"The Story of an American Heritage"
 
Pamphlet from Chapel of the Family of Christopher Columbus and
the Boal Mansion.
 
      The streams of tradition flow from many distant sources,
driven by events through circuitous channels, to merge broadly
and unexpectedly in some quiet pool where the living may compare
their own reflections with those of their predecessors.
      This is the history of an American estate--how the deeds and
the seed of fighting men of Ireland, France, and Spain made a
heritage that is preserved and perpetuated by their descendants
in a peaceful village of central Pennsylvania.
 
Denis
      "Miles Denys, Esquire, was of Irish descent," says the
private history of a French family, "and lived in the 14th
century.  His ancestors crossed the water into Normandy, then
back again with William the Conqueror into England.  The family
records show that they were found among the Crusaders, or any-
where in Christendom, or out of it, where fighting was going on."
      In 1385 an expedition came from England to help Jean de
Montfort wrest the crown of Brittany from Charles of Blois, who
was supported by the French.  Young Miles Denys came with it, and
his sword contributed to de Montfort's victory.  Jean de Montfort
became Jean the Fourth, Duke of Brittany, and Miles remained in
the rocky duchy as one of his subjects.
      The Duke rewarded him by granting to him and his descendants
letters patent, maintaining them in "their nobility" and bestow-
ing upon them the fiefs of Keredern and Trobriand.  Thus, Miles
Denys, of the Irish Denyses, became Miles Denys de Trobriand of
Brittany.  His descendants were hereditary members of the Parlia-
ment of Brittany, and when the duchy was united with France,
became French.  They served with courage on land and sea; but, as
Bretons, the ocean called them oftener than the land, and many of
them were naval officers and explorers.  Their motto is "Trop
Brillant pour estre Terni," "Too Brilliant to be Tarnished."
      Two of them were at Agincourt.  In 1573 another, Alain
Denys, fitted out a ship of war at his own expense, ran the
blockade of the English at New Rochelle, and saved the French
fleet.  Two members of the family gave their names to islands in
the Pacific--the Trobriand Islands and the Denis Islands (for
"Denis" was the later spelling).
      One of Miles Denys's descendants was a member of the body-
guard of the French king, and so became known as Denys de la
Garde, originating another branch of the combative Irish-French
family (later spelled Denis de Lagarde).
 
Boal
      There is no certain account of the origin of the Boal line,
but a probable one held by the family is as follows:  In a small
town of Boal (pron. Bo-ahl) in the province of Asturias, Spain,
in the days of Elizabeth's reign over England, a scion of local
gentry found himself in difficulties over a more than ordinary
infraction of the peace.  With sword and horse he took a hasty
departure for the seacoast, where he settled and raised a family,
one of whom in the 1580's obtained a post in the Spanish fleet--
of course it was the ill-fated Armada, sailing to the conquest of
England.
      The seas were unkind and Drake and the British uncon-
querable.  The galleon that bore the man of Boal was wrecked on
the shores of Scotland.  Like many another Spaniard, the adven-
turer found shelter ashore and remained to start a family, which
continued to be called Boal after the town from which it came.
The family moved to Northern Ireland.  In the latter part of the
18th century one David Boal emigrated from Northern Ireland to
the North American colonies, served in the Revolutionary War, and
eventually settled on a tract of land in Pennsylvania, in what is
now Centre County.  There, in about 1789, he had a small stone
dwelling constructed for him.
      His son, also named David, returned to Ireland, where he
took part in an insurrection.  Reverses forced him to flee the
country.  His wife and children booked passage on a ship about to
sail for America, but David could not escape so openly.  To avoid
capture he was carried aboard concealed in a great wooden chest,
the hinge of which had been sprung so that he might breath, and
from which he emerged only when the vessel was safely at sea.
The chest is still in the family.
      David the younger built an extensive addition to his
father's house in 1798, became a citizen of local note, and was
honored posthumously when the village which grew up nearby was
named Boalsburg.
 
