(bright upbeat music) - From a scenic river cruise in Delaware, a sampling of tasty foods, and a tea party on wheels, here's to exploring your town like a tourist.

(bright upbeat music continues) Welcome to "You Oughta Know," I'm Shirley Min.

And today, I'm your tour guide, so let's explore.

We're going to start with a tasting of what South Philly has to offer.

- My name is Maddy, Tiny Table Tours is my company.

My background is in food journalism, so I've been writing about restaurants in Philly for about six years.

And I started this business because I wanted to give people an in-person experience of the people, places, and dishes that I think make Philadelphia one of the best dining cities in America.

You guys can follow me.

Our Beyond the Italian Market Tour, which is Tiny Table Tours' signature tour, we start on Passyunk Ave in front of the Singing Fountain, which is a wonderful community-gathering place.

My family is Italian.

I was very interested in all of these waves of immigration that have really impacted the way that we eat today in South Philly.

We normally go to Essen Bakery, we try Rugelach, which is a very classic Jewish pastry.

We walk past Pat's and Geno's, and I share some stories that I've gathered from an interview with Frank who owns Pat's.

We talk about the history of cheese steaks in Philly.

The winter of 1935 was a very cold winter in Philadelphia, so the person who owned this building at the time came to Pat and his brother and said, why don't you guys use this empty restaurant space that I have in the upstairs, and you can pay me rent at the end of the season.

Downstairs, there was a bar and a produce stand.

People started taking their food downstairs to the bar to hang out.

The bartender did not like this.

The story goes that he pulled out a saw, and he cut a hole in the wall.

And he said, if people wanna come inside, they have to drink, otherwise they can take their food to go through this window.

So, both Pat's and Geno's, to this day, take-out-window only.

You walk up, you order your food, and then they have these covered picnic tables where you can eat.

You have to lay down after you eat a cheese steak, it's not really good for a walking tour.

So, we don't eat a cheese steak.

Instead, we go to Ba Le Bakery, which is a family-owned, second generation Vietnamese bakery on Washington Avenue.

We try a banh mi, which is one of my very favorite sandwiches in Philadelphia.

It has a lot of freshness, and herbs, and pickles that make it a really, really delicious and dynamic sandwich.

Banh mi, exists in this form in Vietnam because of the French occupation of that country.

And in the late '70s and early '80s, there were about 300 Vietnamese families that were brought to Philadelphia and settled in West Philly.

Of course, when people come to new places, they wanna eat their food.

But very quickly, these Vietnamese restaurant owners realized that people in Philadelphia will eat absolutely anything if you call a hoagie, so they started to market these sandwiches as Vietnamese hoagies.

So, I think that's really interesting, right?

You have the French occupation of Vietnam, brings this bread tradition to Vietnam, it evolves into something different, and then comes to Philadelphia and continues to evolve.

(gentle guitar music) Okay, guys, we're gonna walk by the Italian Market.

- I moved to Philly in November.

And I've always seen food as a great way to get to know a new neighborhood, a new city.

I love that the Food Tour highlights the mom-and-pop shops.

And I thought Maddy, at Tiny Table, did a great job of talking about all the different cultures and how their stories blend, and how you can see that showcased by the food that we're eating and enjoying today.

- Woo.

(tourists cheering) - In front of you, is horchata.

This is a very common classic Mexican beverage.

This is made from scratch.

Super refreshing, it'll give you that sugar rush.

But also if you get too much spiciness from any of the salsas, it'll cut right through it.

So, enjoy, and I'll tell you a little bit more about this restaurant while we're eating tacos.

Raul Castro is the owner of Plaza Garibaldi.

He's an incredible cook, and just has this like encyclopedic knowledge of regional Mexican food traditions.

- These are authentic quesadillas.

It's just the Oaxaca cheese, handmade corn tortillas, that's some little pickle they got you here, lettuce.

And we also have some tacos cabeza de res, which is the steer-head tacos.

We sell a lot of them.

This is the way usually it's served in Mexico.

- We end at Di Bruno Brothers Bottle Shop, also in the Italian Market, and we talk about how they've worked to curate this really fantastic selection of European and American small wine makers.

