Tall trees, no reception, and a sleeping hatchet

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This week marked 134 years since a catastrophic dam failure at a hunting club for wealthy industrialists caused the Johnstown Flood.

What was the name of the hunting club? 

A. South Fork Fishing & Hunting Club
B. Spring Lane Fishing & Hunting Club
C. The Millionaire's Fishing & Hunting Club
D. Pleasant Valley Fishing & Hunting Club

(Keep scrolling for the answer, but don't miss all the good stuff in between. Like what you read? Forward this email to a friend.)

» Five trips worth taking: Philly Mag has a guide to "The Best Pennsylvania Road Trips You Didn’t Know You Wanted to Take (Till Now)," with a beautiful-if-not-pinpoint-accurate map by Eric Hinkley. 

» One thing worth reading: The New Yorker wrote an obituary last year for a most unusual Philadelphia vehicle — Gilbert Hilton's decked-out Badillac —which bit the dust after the PPA towed it away.

» One thing worth knowing: The federal government is looking for nonprofits interested in taking care of a free lighthouse in Erie (and locations nationwide) as GPS makes the towers obsolete. 

» One thing worth sharing: One of the most popular podcasts in the country, "Normal Gossip," is made in Philadelphia. The Inquirer (paywall) says host Kelsey McKinney is "building a (socialist) gossip empire."

» One thing worth (maybe) trying: Pittsburgh startup Revitalize Energy wants you to put caffeine in your eyes. CEO Kyle Guinness told WESA the caffeinated eye drops can help with digital-era eye fatigue. 

I am not a happy camper.

That is to say, I prefer the indoors to the out, a real bed to the ground, and the relative safety of my home to the dubious protection of a nylon tent. 

But I am also a team player in a long-term relationship with a person who — somehow! — sees nature as something to enjoy rather than fear. 

That’s how I ended up camping in the remote wilds of Loyalsock State Forest in rural Sullivan County over Memorial Day weekend armed with a sleeping hatchet (more on that later) and the sheer will to survive being outside for an extended period of time. 

I picked Loyalsock for two reasons: because I believed it would offer dark enough skies for my partner to try out his new telescope; and because the campsites at the better-known dark sky areas in the state, like Cherry Springs State Park, were booked. 

Overall, it was a positive experience, in that I lived and have apparently not contracted Lyme disease. But I definitely would have made a few adjustments based on what I know now that I want to pass on to PA Local’s readers in the form of these tips. —Sarah Anne Hughes, Spotlight PA

Roadside campsites — where nature is your bathroom!

Because of the last-minute nature of the trip, and the fact that it coincided with a holiday weekend, my campsite options were limited. I selected an available roadside campsite simply by looking at the booking website’s extremely basic map with symbols without attempting to learn anything about the area. That was, believe it or not, a mistake.

If I would have read the information readily made available by the state, I would have come to understand just how remote the campsite was. These sites, deep in the forest along a dirt and gravel road, are separated by at least half a mile and offer no access to a bathroom, as the similar sites at the nearby Masten Campground do.

Neither my partner nor I had cellphone service, and I was so scared of the chirping and howling fauna that my partner suggested we sleep in the tent with the hatchet he brought to chop wood. We did not need the sleeping hatchet for self-defense, but it did provide peace of mind. 

I also selected a site that was not within walking distance of water. Other sites, as I learned from this Reddit post, offer that amenity, which would have been a lovely perk.

Tip No. 1: Read the great information provided by the state to make sure you find the kind of campsite that best matches your needs.

If you want to be in an extremely remote area that is still accessible by a road — surrounded by beech trees and not much else — then I recommend you follow my lead and pick a drive-in site near Forksville.

“Low, loud, and frequent flights could disrupt livelihoods in a region that has built its identity on outdoor recreation and bucolic tranquility..."

—Democratic U.S. Sens. John Fetterman and Bob Casey urging further study of a plan to conduct fighter jet trainings over the Pennsylvania Wilds

The failure of a neglected dam at the South Fork Fishing & Hunting Club caused the Johnstown Flood on May 31, 1889, killing 2,209 people.

The club was a getaway for wealthy elites like Pittsburgh's Andrew Carnegie, Henry Clay Frick, Andrew Mellon, and Henry Phipps Jr.

Jared Frederick, an assistant teaching professor of history at Penn State Altoona, has a 10-minute explainer of the historic event for WPSU's PA Past series, which also covers John Burns, Hero of Gettysburg; The Whiskey Rebellion; and The White Lady of Wopsy.

Thanks for reading PA Local. We'll see you back here next week. But first ... send us your feedback. What did you like? What didn't you like?