Louise Denis de Trobriand
      The eldest and the second branches of the Denis de Trobriand
family are still represented in France by the Counts de
Trobriand.  The third branch issued from the Chevalier Francois
Marie Denis de Keredern de Trobriand, born in 1741, who married a
daughter of the Spanish Governor of Venezuela.  Another of the
Governor's daughters was the mother of Simon Bolivar, Liberator
of South America.
      Louise, the eldest daughter of the Chevalier, married Count
Dervieu du Villars in 1791, when she was sixteen.  She went with
her husband to his home in Lyons, where the Revolution overtook
them.  The Count, commanding the Guard of Lyons as a general, was
arrested and condemned to death.  His young wife sought out
Couthon, the Revolutionary prosecutor.  It was late at night, the
eve of the day set for her husband's execution.  She held a
pistol to Couthon's head, as he sat alone in his quarters, and
forced him to sign a release for the Count.  Then she locked him
into his rooms, ran to the prison close by, showed her document,
and managed to lead her husband away before the alarm was raised.
      For a long time the ruined and hunted couple hid in a cave
near the city, whence the Countess emerged daily to sew oat-bags
which a servant took into Lyons and sold for the thirty cents a
day whereby they managed to subsist.
      With the end of the Revolution, the Count obtained the
restoration of his properties, moved to Paris, and became a
senator in Napoleon's government.  The lovely Countess became one
of the leading figures at the Emperor's court and was the most
intimate friend of another famous beauty, Madame Recamier.
      In 1806, the year of the coronation of the Emperor, Simon
Bolivar, the young cousin of Countess Louise du Villars, came to
study in Paris as a guest at the du Villars home.  Thenceforth,
during the course of his brilliant career, Bolivar and the
Countess corresponded frequently.  A memento of their
correspondence, a pistol which he sent to her, is among the
family heirlooms in the Boal exhibits.
      The brother of the Countess, Jacques Denis de Trobriand, a
fiery and devoted officer of Napoleon, was decorated at
Austerlitz and was wounded at Eylau and twice at Ratisbon.  He is
reputed to have fought over a hundred duels.  Once a Prussian
general said to him, "You Frenchmen fight for money, while we
Prussians fight for honor."  "Naturally," retorted Jacques.
"Each one fights for what he hasn't got."  After Napoleon's death
the Medal of St. Helena with a lock of the Emperor's hair was
sent to General Jacques de Trobriand; and this memento, as well
as Jacques' duelling pistols, can be seen among the Boal relics.
      Louise Denis de Trobriand, Countess Dervieu du Villars, had
numerous children.  During her own childhood she had been much
befriended by the Denis de Lagarde branch of her family, so that
when her cousin Pierre Denis de Lagarde desired to adopt one of
them to continue his name, she allowed him to take her son louis
to his home.
      Unlike his adoptive father, who was a cavalry general and
Cuirassier officer, Louis Denis de Lagarde became prominent in
civilian life, in politics, and for over thirty years was
Secretary of the French Chamber of Deputies.  His son, Ludovic,
sent as an attache to the French Embassy in Madrid, fell in love
with a young Spanish girl, Mathilde de Montalvo, and married her.
      The Montalvos were also a family of explorers and soldiers.
One of Mathilde's ancestors had participated in the conquest of
Peru and Ecuador after Pizarro's expedition in the 16th century.
His descendants settled in Cuba, and Mathilde was born in Cien-
fuegos, near which the family had extensive sugar plantations.
She and her sister Victoria went to stay with their relatives in
Madrid, where Mathilde married Count Ludovic Denis de Lagarde and
Victoria married Don Diego Columbus, direct descendant of
Christopher, Discoverer of America, and possessor of the family
chapel, its relics and heirlooms.
 
