as much.

We don't have a chance to chat with them at the post office or different places.

They can't come to church anymore.

This might be people who have experienced disabilities, who've experienced challenges in their physical health, and mobility.

One of the people I talked to is John Waddell, and he's the one that will go visit people quite a bit.

And he has some good stories to tell about the other person that we visited and interviewed was John Helfrich, and he always says, if you want to be uplifted, go visit John.

John is a hidden gem in Big Valley.

He's one of those people that we don't hear a lot about, but it's fantastic to go and visit John.

Every time I do, I come out feeling better.

PASTOR: We went there with three of his old classmates.

Well, I wanted to tell the world that I'm very happy.

And I wish the world would be very happy.

And if the world would be happy, there won't be any problem.

PASTOR: People often come up to me and say, oh, you should have known someone when.

And that may refer to-- I should have known someone when they were really active in the community, and were doing so many things.

But I meet this person in the state that they're in today and I always find a unique gift in each one.

When I learned how to ride a bike, that made Belleville slow down because I could get out in the morning, see more, I remember how I loved to come down the Belleville Hill and I would come down there just as fast as the car did, and I would almost go up the hill over District Street so fast, I'd come down and then I'd go up.

So this is just kind of what I was called to do, to just feel that we can connect with those people we often don't have a chance to connect with, and look to possibilities rather than limitations.

And I think that is just a beautiful message for all of us.

Sometimes you have to go out and find it.

Hi, my name is Steve Stuck and I would like to talk about the revitalization of the village of Milroy.

[music playing] When you first come into Milroy, you come off the Expressway exit, and all you see is our industry, which is prolific.

And so there's a really healthy business base there.

But down in the old part of town is my interest in revitalizing the downtown part of Milroy.

[horse galloping] We have several different startup companies that are in the old part of downtown Milroy.

They're craft shops-- Danny's Craft Shop, Krazy K's, and that, I feel is revitalization of the town itself.

We also have the Hartman Center that is a really nice recreation park, RV park.

We have our own little American Legion.

I'm very proud of our Legion, Post 287, and it is a nice place to live.

That's why I'm interested in the revitalization.

[music playing] I am-- and my wife own a deli in Milroy.

It's called the Milroy Deli and we have just recently invested in it.

We started in 2021, and it was the original firehouse.

It was built in 1930's, specifically as a firehouse.

There were several additions put on to it over the years, and in 2021, the building became available.

My wife is from Philly.

She wanted to have a delicatessen.

Our slogan is, "A little Philly in Milly."

And we are having a great time with it and the folks in downtown Milroy love us.

You can pop in and get a hoagie.

You can get a cheesesteak.

You can get your meats and cheeses.

You can get everything there.

We are trying to make a centerpiece for the community.

We are the home to-- it's called the Armagh Memorial Field.

We're the home of the Babe Ruth state championship games.

That's a big draw for Milroy.

We have a lot of folks come in from all over the state.

It's a recognized Babe Ruth field across the state.

Milroy is a waypoint on the way to State College.

And a lot of people don't get to see the ball field.

You can see it on the expressway when you go by but they don't get a good look for it, a good feel for it.

We have a very strong baseball presence in this area because of the coaches, the Little League system that's come through, the dedicated people that have worked on the field, the hard work that the volunteers put in, and it's a community effort.

It's a community draw.

I taught little league there, I coached little league there, my boys played ball there, my boys played football there.

It's been a center of entertainment for us for years and years and years.

It was a great place to raise kids, beautiful countryside.

You couldn't ask for anything more.

My name is Ruth Knaar, and I want to tell you about Valley View Haven and the Medical Center in Belleville.

[music playing] In Belleville, we always take care of our own.

And that is why we had Valley View and the Medical Center.

We come together to make both of them.

Back in the early days, there was a lady named Nannie Peachy, she was a cousin of my grandfather and she was a very fine caretaker of the older people that she took care of in their own homes.

But she was reaching retirement age, and she was concerned who was going to take care of these people, so she approached pastor Erie Reno who was a Mennonite pastor, and they got together with the churches, and groups of people and they decided to build a rest home.

