The sights of Philadelphia offer a wealth of American history

Despite living in Pennsylvania for about two and a half years while in high school, I visited Philadelphia only once or twice. Wanting to make up for lost time, when my sister Ashley and I decided to take a train trip from Spokane to the East Coast, we chose the City of Brotherly Love as our first stop.

We only had about 24 hours in the city but as mentioned in my previous story, Ashley and I like to hit the ground running when we travel. After arriving in Philadelphia, we took a short train ride to Apple Hostels (33 S. Bank St.), where we booked a private room with one set of bunk beds. The room was bright and cozy, and the hostel was in a great location for all we had planned.

We dropped off our bags then walked to the United States Mint (151 N. Independence Mall East). Now, I know what you’re thinking, but the Mint really is worth a few minutes of your time. All tours are free and self-guided. No reservations are required, and tours are offered Mondays through Fridays, from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. The entrance closes at 4:15 p.m.

Arriving around 4 p.m., Ashley and I knew we had to hustle to see it all. The tour is easy to navigate on your own, and there are plenty of signs to help answer any questions you might have about the minting process.

The tour begins with a look at the artwork that appears on each coin, and an interactive exhibit allows visitors to design a coin of their own. You then head to the die-making area, where the tools used to strike the coins are created.

Next, visitors can look into the factory floor itself to get an idea of the blanking process, through which round blanks are punched out of metal strips. According to a brochure about the tour, the Mint buys strips of metal made from copper and nickel that are 13 inches wide and 1,500 feet long, or the length of five football fields. The coil of metal that’s fed through the blanking press weighs about 6,000 pounds.

From there, the blanks head to the annealing process where they’re softened in preparation for striking before heading into an upsetting mill, which creates a hard edge on each blank. Once out of the upsetting mill, the blank is called a planchet.

The planchet is then set to the striking area, where the obverse and reverse – or heads and tails – dies are struck onto the planchet, creating the coins that jingle in our pockets and hide between couch cushions.

Every coin is then inspected (flawed coins are sent to a destruction machine called a waffler) before being bagged up and sent to Federal Reserve Banks. The tour ends with a look at medals and commemorative coins created at the Mint, including Congressional Gold Medals.

Even though we had to speed walk through the tour, we couldn’t help but stop in our tracks during the sections that allowed us to see into the factory floor (Yes, we really are that nerdy). There’s a dizzying amount of conveyor belts that take the blanks, planchets and coins from place to place, though there are signs above each section of the factory to help you keep things straight.

Once outside while waiting for the city bus, we couldn’t help but look at our loose change with a fresh set of eyes, thinking of all the steps involved in turning a blank into legal tender.

From the Mint, our next stop was the Philadelphia Museum of Art (2600 Benjamin Franklin Parkway). The steps leading to the art museum are the ones Sylvester Stallone runs up in “Rocky,” so be prepared to see a lot of people recreating the famous scene themselves. For a less physically taxing memento, you can take a picture with a statue of Rocky, arms held aloft in victory, at the bottom right of the steps.

Though the Philadelphia Museum of Art typically closes at 5 p.m., we were lucky to arrive into town on a Friday, when the museum is open until 8:45 p.m. Surely a great stop anytime of day, the museum felt more like a block party on Friday night as people mingled while listening to live music, browsed a maker’s market or participated in an art workshop.

There was a vibrancy to the museum that made me wish more art institutions held after-hours events. Extras aside, the museum has a beautiful collection that you could easily spend hours going through.

I’m a big Impressionism and Post-Impressionism gal, so I’m always happy to see works by artists like Claude Monet, Vincent Van Gogh and Édouard Vuillard. The highlight of the museum though by far was the temporary exhibition “The Time is Always Now: Artists Reframe the Black Figure.”

Curated by British journalist Ekow Eshun for the National Portrait Gallery in London, the show featured more than 60 pieces from artists including Kerry James Marshall, Amy Sherald, Nathaniel Mary Quinn and Toyin Ojih Odutola.

I loved the bright colors and languid poses in Odutola’s work and spent a long time taking in Marshall’s “Untitled (Painter),” which features an artist, hair piled on top of her head and wearing a yellow smock, filling in a paint-by-number image.

Njideka Akunyili Crosby’s “Still You Bloom in This Land of No Gardens,” which features the artist holding her young son on her lap as they sit on a terrace covered in leaves and foliage, was a crowd favorite.

After nearly four hours at the museum, we headed back toward our hostel in search of dinner. Our noses guided us to Malooga (134 Chestnut St.), a restaurant that specializes in Middle Eastern cuisine.

I ordered a vegan bowl ($14.99) with hummus, rice, falafel and vegetables including sautéed potatoes, while Ashley ordered fassolia ($12.99), a sauté of white kidney beans with onions and tomatoes served with tandoor bread.

Both dishes were simple but especially flavorful and really filling after an evening on our feet. The restaurant was packed and seemed like a neighborhood hotspot. Had we been in town longer, we definitely would’ve eaten there again.

After a night at Apple Hostels, we woke bright and early for a walking tour of the city with Free Tours by Foot. Walking tours are one of my favorite ways to see a new city, as you learn so much in a short amount of time. Many tours are pay-what-you-like, making them accessible to all budgets.

We met our tour guide Joseph outside of the Betsy Ross House (239 Arch St.), where we learned the veracity of the story of the Betsy Ross flag has been questioned throughout history. We then walked to Elfreth’s Alley, one of the oldest continuously occupied streets in the country. The first home was built in 1715, while the oldest homes still standing were built in 1724. The “newest” home on the street was completed in the 1830s.

From there, we – Joseph, Ashley and I, plus a father-and-son duo from New Jersey – visited Christ Church (20 N. American St.), the tallest building George Washington would see in his lifetime, according to Joseph, and the post office where Benjamin Franklin was postmaster (316 Market St.).

Behind the post office sits Franklin Court, which houses the Benjamin Franklin Museum (317 Chestnut St.) as well as “ghost structures” showing where Franklin’s house and the print shop Franklin built for his grandson used to stand. At a few points in the courtyard, visitors can look down and see fragments of the foundation of Franklin’s home.

The tour continued onto Carpenters’ Hall (320 Chestnut St.), where the first Continental Congress was held, Independence Hall (520 Chestnut St.) and the Liberty Bell, the latter two of which were covered from the outside.

Ashley and I made a quick stop to the Liberty Bell Center (526 Market St., admission is free) after the tour and were surprised to see that the 2,000-pound bell was actually quite delicate and required a lot of internal stabilization to ensure the crack didn’t spread farther.

Walking back to the hostel, Ashley and I talked about just how much history is sprinkled around the city. There were the sites we saw on the walking tour, of course, but also dozens of historical markers commemorating everything from the home of Anthony Benezet, a leading abolitionist whose “writings influenced the antislavery movement worldwide and federal abolition legislation” to the birthplace of Charles Brockden Brown, “considered America’s first important novelist,” to the establishment of the Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society.

Exploring a city like Philadelphia can lead to what Ashley and I call ancient history overload, but it also feels really special to be walking the same streets so many prominent figures did. Twenty four hours wasn’t nearly enough time to see it all, but the rest will have to wait; our train to New York City was ready to depart.

This is Part 2 of Azaria Podplesky’s twin travels on the East Coast. Follow along next week for their next stop.