Boal-Denis
      Mathilde Denis de Lagarde, nee Montalvo, sister of Dona
Victoria Columbus, had among other children a daughter, also name
Mathilde.  The Denis de Lagardes lived a busy life in Paris.
Count Ludovic's wife died while her children were still small, so
that the daughter Mathilde, as the eldest, had the responsibility
of the household at an early age.  She was her father's constant
companion and accompanied him when he made a tour of the United
States to visit especially one of his Denis de Trobriand cousins
who was French Consul-General in San Francisco.  Naturally
enough, on their return to Paris the Denis de Lagarde home opened
its doors to American friends.
      Among them was a young architect studying at the Beaux-
Arts.  He was Theodore Davis Boal, of the Pennsylvania Spanish-
Irish Boals, just returned from spending a year as a cowboy in
the Far West.  His verve, gaiety, and wit--qualities that graced
his character to the end of his days--affected the competent
young French girl.  Despite the reluctance of her father to see
her leave for a distant continent, Mathilde married the young
architect and went with him to his home in Boalsburg.  With her
came many heirlooms of the Denis de Trobriands and the Denis de
Lagardes.
 
The Columbus Family Chapel
      Christopher Columbus's son and heir Diego, Admiral and Vice-
Roy of the Indies, was better situated at court that his father,
enjoyed more continuously the royal protection of Ferdinand and
Isabella, and married a granddaughter of the Duke of Alba.
      To the Discoverer's son fell the wealth his father had
earned.  Some of the gold that began to flow from the Indies was
transmuted into estates and castles--the trappings of nobility
for the Columbus family.  One of the castles was in northern
Spain, in the bleak mountains of Asturias, high tide of the
Moorish invasion.  Amid these mountains the Moors had built a
fortified round tower, which went by the name of "Llamas del
Moro" (Flames of the Moor).  When the Moors had been driven out,
the Spaniards added to this rugged structure a large stone
castle, two stories high, with higher square towers at each
corner.  Built around a courtyard, the lower story of the castle
with its great doors and earthen floor served to shelter horsemen
and coach travelers when they stepped from their mounts and
carriages to the stone stairs rising to the reception and living
quarters.  In its recesses were smoky kitchens and deep cellars,
while the Moorish tower served as a dungeon.
      In the castle, as usual, was set aside a place of devotion.
There family relics and heirlooms would be kept--furnishings and
family swords among religious paintings and statuary--dedicated
to the glory of God and to the patron saints who had protected
the Columbuses from the perils of the sea and of the New World.
Fine wood was carved and gilded, silver was wrought, and each
generation added something to what might already have been
preserved there from the days and voyages of Christopher and his
son Diego:  the little painted statues of saints, carved of wood
and embellished with glass eyes, suitable to the narrow chapel-
places of the ships of discovery; the small painted wooden
crosses which could be used for processions or slipped onto
pikestaffs to be planted on the beaches of islands taken in the
name of the Sovereigns; the admiral's desk studded with gilt
cockleshells, emblematic of St. James of Compostella--a saint
particularly revered by Christopher Columbus.  Such a desk could
be securely locked with its great key to protect the logs of the
voyages; carried ashore or from ship to ship by its strong gilded
handles; or open, would provide a surface on which to write those
letters the explorers and administrators sent to encourage and
reassure their royal patrons.
      When Dona Victoria Columbus died, widowed and childless, she
left part of her estate to her niece Mathilde, notably Don
Diego's family chapel.  Colonel Boal constructed a stone chapel
building on his estate, and brought from Spain to Boalsburg the
entrance door and the interior of the Columbus Chapel with
everything it contained--fine paneling and woodwork, the choir
loft (with a great escutcheon of the Columbus family on the
railing, its colored panels showing the castle of Castile, the
lion of Leon, the Admiral's anchors, the islands of the Indies,
and the colors of Spain with an eagle), reredos, the altar draped
with fine Spanish linen and lace, the massive silver crucifix,
silk and brocade vestments (one maniple is over five hundred
years old), paintings attributed to Ribera and Ambrosius Benson
among others, hand-carved Saints, family swords.
      Of all these heirlooms, the greatest treasure of the Chapel
is contained in a silver reliquary:  it consists of two pieces of
the True Cross.
      In the 5th century, Toribius, a young Spanish nobleman, went
to the Holy Land, where, under Juvenal, he became keeper of the
Sacred Relics which St. Helena had brought together in the Church
of the Holy Sepulchre.  Confronted with the danger of a capture
of Jerusalem, Juvenal instructed Toribius to take the Left Arm of
the Cross of the Savior and other important Relics to a place of
safety.  Toribius carried them first to Rome, where he received
orders from the Pope, Saint Leo, to take the Left Arm of the
Cross to Spain.  Toribius placed it in the cathedral of his own
city of Astorga, of which he became Bishop.  There the Sacred
Relic remained until the 7th century, when the Moorish invasion
threatened Astorga.  Its keepers removed it, together with the
body of Toribius, to San Martin in the northerly kingdom of Leon.
Toribius was canonized as Saint Toribius of Astorga, and San
Martin was renamed Santo Toribio de Liebana, in honor of the
Saint and of the Left Arm of the True Cross revered there.
      Early in the 19th century the Bishop of Leon, Ignacio Ramon
de Roda, went to Santo Toribio de Liebana (in his diocese) and
asked permission of the Priory of the Benedictine Monks to remove
a portion of the Left Arm of the Cross.  This they granted, and
on bended knees he detached a portion, part of which he sent to
Don Joachim and Don Felix Columbus for their family chapel.  It
is the part of the True Cross, arranged in the form of a cross in
the reliquary and presented to the Columbus brothers by the
Bishop of Leon, as certified by his signed and sealed document
dated 1817, which may now be seen in the Columbus Family Chapel
at the Boal Estate.
 
