Happy 4th of July!

Did you know that one of the earliest Presidents of the United States lived in southwestern PA?  The American soldier and politician Arthur St. Clair, who lived in the Ligonier Valley near Latrobe, Pennsylvania, was President two years before George Washington was! Well, sort of.  The US Constitution wasn’t drafted until the 1787, over ten years after Independence Day 1776.  Before that, under the Articles of Confederation, there was a Confederation Congress.  Arthur St. Clair was elected President of the Continental Congress in 1787. 
 
These patriotic specimens of American Bugbane (Actaea podocarpa, formerly Cimicifuga americana) were collected on July 9, 1999 in the Loyalhanna Gorge (Rt. 30 aka the Lincoln Highway runs through it between Greensburg and Ligonier, PA), near where Arthur St. Clair owned property and lived the later years of his life (now known as Saint Clair Hollow).  In the buttercup family (Ranunculaceae), American bugbane, also called mountain bugbane, is a forest understory herb similar in appearance to the more common black cohosh (Actaea racemosa).  The species is currently listed as threatened in Pennsylvania.
 
Arthur St. Clair was born in Scotland in 1737 and fought with British troops in the American colonies during the French and Indian War.  After the war, he settled in Ligonier Valley and was the largest landowner in Westmoreland County at the time.  He was later a American colonel in the Revolutionary War.  After America gained its independence, he was elected a delegate to the new Confederation Congress (governing body under the Articles of Confederation that pre-dates the Constitution).  He served a one-year term as President of the Continental Congress in 1787, during which time the Northwest Territory was created.  He later became governor of the Northwest Territory (large area which are now Midwest states).  After retiring, he returned to live out his days in the Loyalhanna Gorge (between present day Ligonier and Greensburg, not far from Idlewild Park).  He died in poverty in 1818.
 
Many towns in Pennsylvania and the Midwest are named after Arthur St. Clair, including Upper St. Clair near Pittsburgh.
 
A lot of history in Western Pennsylvania!
 
Happy 4th of July!