Valley View took off and was well received by everyone.

But it became obvious that retirees also had special needs.

So a cottage was built along Apple House Road, that is when Valley View became a village.

And then later on, it became obvious that there were those who could not maintain their own home any longer, but still wanted to maintain independent living.

So they built the apartment buildings that became known as The Terrace.

And then we had the rehab center that took care of the outpatients, and also the residents, and then they also had the unit that took care of those who had special needs with memory care.

We have the Medical Center, and it was built for the general public because our pharmacist had passed away, and our two doctors had reached retirement age so their group got together and decided we need to get a medical center to entice young doctors to come to Belleville and take care of us and take care of the general public.

We never dreamed that it would get so large.

In fact, we are the biggest employer.

There are 250 employees and there are 400 residents.

And it's still growing.

We always have cared about each other.

We care about our older people, we always cared about everyone.

We look after our young folks.

It's just a great place to live.

And I have enjoyed living here all of my life.

We're just one big happy family here in Big Valley, and I guess it'll always be that way.

Hi my name is Cheryl Glick.

My story is about Brookmere Winery and Vineyard Inn in Belleville, Pennsylvania.

The winery is one of the oldest wineries in the state.

Don and Susan Chapman started it in 1983 and after Ed and I worked for them probably for about 12 years, we bought the winery in 2007.

We have 10 acres of vineyard that supply about 40% of our need.

We are committed to supporting the grape and fruit growers of Pennsylvania so what our need is off the farm, it comes from Pennsylvania and we're pretty proud of that.

When Ed and I bought the winery, we diversified into some agritourism venues.

So we first started by building a 100 by 40 foot pavilion that we host a lot of weddings.

It's a vintage property that offers a nice backdrop.

We also opened our 1866 mansion into a bed and breakfast.

So we see people far and wide, and even locals love to stay.

We enjoy a lot of fundraisers on the property.

We also renovated our 1800s Pennsylvania Bank barn.

So we do a lot of community-centered events, not all just dealing with wine, all kinds of events we can host there.

Our winery is one of the highest tourist attractions in Mifflin County.

What people come to our area for is the Amish community, a quieter pace of life that people love to experience.

So we often have buggies trotting by the winery and even stopping in the winery.

We loved raising our three kids here in Belleville.

There was a great school district, it was very rural.

There was a lot of opportunities for them, for their imagination to grow, if it's just playing out on the farm.

It's a quieter pace of life here in Belleville.

Hi, I'm Barbara Franhouser and I'm going to tell you about the Belleville Civic Club.

[music playing] It started back in 1938.

And then it was named the Belleville Community Civic Club.

I have been chairman and involved in the civic club now for 44 years.

We have a lot of committees and we have projects going on.

The antique show is one of them.

We had wonderful, wonderful dealers.

We had a food stand there, and people loved that.

I can remember certain people who came in, paid the admission, went straight to the food.

And the other fundraiser was our rose breakfast.

The hostess would be a civic club member.

She would invite seven guests to the breakfast.

And then at the end, we had a program planned, either musical or something like that.

We would pass a basket so that we would have our guests contribute to the scholarship fund.

That was the main reason for the rose breakfast, was to gain money for that.

The scholarship started back in 1955, and then it was the huge amount of $250.

[chuckles] and for the first six years, I think it was that it always went to someone going into the nursing career.

But our very first recipient from Menno Union High school was Nancy Yoder.

Her name now is Nancy Yoder-Smith.

Today, our scholarship is $2,000, and our winner this year was Sonya Yoder from the Belleville Mennonite School.

We've donated to the meat canning project, we donate to the library, to the bloodmobile.

We put benches downtown in Belleville, tennis courts in Belleville.

It's a great feeling, it really is.

I am so astonished and taken aback by the ladies who actually started the civic club, and so I felt it a privilege to be part of the civic club.

The reason I brought this along, on the back is a club collect.

And I think it's good not just for this organization, for any organization.

"Keep us, o God, from pettiness.

Let us be large in thought, in deed.

Let us be done with faultfinding and leave off self-seeking.

May we put away all pretense and meet each other face to face without self-pity and without prejudice."