David Boal's Descendants
      The Scotch-Irish families of central Pennsylvania were
especially inclined to participate in the region's military
affairs.  Among these families the McCoys, the Thompsons, and the
Boals collaborated from Revolutionary times in raising troops and
leading them in the defense of the nation.  General Frank Ross
McCoy of Lewistown, statesman and soldier, was a lifelong friend
of Theodore Davis Boal and his son Pierre.  General McCoy's
father as a young man enrolled troops for the Mexican War with
the Captain Boal of that period, at the tavern in Boalsburg.  The
first Pennsylvanian to volunteer for the Spanish-American War was
George Boal Thompson, another descendant of the original American
Davids.  He went to Puerto Rico with the Sheridan Cavalry and was
on the U.S.S. Wasp when that ship invested the port of Ponce.  He
was sent ashore with the storming party, and it fell to his lot
to receive the surrender of the Spanish garrison--by telephone:
possibly the earliest instance of a military surrender by tele-
phone.
      Theodore Davis Boal, a great-grandson of David the younger,
raised and equipped at Boalsburg a mounted machine gun troop,
which he led to the Mexican border in 1916, at the time of
General Funston's expedition against General Francisco (Pancho)
Villa.  His mounting machine guns on Ford trucks was an early,
perhaps the earliest motorization of machine gun equipment in the
American forces.  On an occasion when he crossed into Mexico,
Colonel Boal obtained the field cap and epaulettes of General
Villa, as well as his photograph (not by force, needless to say,
as Villa was not captured by General Funston's expedition).
During World War I the machine gun company served in France as a
part of Pennsylvania's 28th Division.  Colonel Boal, with General
Muir throughout the war, was awarded the D.S.C. for valor in
action.
      His son, Pierre Denis de Lagarde Boal, succeeded (quite
irregularly) in enlisting in the French cavalry, 1st Regiment of
Cuirassiers, in 1915.  He later transferred to the Lafayette
flying Corps and at the end of the war was the supervising
officer of the American pilots and observers detached to French
air squadrons.  He served in the U.S. Foreign Service in Europe,
Canada, and Latin America, was Ambassador to Bolivia, and retired
in 1947.
      Pierre Boal married a French girl, Jeanne de Menthon, whose
father inherited the family castle on the Lake of Annecy, built
about a thousand years ago by his Savoyard forebears.  In this
castle lived his ancestor St. Bernard of Menthon, who founded the
hospices on the Alpine passes of Switzerland, where the Saint
Bernard dogs, carrying their little casks of spirits tied to
their collars, for centuries succored travelers floundering in
the snows.  As Jeanne's father had no sons, the castle passed to
his brother and is now owned by Francois de Menthon, sometime
President of the European Assembly and distinguished French
statesman.  By his marriage to Jeanne de Menthon, Pierre Boal's
children and grand-children are thus linked to the tradition of
yet another saint.
 
