Statue of Liberty and Pennsylvania

Leaving Ohio, we crossed Pennsylvania. This was a long day driving, with a brief stop in Hershey, PA. I did not notice any smell of chocolate, for the record. By the time we got there and had dinner, the Hershey store was closed, so we settled for buying candy at the gas station.
The next morning we took the ferry out to Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty. Ellis Island had a lot of cool exhibits talking about how immigration has changed over the years, such as gender and nations of origin. It was interesting to give a historical perspective to the current immigration debates. There were exhibits about immigration debates from 100 years ago, when the "problem" immigrants were either from Ireland or Eastern European countries. There were similar concerns back then over the burden the immigrants would be, but there was also information about how the economy grew during that period. Not making judgments, but interesting historical perspective.

The same ferry took us to the Statue of Liberty. We climbed to the top of the base, but not to the crown.

The next day we went to the Mack Truck factory in Macungie, PA. We got to see the whole assembly line and saw how they customized the trucks based on customer requirements. It was mostly manually assembled. The most automation we saw was a machine that would put tires onto rims, and only a single operator. Pretty simple automation, really. Unfortunately, we couldn't take pictures.

At Valley Forge (named after iron forges), we saw General Washington's base (which he rented at his own expense from a resident), as well as troop cabins. In the picture below, the kids are demonstrating how to get a cannonball wound (I already know how to get one! - Brian Regan).