There are places you visit for beautiful scenery, wonderful food, or exciting attractions. Then there are places that stay with you because of the stories they preserve. Boalsburg, Pennsylvania, was one of those places for me.
I visited this charming village in Happy Valley while filming Season 1 of Love Eat Travel with Michelle Valentine, and what struck me most was how much history is woven into such a small community.
Boalsburg has maintained its historic village character for more than 200 years, but it is perhaps best known for its longstanding claim as a birthplace of Memorial Day.
Why Is Boalsburg Associated With Memorial Day?
The story dates to the Civil War era. According to the tradition preserved in Boalsburg, three women gathered at the local cemetery in 1864 to decorate the graves of loved ones and soldiers with flowers. Their simple act of remembrance developed into a community tradition honoring those who had died in military service.
Boalsburg continues to commemorate Memorial Day with ceremonies and community traditions that connect today’s residents and visitors with generations that came before them.
There is an important historical distinction, however. Several American communities have claimed connections to the origins of Memorial Day, and Waterloo, New York, eventually received federal recognition as the official birthplace. That doesn’t diminish what happened in Boalsburg.
Its tradition represents one of America’s early community observances honoring fallen soldiers, and remembrance remains an important part of the village’s identity.
Visiting Boalsburg While Filming Love Eat Travel
I had the opportunity to experience Boalsburg firsthand while filming our Happy Valley, Pennsylvania episode of Love Eat Travel with Michelle Valentine.
It’s difficult to separate the village from its history. Rather than feeling like a historical attraction created specifically for visitors, Boalsburg feels like a community that has simply continued living alongside its past. That made exploring it especially meaningful.
One of the highlights of our filming was visiting the Columbus Chapel & Boal Mansion Museum.
Exploring the Historic Boal Mansion
The Boal Estate has been connected to the Boal family for more than 200 years and tells an extraordinary story through generations of one family. Walking through the mansion, I was surrounded by original furnishings, artwork, documents, family possessions, and objects collected across generations.
That’s one of the things I love most about visiting historic homes. History becomes much more personal when you’re standing in rooms where people actually lived rather than simply looking at objects displayed behind museum glass. The Boal Mansion offers that kind of experience.
The family also had connections to significant moments and people far beyond Pennsylvania, making the collection much more extensive than I expected when we arrived.
The Remarkable Columbus Chapel
Then there is the Columbus Chapel. The chapel came to Boalsburg through Mathilde de Lagarde, who married Theodore Davis Boal. The historic chapel, associated with her Columbus family ancestry, was brought from Spain to the Boal Estate in 1909.
Today it contains an extraordinary collection of European religious art and artifacts connected with the Columbus family. Among the objects associated with the collection is an admiral’s desk traditionally attributed by the family to Christopher Columbus.
Standing inside the chapel was one of those travel moments that made me stop and think about how unexpectedly interconnected history can be.
Here we were filming in a small Pennsylvania village, yet surrounded by objects and stories stretching across centuries and continents. That’s exactly the kind of discovery I love finding while traveling.
Why Historic Homes Are Worth Visiting
Visiting the Boal Mansion reinforced something I’ve come to appreciate more and more through travel: historic homes tell stories differently from traditional museums.
You see dining rooms, bedrooms, artwork, furniture, personal belongings and everyday objects. Suddenly history isn’t only a collection of dates. You begin imagining the people who walked through those rooms, the conversations they had, the world events occurring during their lives, and how one generation’s decisions affected the next.
The Boal Estate preserves the history of eight generations of one family, making it possible to see pieces of American history through a remarkably personal lens.
A Village That Remembers
What stayed with me most about Boalsburg, however, wasn’t a single artifact. It was the community’s connection to remembrance. More than 160 years after the events associated with Boalsburg’s Memorial Day tradition, the village continues to honor that history. That continuity gives the destination a feeling that is difficult to manufacture.
Boalsburg isn’t simply telling visitors about its past. The community is still participating in traditions shaped by it.
Discover More of Happy Valley, Pennsylvania
Boalsburg was just one part of our journey through Happy Valley.
During filming, I also explored an underground cavern by boat, learned to fly fish, experienced Pennsylvania’s agricultural traditions, tasted artisan foods, enjoyed local dining and music, and discovered the remarkable community spirit surrounding the Centre County Grange Fair.
Each experience revealed a different side of Central Pennsylvania.
But Boalsburg offered something particularly meaningful: a reminder that sometimes the most memorable travel experiences come from understanding the people and stories that shaped a place.
Explore more of the places and experiences featured in my Happy Valley, Pennsylvania episode of Love Eat Travel with Michelle Valentine.
And if your travels ever bring you through Central Pennsylvania, don’t simply drive past Boalsburg.
Stop. Walk around. Learn its stories.
Some of America’s most fascinating history can be found in places you might otherwise never think to visit.
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