Amazon.com: Weird Pennsylvania: Matt Lake, Mark Moran, Mark Sceurman: Books

Product Description

Praise for Weird Pennsylvania:

“Fun, amazing, and arrestingly illustrated.” —Booklist

“…a real fine read and can serve as a travel guide for a trek among the unusual, odd and scary parts of our “weird” state.” —Pennsylvania Magazine

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Product Details

Hardcover: 272 pages
Publisher: Sterling (July 25, 2005)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1402732791
ISBN-13: 978-1402732799
Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 9.1 x 1.1 inches
Shipping Weight: 2.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)

Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (22 customer reviews)

Amazon.com Sales Rank: #69,228 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)
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#14 in Books > Travel > United States > States > Pennsylvania

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What Do Customers Ultimately Buy After Viewing This Item?

	90% buy the item featured on this page: Weird Pennsylvania 4.3 out of 5 stars (22) $14.96
	3% buy Weird Maryland 4.2 out of 5 stars (9) $13.57
	2% buy Pennsylvania Ghost Towns: Uncovering the Hidden Past 5.0 out of 5 stars (6) $9.31
	2% buy Moon Handbooks Pennsylvania 4.0 out of 5 stars (4) $13.57

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Customer Reviews

22 Reviews

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

Average Customer Review

4.3 out of 5 stars (22 customer reviews)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good book, would be more interesting if I lived in Eastern PA, September 20, 2006

By	T. Urban (Western, PA, USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Weird Pennsylvania could have been more appropriately named "Weird Eastern Pennsylvania" as I'd say upwards of 80% of the info in it is centered toward the Philly side of the state. It was stil a fun and interesting read, but I'd have loved to have learned about more weirdness on the Western half of PA. Come on, I live here, I know there's all kinds of weirdness to be found! :)

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12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Weird PA- Brings Back Memories of a 'Normal' Childhood in the Keystone State, October 3, 2005

By	Donna S. Talarico "Writer" (Wilkes-Barre, PA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

PA- the postal abbreviation could be mean other things, and still be fitting.

PA- Paranormal activity?
PA- Physics absent?
PA- People abnormal?

As a life-long resident of Pennsylvania (minus a three-year stint in Oklahoma), things like a ghostly handprint on the cell wall of an abandoned county jail, a hill that defies the laws of gravity, piles of rocks that have withstood thousands of years of winter winds and a serpent lurking the waters of Lake Erie all seem pretty darned normal to me. But they are some of the oddities that are nestled between the covers of Weird PA, a new release from Sterling Publishing who brought us Weird US and other weird state books.

This book comes to the delight of the daughter of former traveling show-biz duo. During weekend trips to gigs across the state, we'd always sightsee the roadside attractions and museums. This book brought back fond memories of a childhood full of exploring the Keystone State but still, I learned a lot from this bright and fun title.

The book itself is beautiful--certainly coffee table caliber. The 263 colorful pages are divided into 11 sections: Local Legends and Lore, Ancient Mysteries, Fabled People and Places, Unexplained Phenomena, Local Heroes and Villains, Personalized Properties, Roadside Oddities, Roads Less Traveled, Quaker State Ghosts, Cemetery Safari and Abandoned Places. Each of the sections reveals the oddities, tall tales and myths of Pennsylvania through colorful pictures and testimonies from actual eyewitnesses and personal accounts from the editors who visited most of the included sites. Most of the entries are short snippets, making this a good breeze-through book for those not interested in heavy reading.

If this book does not urge people to gas up their wagons and plot out a Weird PA tour, I don't now what will. In fact, maybe I should get licensing rights to the book and start my own tour group. Hmmm. Anyway, some great sites worth visiting (or steering clear of, take your pick) are Gravity Hill in Bedford County, where a car put in neutral will roll up instead of the obvious; New Hope and historic Philadelphia which are filled with ghost stories of famed Pennsylvanians; Pennhurst, an abandoned mental asylum in Philly and yes, there is even an empty morgue (or is it?); a backyard zoo in Fayette county filled with larger-than-life animal sculptures and in York County, there really is an old woman who lives in a shoe(-shaped house). Okay, former shoe salesman. I was way too tempted to use the nursery rhyme.

