MARY, RALPH, JAKE AND SIBYLLA VISIT THE ALLENTOWN FAIR.
Late in September Jake and Sibylla drove to the Allentown Fair. It was "Big Thursday" of Fair week. They started quite early, long before Ralph Jackson, who had come from the city the day previous, to take Mary to the Fair, had arisen.
SECOND CHURCH BUILDING
Sheltered Liberty Bell, 1777-78. Photographed from the print of an old wood cut used in a German newspaper in the year 1840
Mary, while appreciating Sibylla's good qualities, never failed to be amused at her broad "Pennsylvania German" dialect.
The morning of the "Fair," Mary arose earlier than usual to allow Sibylla and Jake to get an early start, as it was quite a distance from the farm to the Fair grounds. As they were about to drive away, Sibylla, alighting from the carriage, said, "I forgot my 'Schnupftuch.'" Returning with it in her hand, she called, as she climbed into Jake's buggy, "Gut-by, Mary, it looks fer rain."
"Yes" said Jake, "I think it gives rain before we get back yet. The cornfodder in the barn this morning was damp like it had water on it."
And said Mary, "The fragrance of the flowers was particularly noticeable early this morning." Jake, as it happened, was no false prophet. It did rain before evening.
Later in the day, Mary and Ralph drove to a near-by town, leaving horse and carriage at the hotel until their return in the evening, and boarded a train for Allentown. On arriving there, they decided to walk up Hamilton Street, and later take a car out to the Fair grounds. As they sauntered slowly up the main street, Mary noticed a small church built between two large department stores and stopped to read a tablet on the church, which informed the passerby that "this is to commemorate the concealment of the Liberty Bell during the Revolutionary War. This tablet was erected by the Liberty Bell Chapter of the Daughters of the Revolution."