From left, Martin Fromm, museum docent Carole Fruehstorfer, Frank Moeller, Yevheniia Niukhtikova, and Johannes Bruns, visitors from Muhlhausen, Germany — sister city of Saxonburg and birthplace of John Roebling — tour the Maridon Museum in Butler in 2015.

SAXONBURG — With two anniversaries to celebrate this weekend, Saxonburg will once again welcome some distinguished visitors from the German city of Muhlhausen to Butler County.

This weekend the borough is celebrating two anniversaries tied to its history: the 185th anniversary of its founding and the 175th anniversary of co-founder John Roebling receiving a patent for wire rope.

“It's going to be a really exciting time for the town,” said Mayor Bill Gillespie of the festivities, which will begin Saturday with a morning parade that has a historical theme.

That afternoon the borough will host a street party that includes German music groups and vendors. The Saxonburg Museum will also be open, to allow visitors to tour artifacts and replicas that commemorate important moments and happenings in Saxonburg's history.

Saturday also will feature a reception and dinner at Cooper Hall where Clifford Zink, a Roebling historian, will speak about the co-founder's life.

But Saxonburg's fete will have more than just German history and culture on display.

It will have real Germans in the borough as well, as officials from Muhlhausen fly in for their third official visit to what is their official twin city.

Frank Moeller, the commissioner who oversees the sister cities program for Muhlhausen, has twice before been part of the delegations sent to Saxonburg from Germany. He called this year's trip a special occasion for him, and something he was eagerly anticipating.

Moeller called the agreement between Saxonburg and Muhlhausen — which is based on cooperation and the sharing of information and ideas — more than just an official arrangement.

“What we met there was and is more than an official twinning,” said Moeller. “It is every time like coming home to the family.”

This is not the first time visitors from Muhlhausen have set foot in Saxonburg. In 2007 the borough joined Sister Cities International, a nonprofit designed to create partnerships between U.S. and international cities.A year later, in 2008, the borough sent a letter to Muhlhausen — which is the birthplace of Saxonburg founder John Roebling — asking if it would officially become the borough's sister city. Muhlhausen is located in central Germany and has a population of about 33,000 people.That same year Saxonburg sent a contingent of officials to visit Muhlhausen, and in 2009 the city reciprocated, sending a group of officials to visit the borough. Since then other official trips from both sides have taken place.The last time officials from Muhlhausen visited Saxonburg was in 2015, when a group of four visitors — Yevheniia Niukhtikova, Frank Moeller, Martin Fromm and Johannes Bruns — spent four days in Butler County touring places like Cabot, Butler, Mars, Zelienople and Cranberry Township. The visit, which culminated in Saxonburg officials presenting their German guests with a key to the city, coincided with Saxonburg's annual Toast to Tourism and featured a speech by Muhlhausen Lord Mayor Johannes Bruns.

Alicia Hartle portrays Laura Roebling, daughter of Saxonburg founder John Roebling, while talking with Frank Moeller, of Saxonburg's sister city Muhlhausen, Germany, during the “Main Street Mingle” in Saxonburg in 2015.