Two included places happen to be personal favorites: the burning-for-thirty years Columbia county ghost town, Centralia and Shartlesville's Roadside America. The latter impressed the authors so much they called it, "The most pleasant surprise we found." That makes me happy. This massive model train set spans a huge hangar and represents much of America through miniscule interpretations. A must see!

One gripe: nothing from my county of residence for the last decade (Luzerne) and not enough from the Poconos. Is Northeast PA that weird, that even authors of a book recording the strange will not enter? I would have loved to have seen Boulder Field at Hickory Runn State Park, the Archbald Pothole and the old city underneath Lake Wallenpaupak that draws hundreds of scuba divers--you can see the church steeple from land on a clear day.

I'm all for a sequel- Weirder PA.

Grade: A

(I'll make it an A+ if I get to take the authors on a tour of left-out places!)

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13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Weird and wonderful!, October 1, 2005

By	N. Thomas "LibraryFiend" - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I enjoy off-the-wall guides such as this one and discovered any number of stories about various locations in my home state of which I had never before heard. The local legends (such as the ape-boy in the swamp and the myriad haunted locations, such as churches, bridges, and hotels) and bizarre places (like Midgetville and the sad, decayed grandeur of the former Mount Airy Lodge) accounted in this book would startle, entertain, and even amaze almost any reader. Check this out for an unusual and enlightening look into the Keystone State!

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› See all 22 customer reviews...

Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Weirdness
This book is great. It is about weirdness in every way. Ghost, Rocks, Trees, A Pennsylvania Statue Of Liberty, Albinos, Shoe houses, A Klingon language, and many more weird... Read more

Published 2 months ago by Albert J. Bromiley

1.0 out of 5 stars Bad writing, silly stories
A friend lent me this book. I was looking for interesting places to visit in PA. This is not a useful book for that.

The stories are not researched. Read more

Published 8 months ago by D. Mason

4.0 out of 5 stars 2 thumbs up
If you like local history or just want to read about some oddities the weird series does not disappoint.

Published 11 months ago by R. Dorney

5.0 out of 5 stars Weird PA
Its a great book for that on the go explorer in all of us. Gives you a chance to really get to know the state you live in.

Published 16 months ago by Amanda Eckhardt

5.0 out of 5 stars A Christmas Day Read a Thon
My 28 yr old daughter wnted this for xmas and she
and her 22 yr old sister were reading and in awe
of alot of things in this book. Read more

Published 18 months ago by Darlene Winger

5.0 out of 5 stars Very interesting, PA!!!!!!
If you live in or been to the Keystone state than you must own this book. After read this book I did not there were so many abandon insane asylums outside of Philly. Read more

Published 18 months ago by Paul A. Vincent

2.0 out of 5 stars Entertaining, but unbalanced
This is a well written and interesting book, but severely ignores the western part of the state. It seemed as though every page was Bucks, Chester, or Delaware counties and... Read more

Published 19 months ago by D. Swanson

5.0 out of 5 stars Gotta have Weird!
You can't beat the price on this product! (I bought it at a local bookstore for more than this--but still a great price). Read more

Published 24 months ago by Chloe Valentine

5.0 out of 5 stars GREAT BOOK!!
I love abandoned, weird, and odd little out of the way places so this book was a GREAT read for me. Of course it DOES help that I'm quoted in the book as an expert on Dixmont... Read more

Published on May 23, 2007 by Andrew Hill

5.0 out of 5 stars Cool Pennsylvania book
I never knew Pennsylvania was so weird. Heh.
This is a great book about some of the oddities you can find in Pennsylvania.

Published on January 5, 2007 by George T. Warner

› See all 22 customer reviews...

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