The sign says WELCOME TO SOUTH PARK, but Cartman and Kyle and Kenny and Stan and Mr. Hankey are nowhere in sight.

But Oliver Miller is.

Sort of.

I have been invited to visit the Oliver Miller Homestead, a living museum and "sturdy remnant" that pays homage to those good ol' frontier days when land was dirt cheap and booze was made in your living room.

The homestead is considered an important Allegheny County treasure. Nestled among lush greens and tall trees, this is a place where history stands still and beliefs are suspended -- "We are a mini-Williamsburg" as spokeswoman and docent Paula Bowman likes to say.

The Millers are important, I am told, because their story is the story of survival common to those who settled in Western Pennsylvania. People gathered at the Miller home for religious services, probably as often as they gathered to imbibe the homemade booze made in the huge copper still that now sits in the barn. Paula and Jim Willison, the homestead's president, tell me that the Miller sons got mixed up in the American Revolution and, more importantly, the Whiskey Rebellion, the time back in 1791 when Alexander Hamilton, then the first secretary of the treasury, convinced Congress to impose a tax on alcohol.

As Paula and Jim ramble on about the alcohol-sodden history, I am mulling over the irony that Hamilton is on the $10 bill and the recently imposed Allegheny County drink tax is 10 percent ... and how, right at this very moment, I would pay three times the tax for a really cold lemon-drop martini.

Just as my tour starts, a car pulls up and I hear rumblings that a major politician has come for an unannounced visit. Obama? John? Hillary? Ralph? No, it's U.S. Rep. Tim Murphy. When I remind my hosts I am a newbie and don't know who he is, they look more disappointed than Oliver must have looked when the government took over his property in the name of eminent domain.

The congressman goes that way; Paula and Jim lead me this way, into Mansfield, the homestead's focal point and the stone house that sits where the original Miller log cabin once stood. Built in two sections, it's sparsely decorated with period antiques and period-appropriate furnishings, although Paula admits the two upstairs bedroom bureaus are "too Victorian" and should be replaced. The kitchen is dark and smoky just as it was way back when. Dried herbs and punched-tin lanterns hang from the rafters, the beehive oven is clean and ready to bake pies and bread by docents in period garb when they greet visitors on May 4, the opening of the 2008 season.

As we roam the grounds, I am most intrigued with the springhouse, the site that served as the family's "refrigerator." A stream runs through the stone building; it's here the Millers would store their food and beverages. Jim demonstrates how water would be fetched by putting a wooden yoke around his shoulders and attaching two pails to either end of the ropes.

The forge is a neat place, "the Home Depot of the 18th century" is how Paula's husband, Fred, a volunteer blacksmith, calls it. All the hooks and hinges and do-dads and what-nots on display were on the anvil and in the huge fire pit. I spy a billows the size of Rhode Island and ask about central air. Paula smiles. "Once you get really hot, you can't get any hotter."

The grounds show promise of the beauty to come ... the apple orchard beginning to bud, the period flower garden and herb gardens to be planted.

Time travel is tough. I've been tracing the steps of Oliver and his family for more than an hour and I'm tired. I've had my fill of tales of corn-husk dolls, spinning wheels, sheep shearing, sausage making and apple butter churning.

Even Rep. Murphy -- who, I am reminded over and over, was instrumental in gaining funds for the restoration of the homestead -- has left.

I think of the clock sitting on the mantel in grandma's bedroom, its hands frozen at 4:39. It's Miller time! For me, that means a lemon-drop martini.