Meadowcroft Museum of Rural Life

Meadowcroft Museum of Rural Life
Category
Address
401 Meadowcroft Road,
Avella, PA 15312
Operating schedule
Open seasonally from May through October

Albert kept his discovery of Native Peoples at the Rockshelter a secret for over 18 years after the discovery. He waited, searching for the right archaeological team to excavate his land properly.

While waiting, Albert and his brother Delvin founded the Meadowcroft Historic Village on the land surrounding the Rockshelter. The name Meadowcroft is derived from combining Bancroft Farm with the name of his brother's farm at the Meadow Lands. The two brothers gradually restored the natural landscape, planting trees on old coal mines and farm fields.

Their museum played a crucial role in preserving the rural history, culture, and landscape of the region. All the while, the Rockshelter waited quietly under the cliffs. Then, in 1973, Albert found a team of archaeologists at the University of Pittsburgh in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, who were willing to excavate the prehistoric Rockshelter properly.

Meadowcroft Rockshelter and Museum of Rural Life preserves the history of life on the land in Western Pennsylvania over the past 16,000 years. Meadowcroft is one of Western Pennsylvania's fabulous, off-the-beaten-path destinations. Located in a sleepy hollow in the Western Pennsylvania countryside, Meadowcroft is home to a charming 19th-century village and an internationally known archaeological dig at its Rockshelter site.

Plan a day trip and immerse yourself in 19th-century rural life by touring the Meadowcroft Rockshelter, where you can discover how the prehistoric people of the Western Pennsylvania region lived. Less than an hour's drive from downtown Pittsburgh, Steubenville, Ohio, and Wheeling, West Virginia.

Meadowcroft Village

Take a trip back in time with Meadowcroft's carefully recreated 19th-century village celebrating rural life. Visitors can experience what it was like for ancestors to live by spinning wool from the Merino sheep, dipping candles, celebrating an old-fashioned Independence Day in July, or participating in holiday taffy parties. During your visit, you can witness a blacksmith forging red-hot iron or attend a class in the one-room schoolhouse.

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