The Mansion and Exhibits
      Obliged to be absent from Boalsburg for long periods, Pierre
Boal sought a means of making available to his contemporaries the
family heirlooms of general interest and objects pertaining to
Pennsylvania's 28th Division.  He established a museum on the
estate, which contains (in addition to items mentioned earlier)
decorations and medals of the Denis de Trobriand, the Denis de
Lagarde, and the Columbus families; the traveling coach of David
Boal the younger and the family carriages and sleigh; a large
collection of weapons and armor from Europe, Asia, and America--
ranging from halberds and medieval armor to flintlocks, weapons
from the Civil War and those captured from the Germans in World
War I by the 28th Division; the Machine Gun Troop pennants and
the 28th Division Cavalry Flag.
      Several early Pennsylvania and 18th-century European rooms,
with their fireplaces, furniture, and furnishings, have been
reconstituted in the museum; and examples of the fine American,
French, and Spanish porcelains and glass with which the Mansion
is stocked are displayed in showcases.  These represent an
overflow from the old Mansion built by David Boal the younger in
1798; the Mansion itself is still well furnished with Colonial
and European furniture.  Stored in the Mansion are leather trunks
of the Columbus family filled with fine Spanish linen and lace,
and trunks containing the clothing and effects of successive
generations of Boals since Revolutionary days.  Portraits and
miniatures of the French and Spanish families hang among those of
the American ancestors.  At the foot of the main staircase hangs
a portrait of Christopher Columbus, painted many years after his
death, but bearing the motto of the family in its old form:  "Por
Castilla et por Leon, Nuevo Mundo Hallo Colon"; that is, "For
Castile and for Leon, Columbus Found a New World."
 
The 28th Division Memorial Park
      The Mansion was for many years a center for visitors of both
local and national repute.  General Leonard Wood of Spanish War
and Philippine fame was a frequent visitor:  he helped to
organize the machine gun troop and used to be met at the railway
station by David Boal's traveling coach flanked by a mounted
platoon from the troop.  After the war, many veterans of the 28th
Division made trips to Boalsburg; and finally Colonel Theodore
Boal, because of his attachment to the Division, decided to
construct a memorial park for the Division on his estate.
General Edward Martin, lately Governor of Pennsylvania and
presently a senator, encouraged him in this enterprise, as did
many other officers and men of the Division.
      A long field-stone wall was erected above the bank of a
stream, in which were placed tablets for the officers killed in
action while serving in the Division in World War I.  Before it,
on both banks of the stream, were placed monuments to commemorate
units of the Division and general officers killed in action.  The
unit memorials are placed in relation to each other in their
positions during the battle of the Vesle River, with the stream
representing the river.  In the center of the long wall, the
Commonwealth (which eventually acquired, maintained, and
developed the memorial park) erected a monument to the memory of
its founder, Colonel Boal.  The Commonwealth is now preparing a
memorial of the 28th Division in World War II.
      Thousands of visitors stroll through these tree-shaded
grounds every summer, and some travel great distances to attend
the annual ceremonies of the Division.  Many visit the pic-
turesque early-American village of Boalsburg, where Memorial
(Decoration) Day was first observed during the Civil War, and
which is therefore known as the birthplace of Memorial Day.  It
is fortunate that a fund of history and tradition is gathered at
the Boal Mansion and the Columbus Family Chapel just across the
highway from the 28th Division monuments.
 
