Hanna’s Town kicks off Civil War reenactment with children’s program

Of all the portrayals and demonstrations Friday at Historic Hanna’s Town, Waylon Bizup was most excited about the weaponry.

“I liked the cannon,” 10-year-old Waylon said. “I liked the Gatling gun over there. We got to fire it, like two rounds. It was really cool, and we got to be close to the cannon when it fired.”

Waylon attended the Hempfield site’s Civil War children’s program with 25 other youngsters from the Ligonier Valley YMCA. The event took place from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Although battles were not held at Hanna’s Town during the Civil War, the site holds annual reenactments in honor of the Western Pennsylvania soldiers and civilians who provided support to the Union victory in 1865.

The reenactment will take place Saturday and Sunday, but Friday’s event focused on teaching children about the Civil War through living history portrayals — from medical surgeons to generals to corporals.

One of the challenges of the day was figuring out how to explain Civil War history to a youthful audience, said Brian Lebeck.

Lebeck, of Beaver Falls, portrayed a Confederate soldier alongside his son, Blair Lebeck of Rochester. The father-son duo demonstrated the firing of a howitzer cannon.

“We’re talking generically about positions on the cannon,” Brian said. “There’s eight people that are assigned to a cannon, so what we did with the last group, we set them up in the different positions and talked about that for a little.”

Like Waylon, 8-year-old Maz Collins — also with the YMCA group — was excited about the cannons.

But he also was interested in learning about the key leaders of the war.

“The generals are kind of cool,” Maz said. “A lot of interesting stuff.”

Among the generals was George McClellan, portrayed by Bethlehem resident David Strawn.

Strawn has been portraying the Union major general for about two years, but he has done historical military impressions for six years through the Civil War Impressionists Association.

This is Strawn’s first time reenacting at Hanna’s Town. His goal was to teach people about who George McClellan was, beyond his tendency to “butt heads” with his superiors.

“A lot of historians consider (McClellan) a failure,” Strawn said. “There’s new writings out today, more research, that show that he did exactly what he was supposed to do and what he said he was going to do.”

Kevin Kuhn and Brandy Zeiders also hoped to dispel Civil War-era myths in their portrayals, specifically those in the medical field.

“Medicine didn’t really change from 160 years ago,” Kuhn said. “It just kind of changed to power tools. We’re showing (the kids) that this is what went on back then. It may look rude and crude, but it’s what they had to do, and it’s some of what we use today.”

The Johnstown couple explained how surgery was done during the war by demonstrating a limb removal. Kuhn started doing medical reenacting over 10 years ago when he began working as an EMT, and Zeiders — who works as a nursing assistant in “real life” — began joining him about three years ago.

Zeiders, portraying a nurse, focused on women’s involvement in the war and the impact the female nurses had on modern medicine. It has been an “eye-opening” experience, she said.

“I have a lot of respect for Dorothea Dix, despite sounding like an RN I would not have gotten along with,” Zeiders joked. “Without her and a lot of other key players, I would not have a job today.”

Although she found the details of the surgery a little gruesome, Penn Township resident Julie Sims appreciated the learning opportunity for her and her two daughters.

“I love history, and I, as a kid, didn’t get a chance to see a lot of things like this,” Sims said. “I’m trying to expose my kids to it as much as possible.”