There's more but I think this is a wonderful verse not just for our club, but for any organization because sometimes, there's little things that are so petty that we pick on.

We don't need to.

I love Big Valley.

[chuckles] These are my roots.

I've shared things with people away from here.

I've been involved in Pennsylvania school boards for a lot of years, so I've been to other states, but there's no place like Big Valley.

My name is Gerald Yoder and I'm going to talk about Native Americans and Big Valley.

[music playing] Big Valley lies Southwest Northeast.

On the north side, the name of the mountain is-- we all call it Stone Mountain, but the true name of it is Standing Stone Mountain, and it is named after an Indian tribe that lived near Huntington.

The mountain on the south side is called Jacks Mountain.

It's named for Captain Jack Schwartz Captain Jack Schwartz, was a somewhat of a mysterious guy.

We don't have a lot of information about him.

All we know is he was called the "Black Rifle of the Wild Juniata."

The name of the valley itself was Kishacoquillas.

A Shawnee Indian chief who lived at Ohesson near Lewistown with a stream that bears his name, empties into the Juniata River is where his camp was.

They say his name means, "the snakes are in their dens."

And someone surmised that perhaps he was a peacemaker because he was known as always a good friend of the white man.

Where do they live in Big Valley, the Indians?

Mostly along streams.

You can find all kinds of artifacts if you hunt along our streams.

I think the Shawnee and the Delawares are the ones that lived in Big Valley along the streams.

And usually, it was near a big spring.

As a boy growing up, I lived right along little Kish Creek, right near a big spring.

One day, while playing in the creek, I found a stone.

It looked odd.

I knew it was something.

I didn't know what it was.

So I took it to the man who's had a huge collection of artifacts, and he told me it was a pestle.

I could see where it was carved, the handle had been carved.

We know there was family groups here because a pestle was not something that a man would use, that was used by the ladies of the tribe to grind their corn meal, smash their berries, or whatever they had.

I hike almost every day, I go to the mountain.

I don't hike through Big Valley a lot.

I go to the mountain and I hike two miles, three miles, almost every day.

I love the different trees.

I like to stop, look at the trees, figure out-- try to figure out what it is, if I don't know, I come home and look it up in the book.

I just enjoy it, being outside in this area, in the beauty of it.

My name is Kaye Raye Hepler-Stuter, and I'm going to be talking about We Love Armagh Township.

[music playing] We love Armagh Township is actually a social media group, and it is for anyone who has any roots, or any ties to Armagh Township.

And it gives everybody an opportunity to just share what they love about Armagh Township.

We were approaching Armagh Township Community days, which is held the third weekend in June, and I had seen that another local township had a social media page, and I thought, why don't we?

So I did.

Some of the favorite things that I've seen are scenery.

People love to post pictures of sunsets, sunrises, local animals, flowers, or events that are going on in the township.

[music playing] We do themes on the page.

People have talked about what it was like to hike the Knob, to go hunting on the Knob.

And you can see the Knob anywhere in Milroy.

Another theme would be, what it was like growing up in Milroy with the ice cream truck going around town.

The ding-ding truck, and how much people enjoyed running to the truck to pay $0.10 to get an ice cream cone, or going to the playground, the Nagny playground, the Milroy playground, things like that.

I've posted about things that I've enjoyed growing up there that my family has enjoyed.

I like to share, again, pictures of local scenery, fall foliage, things like that.

It has brought people together.

It helps them to reminisce what it was like to grow up there, and it has helped them to have a sense of pride in the community.

One of the things that I like about living here is that it's a small town.

Everybody knows everybody.

That's not always necessarily a good thing, but it can be because there's a sense of community.

If someone needs help, they're right there to help you.

It's just a great place to grow up.

Hi, my name is Lisa Everetts and I'm going to tell you about the Briar Rose Bed and Breakfast.

I was an antique dealer prior to doing the bed and breakfast And I had gone and stayed at one, and then I decided that was the thing for me.

I had known about this area because I used to come down to the flea market all the time, and I always thought it was a really quaint, cute community.

We were looking online, and I found this house.

