Broad Ford Geocacher
Written & Compiled by
K. R. Overholt Critchfield, © 3-8-2008
Photographs by Geocacher "JimBat"
"Broad Ford Swinging Bridge
Support System"
Photograph by Geocacher "JimBat," ©
5-28-2007
Living
Green
By the end of May
along the Youghiogheny River, the pale jades of
early spring are deep greens now. Summer Solstice
is only three weeks away! Foliage has grown in
abundance and melded so well together that, at a
distance, it is hard to see where individual
trees or bushes begin or end. It is a time of
living green, before the heat of full summer
takes all the fun out of it. Mornings along the
river may still begin with a curtain of mist,
blurring the details for a while, until burned
off by the sun. It is a great time of year for
geocaching!
Old Overholt
Distillery Swinging Bridge Cache
In an e-mail dated
December 28, 2006, a query came to me asking
about the swinging bridge at Broad Ford. Did I
have any pictures of the bridge?
"Also," wrote Jim, "on the other
side of the river from the bridge, there used to
be steps that went up over the hill. I think they
led to three houses on top of the hill on the
other side of the river. Did these houses have
anything to do with the distillery?"
Writing back, I
shared the few details others had shared with me.
In essence, the Swinging Bridge that used to be
close to the A. Overholt & Company
Distillery spanned the Youghiogheny River from
Adelaide to Broad Ford. It had been used by
distillery employees, allowing them to walk to
and from work. At some point in the past, it had
become dismantled, but the supports for the
bridge could be seen in the aerial photo found on
my web site. Then I added, "If anybody sends
me a photo of the swinging bridge, I will publish
it asap. Therefore, you may wish to check back
from time to time to see if such a photo shows
up. Regarding the houses, according to the
information appearing in my newest feature, Sons
& Grandsons of Westmoreland County,
Jacob S. Overholt built some houses at Broad Ford
when he was building up the distillery
there."
Imagine my delight
when Jim provided pictures! First, he sent me
jpegs of two old black and white pictures
from the Connellsville Area Historical Society
(shown in the companion article, Broad Ford
Winters). Shortly thereafter, my Internet
friend Jeffrey Antol wrote to direct me to
JimBat's latest geocache web page, which featured
the Broad Ford Swinging Bridge (see URL below).
The page features some photos and text from the
HABS/HAER document originally published on my GeoCities
web site, but also includes a link to his
own photos. The pictures on this page are from
JimBat's gallery, and at his request, are
credited to his geocaching name.
Close-up 1: Broad Ford Swinging
Bridge Support System
Photograph by Geocacher "JimBat," ©
6-19-2007
"Approaching the Swinging
Bridge"
Photograph by Geocacher "JimBat," ©
6-19-2007
Close-up 2: Broad Ford Swinging
Bridge Support System
Photograph by Geocacher "JimBat," ©
5-29-2007
"Broad Ford on the Banks of
the Youghiogheny River"
Photograph by Geocacher "JimBat," ©
5-28-2007
"Misty Morning on the Banks
of the Youghiogheny River"
Photograph by Geocacher "JimBat," ©
6-19-2007
Geocaching -- A Short
Introduction
Geocachers appreciate the outdoors and
enjoy hunting for treasures like geocoins and
travel bugs, which come in all shapes and sizes
and can be trackable. Many will drive to a
location, others prefer a hike or a bike ride,
but they all take pleasure in a healthy trek
along a path less traveled. Call it what you will
-- hobby, sport, or obsession -- folks have
christened it family-friendly. Think of it as
scouting for the whole family, but instead of
earning merit badges, geocachers collect trinkets
and photographs of their excursions. Even
more, the whole family (even the family dog) can
get some good hiking exercise in the surrounding
countryside. But the cityscape is not forgotten!
I did a search for cache sites in and around the
city of Pittsburgh, and found an impressive
number, most of them easily accessible, and
certainly enough to keep a fledgling busy for a
good while. Searching by my zip code, 1793 cache
sites appeared. I clicked on Seek a Cache
to find something close by. In a 5-mile
radius from my home, 111 records came up; in a 10
mile radius, 300 records came up.
If you are interested in doing some
geocaching yourself, check out web sites like GeoCaching.com,
or learn more about the sport at Geocacher
University (see URLs below). Geocaching
101 will teach you the basics of the hunt, and
Geocaching 201 will teach you "the art of
the hide." You may need portable food and
water, a backpack with a flashlight and first-aid
kit, along with other tracking gear. You
definitely need a good camera, in order to snap a
shot of yourself grinning upon finding the cache,
and you might want the latest mapping software
for your Palm OS and Pocket PC. It is true that
the seriously obsessed geocacher can end up
spending serious money on this otherwise simple
nature trail activity. Besides the
trackables and other trinkets you need to buy for
the trades, you will have to choose between the
high-tech, handheld GPS receiver, or the low-tech
compass. Do not forget to check out the high-tech
compass!
Geocaching:
The Official Global GPS Cache Hunt Site
http://www.geocaching.com/
Geocacher
University
http://www.geocacher-u.com/
JimBat's
Old Overholt Distillery Swinging Bridge Cache
http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?guid=e77daf42-6185-4de9-a1d8-b5c0829e5134
JimBat's web page about this
cache includes all the information you will need
to find it. Farther down the page, you will find the
"Logged Visits" (currently at 55), where
you can click on "Visit the Gallery"
and see 24 images. The second page of this
2-page gallery is horizontally elongated, and
reprises the photos from my GeoCities web
site that appear in JimBat's presentation.
Additionally, if you take the time to explore,
you will find an extensive gallery of photos
JimBat has posted showing his trips far and wide
to locate or plant caches. To date, he has
planted four.
My thanks to JimBat for
featuring the Broad Ford Overholt Distillery
site, for allowing me to use a few of his
photographs, and for introducing me to this
really great sport!
See the second
page in this series, Broad Ford Autumn.
End of Page . .
. Return to the first page of Karen's Branches.
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