      The non-profit Society which administers the Chapel and the
museum was created largely through the devotion and public spirit
of a local banker, Claude G. Aikens, and his wife, and Mrs.
George Boal Thompson (whose husband took the telephoned surrender
in Puerto Rico).  Many others--among them Church, State, and
County authorities--helped along the work of restoration and
classification of thousands of items.  students from the
Pennsylvania State University nearby did volunteer work on the
estate grounds.  It is fitting to note that all concerned have
carried on, by their own generous activity, the tradition that
distinguished those brave men and women of many lands whose
heritage of relics presents a tangible past, an experience of
which is a refreshment of the spirit.
 
SPECIAL EVENTS IN 1990 AT THE BOAL MANSION MUSEUM
Business Route 322, Boalsburg, PA  16827
 
      On May 1, 1990, the Boal Mansion Museum and Columbus Chapel
will open for the season.  Guided tours are conducted from May 1
to October 31 six days a weeks (closed on Tuesdays), and on
Saturdays and Sundays in December before Christmas.
 
      "Music at the Boal Mansion" is a benefit champagne musicale
with fine hors d'oeuvres, champagne, and musicians of national
renown.  In 1990 it will take place on Saturday, May 12, at 4 and
8 pm.  It will feature both European Renaissance music and
American shaped noted and folk music by Voice of the Turtle, a
four person vocal and instrumental group from Washington, D.C.
Tickets will cost $35.  Proceeds benefit 1992 Columbus Quincen-
tenary in Boalsburg.  For information, tel.: (814) 466-6210.
 
      "A Memorial Day Festival" takes place every Memorial Day
Monday (May 28, 1990), with food, music, crafts and historical
tours throughout the village of Boalsburg and the Boal Estate.
For information, tel.:  (814) 466-6210.
 
      "An Evening in Boalsburg" is a special weekly tour every
Wednesday evening in the summer from June 27 to August 29th at
the Boal Mansion and Columbus Chapel, preceded by wine and cheese
at the Mansion and followed by a delicious dinner at Duffy's
Historic Boalsburg Tavern, all at a reasonable price.  Group size
is limited and the program is very popular, so make reservations
as early as possible.  For information, tel.:  (814) 466-6210.
 
      The 3rd annual Ethnic and Cultural Heritage Festival will
take place at the Boal Mansion Museum on Sunday, October 7, 1990,
the day before Columbus Day, with ethnic food, music, dance,
crafts, etc., a parade from the village of Boalsburg to the Boal
Estate, special focus tours of the museum and a community seminar
on intercultural communication.  For information, tel.:
(814) 466-6210.
 
      Special Christmas tour hours will be each Saturday and
Sunday in December before Christmas, from 1:30 to 5 pm, and will
include festive Christmas decorations in the style of the early
Boal Mansion and Christmas refreshments.
 
      On Sunday, December 9, 1990, at 8:00 pm, Dr. Tony Lentz,
assistant professor of Speech Communication at the University,
will read "A Christmas Carol" by Charles Dickens.  For
information, tel.:  (814) 466-6210.
 
      On Saturday, December 15, at 8 pm, the public is invited to
a gala Boal Mansion Christmas Musicale to benefit the preserva-
tion of the museum.  Christmas food and drink will be provided.
For reservation information, tel.:  (814) 466-6210.
Some Quotes About the Columbus Chapel and Boal Mansion Museum
 
"The strongest tie to Columbus in the United States . . ."
      --The National Italian American Foundation 1992 Newsletter
 
"A hidden gem . . . a museum of life in an emerging nation."
      --AAA Today Magazine, published by the American Automobile
      Association, with a circulation of three million
 
"One cannot walk away from the Boal Mansion without the feeling
that he or she has, in some magical but unexplainable way, taken
part in a story that appears larger than life itself."
      --Penna. Heritage Magazine, published by the Penna. Histori-
      cal and Museum Commission, the official history agency of
      the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania
 
"This inheritance from Christopher Columbus is one of the strong-
est connections in the United States with the famous explorer
and, without a doubt, will be one of the major points of attrac-
tion when in 1992 the 500th anniversary of the discovery of
America takes place."
      --GeoMundo Magazine, a South American magazine with a
      circulation of two million
 
"Filled with historical treasures."
      --WPVI-TV, Philadelphia, PA (ABC), on "Prime Time," shown on
      Saturday evening at 7:30 pm.
 
