ALLENTOWN, Pa. — While the Liberty Bell Museum ended its 60-year run in downtown Allentown on Saturday, it's expected to be revived when almost all of its artifacts move several blocks east to the Lehigh Valley Heritage Museum.
The same can't be said for Liberty Bell Museum staff members, who fear they'll, too, become relics of the past.
- The Liberty Bell Museum held its final tours Saturday before its impending move to the Lehigh Valley Heritage Museum
- The agreement to send the Liberty Bell Museum's artifacts to the Lehigh Valley Historical Society did not secure the jobs of several museum workers
- The historical society said it will take at least six months for a new Liberty Bell exhibit to be built
The staff's jobs were not secured in the agreement with the Lehigh County Historical Society that moved the Liberty Bell Museum out of the former Zion’s Reformed United Church on Hamilton Street.
That meant Saturday was the final day of work for several staff members who spent countless hours leading hundreds, if not thousands, of tours over the past few decades.
“It is just the history and the artifacts that are moving to a new location,” museum Manager Stephanie Burke said.
Burke managed the museum in addition to her tour-guide duties.
Jerry Still and Jim Mindock also served as tour guides at the museum.
More than 100 people showed up Saturday to see the Liberty Bell Museum for one final time at its longtime location.
Five to 10 people stop by on an average day, Burke said.
Burke said it was “really bittersweet” to hear the Liberty Bell replica ring on the museum’s final day, but she was “touched” to feel support from so many people.
“I would have been heartbroken if nobody had come today,” Burke said.
Museum history
The Liberty Bell Museum housed a full-size replica of the Liberty Bell, which was hidden there from September 1777 to June 1778, while British troops occupied Philadelphia — then the national capital — during the Revolutionary War.
The museum also had dozens of Liberty Bell paintings and other related artifacts on display.
But the museum is set to move out of the church after new owners bought the property.
The museum's board and new owners Resurrected Life Community Church leaders could not agree on a new lease that would have kept the museum at West Hamilton and South Church streets.
The Liberty Bell replica is expected to remain in the basement of the church. It's owned by Pennsylvania, so it can't be moved out of Zion’s Reformed United Church without state officials' approval.
'Interactive' history lessons
Burke said she started at the museum in 2011 as a part-time guide, leading tours on Fridays. She later became stage manager for the museum’s popular Pip the Mouse Show before taking over as executive director about five years ago.
“I got to make history fun and accessible for kids. That has been my personal mission.”Liberty Bell Museum Manager Stephanie Burke
The museum launched an education program in 2014 for Allentown School District third-graders — a program that helped Burke realize her passion for teaching history.
Burke said she dressed in her “best approximation” of 18th-century clothing to make history “interactive” for Allentown students visiting the museum.
“I got to make history fun and accessible for kids,” Burke said. “That has been my personal mission.”
Burke said some former students still call her “the Liberty Bell Lady” when they see her.
Those interactions with local children and students are what Burke said she will miss most. She said she hopes to play some role in the museum’s move to the Lehigh Valley Heritage Museum, but “nothing was guaranteed.”
She said she would also “love the chance to continue to work with the bell if the bell stays here” in the church.
A final tour
Shortly before closing time at 4 p.m. Saturday, Burke led a small group of visitors on a final tour of the museum.
On the final tour, Burke recalled the Liberty Bell’s journey from Philadelphia to Allentown — then Northamptontowne — and back.
When British troops captured Philadelphia in 1777, they wanted to melt down all of the capital’s bells to make it difficult for colonists to communicate, Burke told visitors.
Several farmers from the now-Lehigh Valley agreed to take the Liberty Bell — then known as the Pennsylvania State House Bell — out of Philadelphia, she said.
The bell was taken to a church in Allentown to be safely hidden, and it was returned to Philadelphia after British troops were driven out of the city in 1778, she said.
More than a century after it was hidden in Allentown, the bell left Philadelphia again and traveled to seven cities from 1885 to 1915, Burke said.
“It even stopped in Allentown one more time on its way back to Philadelphia in 1893,” she said.
Parishioners at Zion’s church built a shrine in 1962 to commemorate the bell’s secret journey to Allentown.
They excavated an area under the church, and the museum was built to house a replica of the Liberty Bell, which generations of Allentonians have rung since the shrine was built.
For whom the bell tolls
On the final tour was Jessica Duelfer, who said she first visited Allentown’s Liberty Bell replica as a 7-year-old girl. She said she read an article about the museum’s closing earlier that day and wanted to make sure she saw the museum again before it closed.
“I wish it had stayed here. I think it has more meaning here than elsewhere, but the Heritage Museum is very nice.”Jessica Duelfer, who was at Allentown’s Liberty Bell Museum for the final tour Saturday
“I wish it had stayed here,” Duelfer said of the museum’s impending move out of the church. “I think it has more meaning here than elsewhere, but the Heritage Museum is very nice.”
Jennifer Aerni visited the Liberty Bell Museum for the first time Saturday with her parents. She said she’s “been wanting to come here for years” and decided she “better go” after learning it was about to close.
“I think it’s a great piece of history that a lot of people don’t know about,” Aerni said.
Burke gave the Liberty Bell replica a few last tolls before locking up the museum.
“Once more for posterity,” she said.
