USA > Pennsylvania > A history of the Juniata Valley and its people, Volume I > Part 18
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In 1812 Tobias Kreider laid out the town of New Mexico at the mouth of Doe run. John S. Blair opened a tavern there in 1820, after the turnpike was completed, and kept the place for many years. The first store in the village was opened by James Thompson in 1814, and, when the postoffice was established in 1821, he was appointed postmaster. Hugh Knox was the first blacksmith, and in 1836 Charles Thompson built a foundry which continued in operation for about thirty years. The "New" was dropped from the name some years ago and the place is known simply as "Mexico," a station on the Pennsylvania on the oppo- site side of the river bearing the same name. The population of the
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village in 1910 was 184. Other villages in the township are Van Wert, known at first as "Slabtown," in the eastern part, and Vandyke, a small station between Mexico and Thompsontown. About a mile below Mif- flintown, on the river, James Taylor laid out a town about 1789 which was known as Taylorstown and later as Mifflinburgh. The lots were in time returned to agricultural use and the town i only a vague memory.
There are four boroughs in Juniata county: Mifflintown, Mifflin, Port Royal, and Thompsontown. Mifflintown, the county-seat and largest town in the county, is pleasantly situated on the left bank of the Juniata river, forty-nine miles from Harrisburg. The town site was warranted to Alexander Lafferty on September 8, 1755. After several changes in ownership it passed to John Harris in 1774. When the move- ment for the erection of Mifflin county commenced in 1788 a number of citizens, through a committee of three disinterested persons, selected Harris' plantation as the site of the county-seat. Before the question was finally settled Harris, in 1790, laid out a town and named it Mifflin- town, in honor of Governor Thomas Mifflin. The square now occupied by the court-house and jail was set apart by him for the county build- ings, and the fight to have the county-seat located there was kept up for years. Harris died on February 24, 1794, and did not see the reali- zation of his hopes, for Mifflintown did not become a county-seat until after the erection of Juniata county in 1831.
When John Harris bought the land in 1774 there was a log house upon it south of the ravine, "at the intersection of the Cedar Spring road and Water street." Rev. Philip Fithian stopped with Harris the next year and described his house as "elegant, the windows in the parlor each containing twenty-four large lights of glass." This was the first house in Mifflintown, but by whom it was built is not certain. Additions were made to it by Harris and in time it assumed the character described by Fithian. In 1791 the proprietor of the town designated a lot on Main street for a church and cemetery, in which he was the first person to be interred.
A slight impulse was given to the growth of the town by the open- ing of the canal in 1829, and after the erection of Juniata county the village took on new life. The first court-house was built in 1832. On December 19, 1832, a meeting was held to discuss the advisability of incorporating the town. A petition was prepared and signed by nearly
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all present, after which it was sent to the legislature. On March 6, 1833, Governor Wolfe approved the act incorporating the town. An election for borough officers was held a few days later and resulted in the choice of the following: James Frow, chief burgess; David Elder, assistant burgess ; Joseph Cummings, Robert C. Gallagher, Andrew Parker, Amos Gustine, and James Mathers, councilmen ; Samuel Wright, constable. These officers met at the house of Joseph Cummings on March 18, 1833, and were sworn into office.
The first physician in the town was Dr. Ezra Doty, a native of Sharon, Connecticut. Shortly after Mifflintown was founded he made a tour of Pennsylvania and stopped there for the night. One of the citi- zens was suddenly taken ill and the young doctor was called in. His patient recovered and the neighbors persuaded him to locate there.
In 1792 Captain David Davidson located in Mifflintown. He had served in the Continental army during the Revolution. He built a hotel on Water street and named it the "General Greene House," which he kept for several years. This was the first hotel. Some years later the "Yellow House" was opened and conducted as a hotel until destroyed by fire, the daughter and stepdaughter of the proprietor perishing in the flames. The Mansion House, later the National Hotel, was built in 1833. Other hotels came later, but in the spring of 1913, when the court refused to grant licenses for the sale of intoxicating liquors, two of the largest houses closed.
A postoffice was established early in the nineteenth century, and in 1808 Captain Davidson was postmaster. In that year the Juniata Stage Company began running their stages through Mifflintown. The first newspapers, the Juniata Free Press and the Juniata Telegraph, were started in 1832. The first tannery was started by Jacob Wright, who came to Mifflintown from Chambersburg in 1794. Amos Doty, a brother of the doctor, started the second one about 1809. Among the pioneer merchants were Amos Gustine, James Knox, Robert C. Gallag- her, and S. & M. W. Abraham. The first bank was established in 1864.