"There is something here that touched nearly every visitor.  The
exhibits are presented by docents in an engaging fashion."
      --Dr. J. Ritchie Garrison, Reviewer, Museum Assessment
      Program, American Association of Museums.
 
"A house that bears testament to the American story from frontier
times to the present . . .  Few American houses have been home to
a single family for more than two hundred years and for nine
generations--a most compelling reason to pay the Boal Mansion a
visit."
      --Mid-Atlantic Country Magazine
 
"A unique Pennsylvania heritage."
      --Pennsylvania Magazine, read by 100,000 Pennsylvanians.
 
"The works are of very high quality . . . a remarkable ensemble
. . . a great asset to the community."
      --Dr. George Mauner, Pennsylvania State University,
      Professor of Art History, Director of the Institute for the
      Arts and Humanistic Studies (PSU).
 
"A vivid and unexpected glimpse of a fabulous past."
      --Sir Lawrence Gowing, Slade Professor of Fine Arts
      (Emeritus), University College, London, and Kress Professor
      at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Columbus Chapel and Boal Mansion Museum Fact Sheet
 
      The Boal Mansion has been the Boal family home for nine
generations and 200 years, from the frontier beginnings to the
present, and contains the original furnishings.  It is a strik-
ingly intact reflection of America, the emerging nation.  It was
the home of Colonel Theodore Davis Boal, who outfitted his own
troop for World War I and founded the 28th Division Shrine.
      The Columbus Chapel is a unique national resource.  It is an
authentic, sixteenth century, Old World chapel full of Renais-
sance and Baroque masterpiece oil paintings, centuries-old
religious relics and vestments, and items from the Columbus
family such as an Admiral's desk of the king used by Christopher
Columbus.  The chapel was inherited by the European wife of
Colonel Boal from her relatives in the Columbus family.  Colonel
Boal brought it to Boalsburg from Spain in 1909.
      Three additional exhibit buildings contain fascination
relics from the exciting past of this distinguished family,
including weapons, carriages, tools, clothes and china from the
Boal family, and European relics such as a conquistador's helmet,
a lock of hair of Napoleon and chain mail from the crusades.
      The site is an unexpected delight, rich in art and history.
Three goals have been expressed for the museum:  preservation of
this rich heritage, it's use for community education, and in-
creased community involvement.  An appeal has been issued for
community participation and support to achieve these goals.
      Guided tours are available to the general public from May 1
to October 31, six days a week (closed on Tuesdays), and on
Saturdays and Sundays in December before Christmas.  Tours by
groups are available at other times by advance arrangement.
      In addition to regular tours, programs include a series of
festivals on holidays such as Memorial Day, Fathers Day and
Columbus Day, musicales in May and December, weekly extended
evening tours in the summer, and special exhibits such as the
Boal Family Papers exhibit at Penn State's Pattee Library in
1989.  Special programs are being planned for the 500th anniver-
sary of Columbus in 1992.
      Nearby points of interest include the historic village of
Boalsburg with its shops and restaurants, the adjacent
Pennsylvania Military Museum, Penn State University and many
other cultural, historical and natural highlights.
      This nationally registered historic site is located on
Business Route 322, four miles east of State College, PA, and is
a 501 (c) 3, non-profit educational organization.  To contact the
museum, write:  The Columbus Chapel and Boal Mansion Museum, P.O.
Box 116, Boalsburg, PA  16827, or telephone:  (814) 466-6210.
 
 
Reprint permission granted by author.
 
                                                           BOALS-01.INS