In the 1870's, Franklin H. Gruber began building wagons and repairing agricultural implements at a small shop on his farm. As demand increased, he relocated and expanded by building a new structure along Licking Creek near Mt. Pleasant (Obold), PA. Erected in 1882 in Penn Township's Pleasant Valley, about 5 miles north of its present location, the Gruber Wagon Works developed from a single craftsman using wheelwrights' long-established tools and techniques into a family-operated business employing mass production methods. Four of Franklin's sons, John, Adam, Jacob, and George, entered the business and each specialized in a particular process. The shop manufactured farm wagons, hay flats, wheelbarrows, work sleighs, wooden truck bodies, and specialty wagons to customers' specifications. Frank P. Gruber took control in 1935 and operated the shop until 1972. On June 2, 1972, it was placed on the National Register of Historic Places. In late autumn and winter of 1976, the building was carefully separated into 4 major sections and moved 5 miles from its original location to the Berks County Heritage Center, although the largest section measured 71 feet long, 26 feet wide, 40 feet high, and weighed 86 tons. On December 22, 1977, the Secretary of the Interior declared it a National Historic Landmark. With over 19,000 tools and wagons in the collection, it survives as one of the few examples of rural wagon manufacturing in the United States.