And the preacher he kept preaching
Long is the struggle, hard the fight— Lyle Lovett | Church | 1992
Horseshit and hay
It’s September of 1777, and things are looking pretty bleak in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. After suffering a demoralizing defeat at the hands of well-dressed, well-trained, well-armed British forces at the Battle of Brandywine Creek, General George Washington and his men retreat 24 miles north to Valley Forge. There, they regroup and reassess while patriots in Philadelphia prepare for an imminent British invasion.
As spoils of war go, bells are hard to beat — silence the enemy’s warning signals and melt them down into cannon and musket balls. Knowing the British will turn the city’s means of communication into the munitions that might well kill them, the new nation’s Supreme Executive Council hatches a plan.
Citizens scramble to rescue 11 bells throughout the city, including the Christ Church chimes and tower bell, Saint Peter’s tower bell, and the biggest boy of them all — State House Bell B. They dismount the State House Bell from its yoke and trunnions and remove the clapper. It’s hoisted into a Conestoga-type wagon and summarily buried in horse manure and hay. The bronze booty then blends into a 700-vehicle wagon train guarded by 200 Cavalrymen from North Carolina and Virginia. The convoy leaves the City of Brotherly Love under the cover of darkness on an 8-day trek through Sellersville, Perkasie, Quakertown, Bethlehem and Northampton Towne.
Waggoneer John Jacob Mickley knows this route like the back of his hand. His usual cargo is more carnal in nature — if you’re to believe the scuttlebutt — but it matters not to John Jacob whether he’s hauling a ton of bronze or a cache of applejack; he navigates these muddy, rutted roads with journeyman swagger. On day seven, his wagon fails him outside of Bethlehem.1 It could be the cargo. It could be bad luck. But this is the end of the road for his rig. Fellow convoy man Fredrick Leaser and his wagon will run the last lap.
Floorboards
William Allen, one of Pennsylvania’s wealthiest men, can live wherever he wants. Fifteen years ago, he purchased 700 acres in the fertile Lehigh Valley, 63 miles north of the nation’s capital. Allen named his fledgling colonial village Northampton Towne. In the center of a sprawling meadow, he built a modest log cabin where the smattering of residents, mostly German immigrants, would gather to worship. In 1773, an austere stone building replaced the cabin. German Lutheran and Zion High German Reformed worshippers alternated services there. Fredrick Leaser and the wagon train slow their roll as they approach Northampton Towne’s house of worship. Perhaps some Masonic connection led them here (you never really know with Masons). Perhaps the church is just the most logical place for miles where one could conceivably conceal 11 bells.
And the preacher and his congregants greet the caravan. Together, they efficiently roll the State House Bell inside the church along with its bronze compatriots. Someone who remembers building this church grabs a hammer and pries up floorboards to reveal an excavation just large enough to hide the stash.
In this humble house of worship, the good people of Northhampton Towne worship above as the State House bell and its 10 Philadelphia brethren sit silently below. Only a small handful of people know they’re there.
Meanwhile, back at the capital, British Soldiers — who, just as suspected, invaded Philadelphia the day after the bells arrived in Northampton Towne — live high on the hog.
While Washington and his troops stay hungry and stay alive, sleeping in the fields of Valley Forge, occupying general Sir William Howe throws himself a splendid shindig in Philly, replete with triumphal arches, fireworks, debutantes, jousting tournament and a regatta down the Delaware River.
Becoming
The French join the conversation, the Brits move to New York, and nine months after evacuating, the bells return to Philadelphia. State House Bell B goes back to work. It narrowly misses being scrapped during metal drives and avoids the auction block when the capital’s move to Harrisburg in 1812 puts it out of a job. In the 1830s, when abolitionists make it the face of their cause, State House Bell B becomes the Liberty Bell. The Pennsylvania State House becomes Independence Hall. In 1838, William Allen’s colonial village becomes Allentown.
Intersections
A trucker for Rodgers Motor Lines out of Scranton, Fred Saar knows these roads like the back of his hand. What he’s less comfortable with is all the hubbub of late. Even overseas — especially overseas — he’s found it best to not draw attention to himself. Drive the Jeep. Keep your head down. Protect your brothers. Do what you’ve got to do.
But when the newspapers got wind of what he did in the fall of ’49, Saar found himself in the spotlight. On Route 6 between Carbondale and Honesdale, the trucker came upon a wreck on the highway. The car was on its roof, wheels still spinning, flames starting to lick out of the engine compartment. His Army training kicked in, and he rushed to the driver’s side to find a man, upside down — alive, thank God. Still wearing his seat belt. Saar pulled the Ohio man to safety, extinguished the blaze and waited for help to arrive.
At the January 1950 gathering of the Pennsylvania Motor Truck Association, his peers honor him as the Pennsylvania Driver of the Month for doing what he’s sure any of them would, and for a 13-year safe driving record.
