Militias played a central role in antebellum Centre County, teaching men military discipline and arms skills to ensure their readiness for war. The volunteer companies also served as fraternal organizations that linked members to the communities.
The Penn State Blue Band is the university’s marching band that performs at football games and other major events. The band, which is comprised of more than 300 members, is open to all students at the University Park campus.
The State College Spikes is a professional baseball team that plays in Centre County. The club, formerly the New Jersey Cardinals, was purchased in 2002 by a group that also owned the Double-A Eastern League Altoona Curve. The team moved to State College in 2006, playing in the New York-Penn League.
Penn State fielded its first organized football team in 1887 — just 11 years after the rules of the sport were established — and has had a team ever since. The program has been among the most successful in the country, winning national championships in 1982 and 1986.
Since 1887, the perennially youthful journalists of The Daily Collegian and its forebears have recorded the first draft of the history of Penn State and its students. Throughout its history, students have run both the editorial and business sides of the enterprise, aided by a small staff providing management, professional advice and technical support. In […]
St. John the Evangelist Catholic Church in Bellefonte, established in 1828, is the oldest Roman Catholic church in Centre County. Catholics began settling in the county in the early 1800s. By 1824, the number had grown large enough to warrant a priest from Bedford visiting Bellefonte regularly on mission stops. Mass was said at a […]
Emmanuel Union Church in Tusseyville, founded in 1810, is one of the oldest churches in Centre County and for many years was one of the last remaining “union” churches, serving both Lutheran and United Church of Christ congregations.
Weather World is a weekday weather telecast begun in 1957 by Charles Hosler, dean of Penn State’s College of Earth and Mineral Sciences, who wanted to provide more accurate forecasts for Pennsylvanians. Since its inception, many professional meteorologists have received their initial television experience on Weather World and have gone on to provide forecasts for […]
The Civilian Conservation Corps was a government jobs program, conceived during the Great Depression, that put thousands of unemployed men to work primarily in state and national parks and forests, including four sites in Centre County.