Although Jean and Rich Schweigart, volunteers at the Berks County Heritage Center, encourage people to visit the Gruber Wagon Works at the Heritage Center, the duo provided attendees at their “trunk show” at the Schuylkill Valley Community Library on July 7 a great opportunity to experience the Wagon Works off-site.
The Schweigarts of Brecknock Township, along with other volunteers out of the Heritage Center, take their shows on the road to educate community groups, but also provide tours at the actual Gruber Wagon Works.
The attendees at the Schweigarts’ presentation learned that the Wagon Works facility was transported by flatbed in 1976 from Mt. Pleasant. Jean Schweigart introduced the Gruber family history to the group with her description of them as “very, very organized. Very appreciative of what they had. They were ingenious people.”
Jean, a retired teacher from the Hamburg Area School District, displayed a timeline to explain the growth and changes within the Gruber family that allowed for a Berks County-based wagon-building business that spanned 100 years.
During her portion of the program, Jean relayed that the Grubers’ “ingenuity was always at play” as she described to the group how the wagons were lifted to a second floor paint booth to protect the wet paint from road dust. The Grubers eventually made an elevator using a pulley system that is still operational at the Heritage Center site.
The working conditions, as Jean discussed, were safe and ahead of their time and she confirmed that “never a fire, never an accident” was documented at the Wagon Works, although hourly wages only averaged about thirty cents. Women were only allowed at the facility on Saturdays to clean, and as Jean joked with her audience, that “never changes.”
Rich Schweigart focused his portion of the presentation on the actual making of the wagons, and as he relayed to the group, “the toughest part about making a wagon is the wheel.” He described how Gruber Wagon Works churned out 100 wagons a year as their techniques advanced from the hand tool production that allowed only one wagon per month to be produced.
The Schweigarts included in their talk that the two types of wagons crafted by the Grubers were hay-flats and box wagons. On hand for the Wagon Works presentation was Leesport Deputy Fire Chief Ryan Kopicz, who relayed to the group that his grandmother, Emily Gruber, a past Justice of the Peace in Heidelberg Township, donated a Gruber hay-flat wagon to the Heritage Center in the late 1970s. The wagon is on display, bearing the official Gruber Wagon Works plaque, the Gruber signature dark green paint and their custom hand-painted decorations.
Not only did the Schweigarts encourage the community and tourists to visit the Berks County Heritage Center and tour the Gruber Wagon Works, but they also entice visitors with their tales that the ghost of Adam Gruber still enters his second floor paint shop and makes noises that are inexplicable to the volunteers.
The Gruber Wagon Works experience is available at the Berks County Heritage Center, 1102 Red Bridge Road, Bern Township. The Center is opened to the public from May until October, Tuesdays through Sundays from 10 a.m. until 4 p.m. During their off-season, they are available for group tours. Admission is charged. For more information, contact the Heritage Center at 610-374-8839.
The Schuylkill Valley Community Library is located at 1310 Washington Road in Leesport. For information about upcoming events, contact them at 610-926-1555.