The next honor bestowed on Fred Saar is one he has to share with four other drivers from four other trucking lines — escorting the Liberty Bell replica through the state where liberty was born. His tour is scheduled to finish on May 31 in Pottsville, where he’ll hand the 1950 flatbed Ford and its cargo off to a dispatcher with the Lancaster Transportation Company. The dispatcher, it turns out, is James Robbie Jr. — the Captain that Corporal Saar was responsible for escorting in the French theater of war. Drive the Jeep. Keep your head down. Neither man knew the other was on the docket and hadn’t seen one another since the War.
Dibs
In the opening days of the Saving Bond drive, the Liberty Bell retraces the original’s journey: Philadelphia, Sellersville, Perkasie, Quakertown, Bethlehem, Allentown. During Allentown’s May 19 dual celebration of the bond drive and Armed Forces Day, Pennsylvania’s brand-new Liberty Bell is distinctly second on the bill. The headliner is 14 inches tall and still in perfect working order. Cast in 1769, the Allentown Liberty Bell called the inhabitants of Northampton Towne together on July 8, 1776, to hear the Declaration of Independence read aloud. The ceremony includes a descendant of one of the document’s signers, as does nearly every visit to every town in the state. Several thousand show up despite the crummy weather.
While the drive was still on, Allentown made its case to become the replica’s permanent home. The Treasury’s plan is to gift the replicas to their respective states and territories when the campaign ends on Independence Day. While there’s no clear directive for the bells to live on the Capitol grounds in the capital cities, that’s what ends up happening in most locations. In Delaware, Kansas and Nebraska, the replicas bounced around for decades before finding homes. New Jersey, Texas, Virginia and Washington set a precedent for their bells to reside elsewhere.
Six days after the Liberty Bell leaves town (again), Mayor Donald V. Hock shoots his shot, reminding Harrisburg of Allentown’s unique connection, “Because of this historical association between Allentown and the Liberty Bell, I am herewith beseeching you to use your good offices to have the replica now in transit in the Keystone state returned to Allentown, after the drive for safekeeping.”
An aide to Governor James H. Duff politely declines Hock’s request, citing prior commitments to the feds: “I am informed that before the bond drive began, the committee asked the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission to accept the replica for display in the state museum.” But Harrisburg leaves the door open just a crack, “… it might be possible at some future date to arrange for a temporary loan of the replica.” Allentown plants its foot firmly in that crack. The replica does a 5-year residency at the State Museum, followed by a stint at the Daniel Boone House in Birdsboro.
Great expectations
The U.S. Treasury set the ambitious goal of selling $4.33 worth of Savings Bonds per person over the 50-day drive. The quota was broken down at the state and county level — to the penny. Understandably, Pennsylvanians were expected to do better than the average American, with the quota set at $4.95. In the end, Keystoners crushed expectations, buying $6.46 per inhabitant, or 129.9% of quota — outperforming all other locations.
Shrine on
In 1958, archaeologists dig around in Zion’s basement. Cutting cross trenches, they uncover a 38 x 48-foot fieldstone foundation of the church’s 1777 predecessor and pinpoint exactly where they believe the OG Liberty Bell was stashed.
This discovery and the city’s impending 1962 Bicentennial add fuel to Liberty Bell fever. Allentonian Doctor Morgan Person spearheads a $50,000 fundraising effort to build a Liberty Bell Shrine in Zion’s nondenominational basement. Harrisburg grants Allentown a four-year loan of the replica. The following year, the Pennsylvania Liberty Bell makes its triumphal return to Allentown in a much-ballyhooed ceremony climaxing with 13 tolls of the replica. President Eisenhower pumps up an already raucous homer crowd via telegraph, “It is most fitting that this historic replica of the Liberty Bell which it held in protective custody many years ago (returns to Allentown). As its people have freely served their God and neighbors, they have strengthened the spirit of liberty which this bell proclaimed through the land.”
Zion’s United Church of Christ (which owns its own building) extends a lease to the newly christened Liberty Bell Shrine corporation. Rent is set at $1 annually. The Commonwealth extends its four-year term to an indefinite loan. Workers have to remove and replace part of the church in order to crane the new Liberty Bell into its old hiding place.
Thanks to several hundred supporters and the donated pennies of 10,000 schoolchildren, Allentown’s Liberty Bell Shrine debuts on May 30, 1962, just in time for Bicentennial festivities. The attraction is open from Wednesday to Monday. Admission is free. Doctor Person invites visitors to touch history in the exact place where it happened.
It’s hard to keep a good museum down
Over the next sixty years, the fortunes of Allentown and Lehigh County and Pennsylvania and the Rust Belt and these entire United States rise and fall and rise and fall again and again. In 1982, Billy Joel writes a song about Levittown, New York, that becomes a song about Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, that becomes a song about Allentown. Jesus wasn’t born there, and it rhymes better (down, ground, found), so while Allentown isn’t about Allentown the way Youngstown is about Youngstown, it’s not not about Allentown.