And so we came and we looked at it, and I walked up onto the porch, and the porch had an E on, the front door, which is my last initial, because the people that lived there before us, their last name was English.

And I said, I would take the house without even going inside.

The house was originally built in 1887.

It was originally built as a tourist house and then we bought the house in 2002.

It took us four years to get it ready to open.

We opened on April Fools Day, April 1, 2006 and I opened on that day because I'm heavily into pop culture and I love this horror movie from the '80s called April Fool's Day.

We redid the bathrooms, we redid the kitchen.

I am an extreme holiday decorator.

I'd redo everything every season, and that's one of the things for our bed and breakfast that you probably won't find in most places.

I do themed breakfasts for all the holidays.

For the seasons, I change all the decor, I change all the bedding, change all the pictures on the wall, all the archways, all the flowers, shower curtain, everything.

Say it's Halloween, I might do ghosts or pumpkin, or Christmas, I might do a Santa Claus, Belgian waffles, or a snowman pancake, or a reindeer.

Easter, I might do an Easter bunny.

The name Briar Rose came from the Walt Disney movie, Sleeping Beauty.

My sister-in-law painted my sign.

It's made to look like an Amish wedding ring quilt.

On the back of it, it says, "Come as a guest, leave as a friend."

And in each part of the wedding ring is the little holidays.

And then there's a little fairy on there that is Merryweather from Sleeping Beauty.

We have four rooms.

The one room, it's called the gazebo room, because there's a corner Jacuzzi in it, and then there's a gazebo built around it.

Everybody says very fairy tale-ish looking.

The rooms all are named after the fairies in Sleeping Beauty.

There's the Flora, the Fauna, and Merryweather.

Downstairs, we have a game room.

I have a Miss Pac-Man machine, I have a jukebox.

It only plays like '70s and '80s stuff.

We love that.

So we hope our guests like it.

It's a beautiful area.

And so that's why we're here.

We love it, and our guests, you know, they come, they have a blast.

We have a lot of repeat people, people that have become our friends.

I just-- I love what I do.

I love it.

My name is Lisa Griffith and my story is about my career as an opera singer.

(SINGING) I love.

I grew up singing and with music, and in the church choir, and one of the things that got me started, I was in the Miss Pennsylvania pageant back when I was in college, and I won it with an opera aria, and I started thinking, OK, well, maybe that's the direction I should go.

I went to Europe.

And I thought, oh, I'll just give it a try, and I got a job on my very first audition in Wiesbaden, Germany, spent five years there, and then went on and ended up in Dusseldorf, Germany.

It has to be something you really want and really love because it takes a lot of discipline.

At first, quite challenging, but then, it's an exciting life and you meet a lot of people from all over the world, and it's just been a very interesting life.

But like I said, you do have to really want it, because it takes a lot of discipline.

I get home to Belleville about two or three times a year now.

They want me to sing everywhere, and I sing in a lot of the churches.

I sing at Valley View, which is our retirement home here.

I do a lot of singing when I'm in the area, and they are very, very appreciative and my parents are no longer living, but everyone always says, your mother would be so proud, and she would.

[chuckles] But that's why I love coming home, because it's the country, and I've still got that country in me.

I've been living in Germany for 39 years now.

And the longer I live away, the more I want to come back because it's just such a special place.

The scenery, the mountains, the Amish population, it's just such an unusual and special place, and it's hard to describe to anyone, unless they come here and really see for themselves.

I think the older I get, the more I long to come home.

[music playing] NARRATOR: And that's Our Town, Big Valley, a look at the Kishacoquillas Valley through the eyes of its residents.

Support for Our Town Big Valley comes from Geisinger, committed to making better health easier for their patients in the Belleville and Reedsville clinics, and throughout the Juniata Valley.

More information at geisinger.org.

Kish Bank, serving the community with financial solutions for more than 120 years, with the belief that they can improve the lives of their employees, clients, and communities.

Information available at mykish.com.

The Dalton Group at Morgan Stanley, who believed that goals can be achieved with an in-depth discussion with a financial professional.

Information at 814-861-1706.

Morgan Stanley Smith Barney, LLC, Member SIPC.

And viewers like you.

Thank you.

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