Pennsylvania

The Liberty Bell cracked the very first time anyone tried to ring it. When it arrived from London in 1752, the first hit cracked the rim.

Two local metalworkers named John Pass and John Stow melted it down and recast it. Their first attempt sounded so bad that people made fun of them, so they tried again. That third version became one of the most famous symbols in American history. It still sits in Philadelphia, crack and all.

The Lenape people lived in Pennsylvania's river valleys long before Europeans arrived. In 1681, King Charles II of England gave William Penn a massive land grant to settle a royal debt. Penn, a Quaker who'd been jailed in England for his beliefs, built his colony on the idea of religious freedom and made peaceful agreements with the Lenape.

That peace didn't last. Penn's sons tricked the Lenape into giving up a huge piece of land by hiring the fastest runners they could find to cover far more ground than the Lenape expected. Most Native communities were eventually pushed out of the state entirely.

Philadelphia became the center of the American Revolution. Delegates declared independence from Britain inside the Pennsylvania State House in 1776, and came back to the same building eleven years later to write the Constitution.

In the brutal winter of 1777-78, George Washington's army nearly starved at Valley Forge, about 20 miles away. In 1780, while the war was still being fought, Pennsylvania passed the first law in America to gradually end slavery.

The bloodiest battle of the Civil War happened at Gettysburg in 1863, leaving more than 50,000 soldiers dead or wounded in three days. A short speech Abraham Lincoln gave at the battlefield four months later, called the Gettysburg Address, became one of the most famous in American history.

Visit Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell in Philadelphia, where you can stand in the room where both the Declaration and the Constitution were signed. Walk the fields at Gettysburg National Military Park.

Explore the Philadelphia Museum of Art, run the Rocky steps, and grab a cheesesteak at Pat's or Geno's in South Philly. In Hershey, tour the chocolate factory and ride the roller coasters at Hersheypark.