And we have a little glass of wine, and we talk about the tour.

I love this wine, it's delicious.

As a freelance food writer, sometimes it seems like all I do, is write lists of restaurants.

So, I like to give out my cheat sheet, which is lots of restaurants that I think don't appear on every single list, but that I think are some of the very best in Philadelphia.

Thanks, guys, so much.

(tourists applauding) My hope is that I take people to places that they might not have gone on their own, or that they hadn't been before, and that they'll go back and try these places again.

I really wanna drive money into small businesses so that they'll be around for a long time in Philadelphia.

- Cheers.

- Woo.

- [Tourists] Cheers.

(glass clanking) - Now, let's sit back and sip some tea as we take a sightseeing tour inside a mobile tea room.

(soft Music) - [Presenter] Welcome to Tee Around Town, the very first traveling tee bus in the entirety of Center City, Philadelphia.

- I'm at the pickup spot for Tee Around Town Philly at 6th and Market Streets.

Let's go inside and check out this mobile tea room.

- Welcome to Tea Around Town.

- Thank you.

- All right, come right in.

- Okay.

Ryan, thank you so much for having me.

- Oh my gosh, thank you for joining us.

- It's so pretty in here.

- [Ryan] It's flowers everywhere.

- I love the flowers.

Talk to me about Tear Round Town Philadelphia, and just the experience as a whole.

- Sure, first of all, we absolutely love Philadelphia.

Tea Round Town is our version of the sightseeing experience with a little bit of twist.

(upbeat energetic music) So, we definitely give you facts about the city.

Either it's a tour guided heart letting you know fun information about your city, but then they slide in some jazz singing and live, you know, vocals and contemporary music, and just our fun twist on what sightseeing is traditionally been.

♪ Flash, bam, alakazam ♪ ♪ When out of an orange-colored sky ♪ ♪ I was walking along, minding my ♪ We hit the main attractions, You'd go pass the Liberty Bell, we'll go by the museums, we'll go by the Rocky Statue, of course, we'll go by Love Park.

Just wanna make sure that you get a sense of what the city is like.

And that way, you can have your own little spin on it.

- And I loved the full-tea service, okay?

So, talk to me about some of the offerings.

- [Ryan] Sure, we separated into three tiers.

Just like any traditional tea experience, we have our sweets on top, our savory in the middle, and our scones on the bottom.

- My name is Thomas, I'm gonna be one of your tea specialists for this lovely trip this afternoon.

I have, to start for you, a lovely watermelon-mint tea.

- [Ryan] There is hot tea.

Not everybody loves hot tea in the summer, so we do give them a mixture of hot tea and cold tea.

- Cheers.

Mm, this is good.

I do have an important question I do wanna ask, is there a bathroom on the bus?

Because with all the tea- (Ryan laughing) - We do serve up to six flavors of tea, so yes.

(both laughing) And yes, there is a bathroom on the bus.

- [Shirley] Ryan, thank you so much.

I've really enjoyed getting to see Philadelphia- - I'm so glad that you joined.

- In a new way.

As a local, this is kind of fun.

- And that's what we want, We want you to rediscover your city.

- Ryan, thank you so much.

- Thank you again.

- And here's how you can learn more about Tea Around Town Philly.

Philadelphia neighborhoods are known for their unique characteristics.

Next, we head to West Philadelphia and Spruce Hill, where we learn about history through architecture.

- Philadelphia has the largest stock of 18th century buildings in the country, and the Preservation Alliance is the leading nonprofit in Philadelphia to help protect and save our historic buildings.

The streets that had better access to transportation developed more quickly than those that didn't.

It wasn't until the 19th century that this area started to grow as bridges were built.

All right, we're gonna head up this way.

- Our Walking Tour Program actually dates back to the 1980s, and it was started by the Foundation for Architecture.

But in 2008, we assumed the catalog of tours.

And since then, we've had over 35 unique tours every year.

From Camden to Media, Bella Vista to Chestnut Hill.

We like to see a lot of different types of communities, and it's great to see the different perspectives that our tour guides bring to the various communities that we feature.