By the nation’s Bicentennial, the Liberty Bell Shrine has grown — through donation more than deliberate acquisition — to more resemble a full-on history museum. During an average week, it welcomes 1,000-plus visitors from 23 states. Shrine president John F. McHugh seeks a new location for the other artifacts (paintings, replica wagon, flags, uniforms, historical documents, etc.), allowing the shrine and its bell to refocus on the original mission.
The effort to separate the museum and the shrine is ultimately unsuccessful, and the board of directors continues to adapt to provide an ever-necessary service to an ever-changing market. The shrine rebrands as The Liberty Bell Museum and launches a website.
Every weary franchise needs a mascot, and Pip the Mouse takes Allentown by storm. The Mouse Before Christmas, a 7-minute puppet show.2 begins an annual Christmastime residency in 2003, drawing in much-needed younger fans. In 2011, the museum receives a half-size replica of the wagon that brought the OG Liberty Bell to town.
Dollar bills, y’all
Congregations wax and wane, and by the Liberty Bell Museum’s 60th anniversary in 2022, the remaining members of Zion’s United Church of Christ have voted to dissolve. Too much church, not enough people. Before they fully commit the community that has gathered here for the last 260 years to the history books, the congregation agrees to sell their building, now on the National Register of Historic Places, to another local church. Sale price: $1. The deal comes with one string attached: the continued guardianship of the Liberty Bell Museum.3
After the sale is complete, the new owners (Resurrected Life Community Church, United Church of Christ) and the old tenant negotiate the terms of what exactly “continued guardianship” might look like. Resurrected Life’s best and final offer is just over $1,000 monthly with an escalation to market rate in three years.
On April 1, 2023 (no joke), Allentown’s Liberty Bell Museum can’t make the numbers work and closes. Reportedly, all artifacts will be transferred to the Lehigh Valley Heritage Museum three blocks away. At the time, I reached out to the museum for details on when the replica might return to public display and got no response. In the January 11, 2026 edition of the Lehigh Valley Times, county executive Phil Armstrong describes running into a little snag while helping to relocate the collection, “… the replica bell couldn’t be moved for two reasons — the bell is owned by the state and can’t be moved without its approval, and the bell is also too big to get out of the church. They say that part of the church was built around the bell.” His second point is rock solid. It’s well detailed in the collection he helped move that part of the church was disassembled in 1962 to put the bell into place. Why that effort couldn’t be performed in reverse in 2026 is less clear. Armstrong’s first point — like the provenance of these replicas — is murky. Governor James H. Duff accepted the Treasury’s gift in 1951 and entrusted it to the care of the Pennsylvania Historical & Museum Commission, which lent it indefinitely to the Liberty Bell Shrine / Museum. Possession being nine-tenths of the law, and lease terms being what they typically are, if a tenant moves out and leaves their stuff, that stuff then belongs to the building owner. If that owner sells to a new buyer, the buyer then owns the building and its contents. Also, if the Commonwealth still owns the Pennsylvania Liberty Bell, why didn’t they come get it?
Look, over here!
Around the same time the powers that be decided the Liberty Bell wasn’t budging, the Allentown Neighborhood Improvement Zone Development Authority (which calls out Billy Joel on its homepage) announces the commission of a brand new Liberty Bell to be displayed outside the church. In keeping with the America250 theme, the $250,000 bell (cast by a foundry with “Pennsylvania connections”) will somehow be larger, lighter and $130,000 more expensive than a real brand new Liberty Bell Replica. If you’re keeping score at home, $250,000 would also pay for about 20 years of Liberty Bell Museum rent.
This Sunday and next Sunday and the Sunday after that — in this humble house of worship — the good people of Allentown will gather above as the Pennsylvania Liberty Bell sits silently below. Only a small handful of people know it’s there.
1 What do Jesus and Peeps have in common? Born in Bethlehem.
2 Yes, it was as difficult as you might imagine for me not to make a Spinal Tap reference while writing about the Liberty Bell being second on the bill to a puppet show.
3 I’ve reached out to the church to get some clarity on what exactly this meant: whether and how it might have been specifically stated on the bill of sale, whether it was more of a verbal agreement between churchfolk, or whether it was reported inaccurately.
Pennsylvania Liberty Bell replica
Update: 3.31.26: It seems like — on account of how difficult it is to move a Liberty Bell out of a basement — the bell was never actually moved. The new owners of the old church, Resurrected Life Community Church, United Church of Christ, seem to have no plans to make the replica publicly accessible.
Update: 7.15.23: I just got a comment from someone who was not able to see the bell. After some digging, it looks like the museum closed on April 1, 2023 — no joke. All artifacts will be transferred to the Lehigh Valley Heritage Museum in Allentown. I’ll reach out to them to see if they have a timeline on when the bell might return to public display. I’ll keep yizall posted. Let me know if you hear anything before I do.
Location: Resurrected Life Community Church, United Church of Christ (Basement)
620 Hamilton Street
Allentown, PA 18101
Serial Number: 4
Can I ring it? The bell is in ringable condition, but good luck getting in to see it.
Hours: Not accessible to the public
First stop on our Northeast Bell tour, The Liberty Bell Museum and shrine in Allentown.