Yesterday, I had the pleasure of speaking with six individuals or groups who are interested in visiting the Historic Mifflin Farm this season. As the weather warms, people are looking to get out and explore. This means our summer visiting season is fast approaching! Living with this project every day, I’m excited to see that the historic property is continuing to grow into a place where history is not just preserved, but actively experienced. The winter was cold and snowy, but it gave the team a chance to plan, both for the upcoming visitor season and long-term site development.

We are deep into preparing for the rehabilitation of the historic Mifflin House as an Underground Railroad Learning Center and the construction of our initial trails system. While we are eager to see these two components complete, we recognize that we are stewards of this property and need to treat it with the utmost care. That means understanding the history of the site before beginning any alterations. Working with John Milner Architects and the Urban Heritage Partnership through the winter, we engaged in a Historic Structure and Cultural Landscape Report. The Historic Structures Report has provided a clearer picture of the way the house looked during its period of significance (1800-1863), along with deeper insight into the people who lived and passed through it. As we move through the rest of 2026, we will be working with architects and engineers to develop plans to responsibly transform the house into a place of learning and reflection.

But you won’t have to wait until this work is complete to learn about some of our recent findings! The Historic Structures Report has provided a deeper understanding of the Black indentured servants who lived in the Mifflin home. Better awareness of public and private spaces of the house is helping us envision where these men and women likely slept and worked. This revelation, of course, also adds a layer of complexity to the Quaker antislavery experience.  This research is already helping us create an enhanced house tour for this summer, one that connects the physical space more closely to the human stories at its center.

Outside the stone walls of the house, we’re also adding new layers of interpretation across the property. This summer, we will install three new wayside exhibits, based on the Cultural Landscape Report. Guests will soon be able to learn more about the original log home, erected before the Mifflins moved to the property, and has since been torn down. Visitors will also discover the agricultural significance of the farm and the people who worked the property over the last 225 years. We are also working with Vision Solutions of York and Friends of Lebanon Cemetery to develop a new augmented reality tour of the core historic farmstead. On this tour visitors will meet historic figures and learn about the functions of the farm buildings. Taken together, these improvements will help guests better understand how the land itself functioned over time.

We can’t do all this work alone! Over the past year, we’ve expanded programming alongside both longtime and new collaborators. A Juneteenth Commemoration, developed in partnership with Pennsylvania DCNR and regional partners, will offer an immersive experience rooted in the site’s Underground Railroad history. Participants will move across the farm on foot and the Susquehanna River by boat, following the same paths once taken by freedom seekers. We will host our second year of “Lectures on the Lawn,” inviting local speakers to discuss topics that tie directly with the stories of the Mifflin Farm. And during our annual Riverfest event, we will host our inaugural “Fields of Fire” event, complete with live music and food trucks. Bring a chair or a blanket and enjoy the landscape as the sun sets to the west.

These efforts reflect steady, intentional progress. Step by step, Mifflin Farm is becoming a place where the landscape, the buildings, and the stories all work together—inviting visitors not just to learn about the past, but to encounter it in a meaningful way. We are thankful you are on this journey with us.