- Wilmer Atkinson was the Founder of the "Farm Journal," and he also was the President of the Philadelphia Men's League for Woman Suffrage.

And they were unsuccessful in their campaign first suffrage at the state level, but we appreciate his efforts anyway.

(chuckles) (all laughing) I've been a volunteer tour guide with the Preservation Alliance for three years, and I'm also a part of our Young Friends of the Preservation Alliance Group, and we try to get young people interested and involved in historic-preservation efforts.

And I really love just being able to introduce people to the beauty of Philadelphia.

There's so much that you can learn about Philadelphia's history in its different neighborhoods.

Cast iron is really prevalent in this area.

They were made in sand molds, and they were relatively cheap to manufacture.

So, we'll see that a lot in this area.

But let's walk a little bit, we'll talk about this house on the corner.

(bright music) - [Hanna] Dating back to its founding with William Penn and his layout for the city, it really started us on having a really unique architectural identity.

It is really a walking museum.

- [Allysa] The buildings in this area are protected.

They can't have certain alterations done without the approval of the Historic Commission, and it protects against any demolitions of these buildings.

- [Hanna] We have so much pride in our neighborhoods and our unique community identities.

Having people go to neighborhoods that they might not live in or be familiar with really fosters a deeper engagement and appreciation for what makes our region special.

- I've taken several tours with the Preservation Alliance.

I get the emails because I'm a member.

Susan and I have been wanting to do this Bruce Hill Tour for a long time, 'cause it's a beautiful neighborhood.

- I've been in Philly now five or six years, but I live on the other side of Main Street.

So, coming over here and seeing houses that seem very unusual for what we find in Philadelphia is really interesting.

- This is an example of the Italianate suburban houses.

And a number of alterations were made in the 1900s.

There's an annex on the back, and that's actually part of the Restaurant School at Walnut Hill College.

This one was built in 1897.

The facade is orange, Pompeii, and brick, and that's typical in buildings from around the 1890s.

- [Hanna] We would love to see all of Philadelphians appreciate their city a little bit more, because not a lot of other American cities are full of brick row homes like we are.

We have an incredible amount of historic architecture, and can really just showcase an amazing collection of buildings.

We use our walking tours in our lecture series to kind of uncover these stories that Philadelphians might walk by all the time and just not know the deep history, whether that was the colonial period or in the 1960s.

Being able to showcase all of those layers is really important to us as well.

- Tours by land, now by sea.

We set sail aboard Delaware Cruises to explore the Christina River, which flows into the Delaware River.

(bright upbeat music) - Welcome to Delaware Water Tours.

My name's Tim, I'll be your captain today.

Kate will be my first maid when we're docking and undocking.

And other than that, she's your bartender, she'll be taking care of all your beverage needs.

Right now, we have one here in Wilmington.

We have one in Chesapeake City, one in Northeast Maryland, one in Cat Narrows, and the one down in Ocean City.

We collaborate with the Waterfront Corporation.

With the events that they have going on here, we try to match our cruises with that.

Every boat, you'll have a captain on board and you're gonna have a maid on board.

And the maid's job is to be the DJ and make the best cruise for the people on board.

- Let's get the party started.

(energetic music) - We have our corporate charters, or we have our private charters, which include any event, special event you may have.

And then we have our public sightseeing cruises that we go out talking about the history of the area and how the Swedes landed here in 1638, that type of thing.

The name of this river came from way back in 1638 when this area was settled by the Swedes.

The King of Sweden's daughter's name was Christina.

Coming up on our left-hand side here, this is the location of the original Fort Christina where they landed here in 1638.

There's a monument that's right there.

On top of that monument, is a replica of the tall ship that actually landed here, the Kalmar Nyckel.

Just ahead of us, is a replica of the original ship.

(bright music) What we wanna do, is exceed their expectation.

And that may be just coming out and having a party on the boat.

Or the sightseeing trip, get a little history lesson.

Or just having a boat ride.

The people are great, they're happy to be here, and we have a good time, so it's really a, it's a crime to get paid to do it, it's nice - Walking is a good way to tour historic Philly, but Franklin Mobile's electric cars is a great way to zip around to tour the attraction.