In August, 1795, in a petition for opening a road, mention is made of a "school house on Main street," which is the first information of such an institution in the town. Rev. Matthew Brown was one of the early teachers, but whether in this house or not is not known. In 1815 a subscription fund was started for the erection of a public school house
JUNIATA RIVER AT MIFFLINTOWN.
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and in May, 1816, the trustees-Rev. John Hutcheson, Benjamin Law, and William Bell-bought a lot on Third street and a stone house was built during that year. On November 4, 1834, a meeting was held in the court-house, composed of delegates from the several townships, which decided to raise $3,500 for the purpose of establishing public schools, pursuant to the law passed at the preceding session of the legis- lature. The Mifflintown Academy was founded and incorporated in 1883.
In 1910 the population of Mifflintown was 954. It has two national banks, a number of well-stocked stores, water-works, electric lighting system, neat residences, several commodious church buildings, and the general atmosphere is one of contentment and prosperity.
Mifflin, directly across the Juniata river from Mifflintown, was until recently called Patterson, under which name it was laid out in 1849. The land where the borough stands was warranted to John McClellan in September, 1755, and the place was known as Mcclellan's ferry for a long time before the town was laid out. A tract of ground was given by the proprietors to the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, which built repair shops there in 1851. This gave the new town an impetus, a force of some seventy-five men being employed in the shops, and Patterson was for a time an active little place. In 1869 most of the machinery in the shops was removed to Altoona and two years later the round- house was demolished, which proved a check upon the prosperity. Fal- lon & Wright built a hotel called the Patterson House and had a con- tract with the railroad company that two trains daily were to stop there long enough for passengers to take meals. The hotel was kept by the Lusk brothers until 1854 and then by William Bell for about four years, after which it became merely a lunch room.
Patterson was incorporated by an act of the legislature, approved March 17, 1853, and by the act of April 18th of the same year John J. Patterson, James North, and Joseph Middaugh were authorized to carry out the provisions of the incorporation act by holding an election for borough officers on the first Tuesday in May. Subsequently it was discovered that the tax on the act of incorporation had not been paid and the act was therefore inoperative and the election void. By the act of April 13, 1854, the election was legalized and the borough became a thing of fact. The writer has been unable to ascertain the results of
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that first election. The first school board was organized on May 23, 1853.
On April 1, 1880, a hook and ladder company was organized and provided itself with truck, ladders, buckets, Babcock fire extinguishers, etc. It was chartered on June 10, 1884, as the "Friendship Hook and Ladder Company," with about fifty members. A house was erected for the use of the company and on it was placed the bell formerly on the old court-house.
James North was the first merchant. He opened his store in May, 1850, with a stock of goods valued at $250. Oles & Frank opened a store in 1853. Twenty-five years later the borough had seven dry-goods stores, a drug store, a hardware store, three hotels, a shoe store, and two coal and lumber yards.
In the census of 1910 the name is still given as Patterson, but about that time the name of the postoffice was changed to Mifflin and the name of the borough was altered to correspond. In that year the population was 885. Mifflin has a bank, several good mercantile houses, hotels, etc., and is the principal railway station between Port Royal and Lewistown.
Port Royal, situated at the mouth of the Tuscarora creek, three miles east of Mifflin, had its beginning more than a century ago. In June, 1792, John Campbell sold to Lawrence King 218 acres of land on Tuscarora creek, a short distance above the mouth. Some time be- tween that and the end of the century King laid out a town which was called "St. Tammany's Town." In April, 1815, Henry Groce laid out a town at the mouth of the creek and named it Perrysville in honor of Commodore Perry, whose fame was at that time being discussed by nearly everybody. In 1833, or about that time, a postoffice was estab- lished at St. Tammany's Town and the name of the office was made "Port Royal." When the railroad was completed Perrysville was on the line of the railway and the business of St. Tammany's Town began to drift to the station. In 1847 the postoffice was removed there, but the name was not changed. In the meantime the town at the mouth of the creek had been incorporated on April 4, 1843, under the name of Perrysville. One name for the borough and another for the postoffice caused confusion, but it was not until 1874 that the name of Perrysville was dropped and the borough took the name of Port Royal. Since that time St. Tammany's Town has been known as "Old Port."
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The first store in Port Royal (or Perrysville) was kept by Benjamin Kepner in a stone house near the river. In April, 1829, the Perrysville Bridge Company was incorporated and the first bridge across the river was built two years later. It was broken down by the weight of a heavy snow-fall in 1839. A second bridge was built in 1842 and it was washed away by a flood in October, 1847. The third bridge was built in 1851. The first school was taught by John Gish in a house that stood on the river bank. On April 5, 1856, the borough was organized as a separate district and in 1870 a two-story brick school house was built.
