The Union Mills Homestead celebrated its 225th year in 2022, marking the anniversary of the site’s founding by brothers Andrew and David Shriver, Jr. in 1797. The brothers planned to combine their respective skills in a business enterprise centered on a set of water-powered mills to be built in a wide valley along Big Pipe Creek. The site was promising, strategically located between Westminster and Littlestown where Pennsylvania’s early roads
(Photo above: George M. Shriver, III volunteering at the 1981 Flower & Plant Market at the Union Mills Homestead.) The Union Mills Homestead community was saddened to hear of the passing of George M. Shriver, III, who died July 24, 2021 at his home in Reisterstown, Maryland at age 88. A long-time member of the Union Mills Homestead’s Board of Governors, Shriver left a legacy of lifetime support for the
A Christmas Eve poem written in 1886 has been brought to life by a video that highlights some of the evolving Christmas traditions of the families that lived at Union Mills in the nineteenth century. The author, Louis E. Shriver of Union Mills, dedicated the verses to his nieces Winnie and Catherine Shriver. Louis lived in the Union Mills Homestead. His nieces, daughters of Lou’s brother Wirt and his wife
(Photo above: Stone Arch Bridge over Big Pipe Creek in Union Mills, circa 1890. The bridge was built 1807-08 and remained in use until washing out in a 1933 storm. Photo by Louis Shriver.) If you have even been to Union Mills, you have driven the route of the historic Baltimore-Reisterstown Turnpike. The road, with important ties to Union Mills, played a significant part in the early economic growth of
With the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020 forcing cancellation of the Union Mills Homestead’s Flower and Plant Market for the first time in 51 years, we are reminded of a similar health crisis in 1918. That year, a wartime influenza epidemic ricocheted around the globe before finding its way to the far reaches of rural Carroll County. The 1918 flu outbreak took a heavy toll in the area. ‘Spanish Flu’ Outbreaks
With another election season upon us, attention once again is focused on the tone of political discourse in the United States. These concerns are not new, however, as politics has been almost a full-contact sport since our nation’s founding. The Shrivers who founded the Union Mills Homestead took center stage in some of the most brutal political battles of the early 19th century. This topic will be one of those
Just who is Belsnickel? To some the answer may come readily, but for others it is an unknown word. The Belsnickel and related Kris Kindle customs trace to the Palatinate area of Germany. During the early 1700s, these customs were brought to North America by early German immigrants. For many Pennsylvania German families, Kris Kindle or Christkindle was the St. Nick of the Santa Claus tradition, who slips down chimneys