- I started 18 years ago driving a horse and carriage.

And in the meantime, I also became closer with the people and the history, and it's just awesome.

- I've been here for 35 years.

And I like history, I like old stuff, so it was kind of a natural to come and go do tours in the National Park, either by horse, or by bus, on a trolley, and in the electric cars.

- Segueing from a horse carriage and horse to a car, it is more functional for the city.

Obviously, it's faster, I can stop.

Where it's hard to stop with the horse, it's a lot easier.

'Cause with a horse, it's a lot of preparation, a lot of grooming.

The car, wipe it down, wash it, I'm good to go.

We can take five maximum in a car, take 'em to the National park, explain the buildings.

Society Hill, real pretty neighborhood with all the brick homes.

Down to South Street, the Head House Square.

Then I shoot up to Old City and show 'em Betsy Ross' house and Ben Franklin's grave, of course.

(energetic music) - This is our vehicle, it's a GEM car, they are fully electric.

It's kind of like a luxury golf cart that has seat belts, and signals, and lights, and windshield wipers, just like a regular car.

It also has a backup camera, which is great.

Basically goes about 25 miles per hour.

They can run 40 or 50 miles on one charge.

And we do tours of the Nashville Historic Park area, the most historic mile of the city, Society Hill, which is the old residential area, the Old city, which is the oldest part of Philadelphia.

It's very nice, we have like a lot of park land in Philadelphia, so it's very green.

So, we're gonna pass by Independence Hall, and it's two-side buildings.

This is Congress Hall on the corner, which was originally built as a county courthouse in Pennsylvania when this was just the City Capital.

We were also the capital of the United States for about 10 years while Washington DC was under construction.

So, all the buildings served double, or sometimes, triple duty.

The State House, which is in the middle, which we all know by its famous nickname of Independence Hall, is where the Pennsylvania Supreme Court met.

And it's also where the Declaration of Independence, the articles of Confederation, and the Constitution were all signed at within an 11-year period.

On the right is the Second Bank of the United States.

Greek-revival architecture was very popular here in Philadelphia, probably because we have a Greek name.

Philadelphia means city of brotherly love in that language.

We're in Society Hill right now, which is the largest collection of privately-owned colonial homes in the country.

This was all redone for the Bicentennial, as well as the National Park.

Elfreth's Alley, which is coming up on the left, this is the oldest, continuously occupied residential street in the nation.

You can actually book tours either online on the website, or you can walk up and come and get a ride, or you can just stop in the Visitor Center, they also have information there.

I've had folks from Africa, Asia, south America, just all over.

And I want 'em to have a good time in the city.

It's a nice city, it's got beautiful parks, it's got a lot of history.

You know, try and accommodate people.

(car honking) - This next historic Philadelphia tour is for adults who aren't afraid of things that go bump in the night.

- One of the big ghost stories surrounding Washington Square Park is the local legend of Leia the Quaker woman, who knew that gray robbers were coming into this Potter's Field late at night.

She volunteered to patrol it with the intent of dissuading those grave robbers from disturbing the dead that are buried here.

But even after Leia herself died, people said that they still saw her coming in here late at night, walking along the edges of the square.

And they say that Leia is still protecting the dead that are still buried here today.

(intense music) (soft music) - This is probably the most historic space in America.

Philadelphia is home to the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall.

We've got the Declaration, the Constitution, George Washington, Jefferson, all the founding fathers were here.

And I'm a college professor, I teach history.

And I thought, you know, I love this stuff, but I like a little bit of the offbeat kind of history.

- Are you here for the Grim Philly tour?

- Yeah.

- I went to develop one of the coolest unique tours, our Dark Philly Adult Night Tour is unique in that it focuses on a lot of the scandals of the founding fathers.

- Welcome to Grim Philly's Dark Adult Philly Tour.

- [Joe] We do daytime tours, we do nighttime tours, we do a true-crime tour, and then we do family-friendly things in the daytime.

More of what you would expect on a history tour, although we try to interject as much of the cool entertaining stuff as we can there too.

- [Britnee] Over there, in the 1790s, that was a house.

And that house actually served as the President's house while we are the Capital.

It belong to a founding father by the name of Robert Morris.

So, Robert Morris, it's his house, and he is going to let the first two presidents use it while they are serving as president here in Philadelphia.

The glass case over there, if you look down, you'll actually see some of that original foundation that they did uncover.

- Everybody that does our nighttime tour has a Master's Degree in American History, we've got a couple of PhDs that work with us as well.

And I was surprised, more than anything else, that people were into what I put together.

- Carpenters' Hall, and this is gonna be the location of the first bank robbery in US history.

Thomas Cunningham and Isaac Davis are going to steal, what is in today's US dollars, a little over $160,000.

They're gonna get away with it, but Thomas Cunningham, just a couple days later, he's gonna die of yellow fever.

So, Isaac Davis has all the money.

And the police, they're not looking at him, they're looking at Patrick Lyons.

He had just replaced all the locks and keys inside the bank.

And then because there's a yellow-fever outbreak, he's gonna get out of the City of Philadelphia.

But the police track him down, they arrest him, they drag him back to Philadelphia, and they're gonna throw him in jail.

Isaac Davis has all the money, nobody to share it with, and somebody in jail for the crime.

But we also stopped by here because of the ghost story surrounding Carpenters' Hall.

So, Carpenters' Hall is considered by some to be the oldest haunted building here in the Historic District of Philadelphia.

And they say that the ghost that is haunting Carpenter's Hall is that of friend Thomas Cunningham, the bank robber who dies of yellow fever.

They find his corpse up on that top floor.

There are countless stories of people seeing Thomas Cunningham here at Carpenters' Hall.

So, that is your bank robbery ghost story of Carpenters' Hall.

- I would love for people to leave at the end of the tour with an appreciation for American history, because there's a lot of really cool American history.

(bright music) - Throughout the show, I've been standing in front of murals by Mural Arts Philly.

Jane Golden, Founder and Executive Director of Mural Arts is here with me now.

Jane, good to see you again.

- It's great to see you.

- Let's first talk about "Garden of Delight," which is the mural behind us, isn't it beautiful?

It's so pretty.

- I love it.

So, this is by the extraordinary artist and muralist, David Guinn, he actually lives on this street.

And the idea came to him because he would walk by this site all the time.

And he, like everybody else in our orbit, is a wall hunter.

So, he's like great wall alert.

You know, our mural tours go by here, I walk by here often, and it is as beautiful today as it was the day it was painted.

- [Shirley] It really is a collaboration, isn't it?

- It is, it's very big.

And when I tell other cities that we do 130 projects every year, they always say, are you speaking for the state of Pennsylvania?

And I'm like, no, in Philly.

We have over 4,000 works of public art, it's awesome.

We were just named the number one city for public art and murals and street art by "USA Today."

Yay.

And what you see, is almost what I call the autobiography of the City of Philadelphia, 'cause it's work that resonates with people who live there.

It is not work that drops down from the sky.

- Mural arts offers a lot of different tours, how are they grouped?

- We have walking tours, we have seven different routes.

So, that's really exciting, that you can go on a walking tour, it's very intimate.

You talk to people, ask questions.

And then we have trolley tours, and we have different route as well.

It's just a wonderful way, both for visitors to experience our city.

And not just see the center of the city, but to see all the glorious neighborhoods.

And also a way to understand how much artists contribute to Philadelphia.

- This is mural arts, gosh, going into 30 years, is that right?

- Yes.

- Talk about what you think has contributed to this success.

- I think we all have a yearning for beauty in our lives.

That's why we go to museums and galleries and hang art on our wall.

People here feel a co-ownership of the collection.

We're known internationally as the city of murals.

There's just a huge impact on the civic life of Philadelphia as we've turned it into an outdoor museum, but one with real meaning.

- Jane, I love your enthusiasm and your commitment to the arts.

Thank you so much for making time for us, and always great to see you.

- Thank you so much, we always say that art ignites change, and it's 'cause I see it on a daily basis.

Thank you.

- All right, that is our show.

I hope we've inspired you to rediscover this amazing place we call home.

Goodnight, everyone.

(bright upbeat music)