In 1910 the population of Port Royal was 535. It has a bank, sev- eral good stores, some manufacturing enterprises, churches of various denominations, and a number of neat residences. It is the terminus of the Tuscarora Valley railroad, which runs southwest up the valley through a rich agricultural district and is the means of bringing to the merchants of Port Royal a large country trade.
Thompsontown grew up about the mill erected by John Kepner in 1771. William Thompson bought a part of the tract in 1785 and in 1790 laid out the town. In the same year Michael Holman was licensed to keep a tavern, which was one of the first business enterprises estab- Mathias lished. Mietraer Lichtenthaler came to the village in 1796 and opened a tavern. He also operated two distilleries until his death about 1810. John McGary was the first postmaster, the postoffice being kept in his tavern, and he was also the first justice of the peace. Other early busi- ness concerns were the tannery of James McLin, started about 1794, and the store of William Thompson, which was opened in 1801. In 1809 he put up a fulling mill and two distilleries and in 1812 added a carding machine to the fulling mill. He died about a year later.
Miss Nancy McGary was the first school teacher. In 1833 the Thompsontown Academy was built by subscription and was used as a school house and church for several years. In 1838 the township of Delaware accepted the school law and the Thompsontown school was a part of the township system until the spring of 1868, when it was made an independent district. This was largely due to the fact that Thomp- sontown had been incorporated as a borough on December 4, 1867, with Thomas Patton as the first chief burgess.
Lodges of various fraternal organizations are or have been in exist- ence in Thompsontown. The Odd Fellows' hall was built by a stock
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company, in connection with which the Postoffice Building Association was organized in October, 1865. In 1905 a bank was organized with a capital stock of $10,000. The population of the borough in 1910 was 293.
Besides the four boroughs, the postoffices of the county, with the population of each, are as follows: Academia, 186; Blacklog, 173; Bunkertown, 62; Cocolamus, 220; Doyle's Mills, 48; East Waterford, 340: Evandale, 125; Honey Grove, 279; Kilmer, 26; McAlisterville, 578; McCoysville, 142; Mexico, 184; Nook, 25; Oakland Mills, 121; Oriental, 130; Perulack, 27; Pleasant View, 100; Reed's Gap, 56; Rich- field, 500; Ross Farm, 22; Spruce Hill, 58; Vandyke, 34; Walnut, 150; Wistie, 30. There are two rural delivery routes from East Waterford, one from Honey Grove, two from McAlisterville, one from Mifflin, three from Mifflintown, one from Perulack, two from Port Royal, two from Richfield, one from Spruce Hill, and two from Thompsontown, making a total of seventeen in the county.
CHAPTER X
PERRY COUNTY, ORGANIZATION, ETC.
Perry a Part of Cumberland County-Organic Act of 1820-Boundaries as Fixed by the Law-Commission to Locate the County Seat-Ten Sites in the Contest --- Protests-A New Commission-General Dissatisfaction-Meetings Held-A Third Commission-End of the Contest-Sale of Lots-The First Jail-Court-House and Additions Thereto-A New Jail-The Poor-House-Election Districts-Irreg- ular Outline of the County-Boundaries-Railroads-The Civil List.
P ERRY county embraces the southern part of the Indian purchase of July 6, 1854, and began its separate existence as a political organization under the provisions of the act of the Pennsylvania legislature approved March 22, 1820. Prior to the passage of that act all the territory now included within the limits of Perry county formed a part of the county of Cumberland.
Section I of the act provided that "From and after the first day of September, 1820, all that part of Cumberland county lying north of the Blue mountain, beginning on the summit of the Blue mountain, where the Franklin county line crosses the same, and running thence along the summit thereof an eastwardly course to the river Susquehanna; thence up the west side of the same to the line of Mifflin county; thence along the Mifflin county line to the Juniata river; thence along the summit of the Tuscarora mountains to the Franklin county line; thence along the Franklin county line to the place of beginning, be and the same is hereby declared to be erected into a separate county to be called Perry."
It should be borne in mind that at the time Perry county was thus created the county of Juniata was part of Mifflin, and the Mifflin county line described in the above section is now the southern boundary of Juniata.
Section 9 authorized the governor to appoint, before the first day of September, when the act was to become effective, "three disinter- ested persons, not resident in the county of Cumberland or Perry, whose
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duty it shall be to select a proper and convenient site for a court-house, prison, and county offices, as near the center as circumstances shall admit, having regard to convenience of roads, territory, population, and ac- commodation of the people," etc.
Pursuant to the provisions of this section, Governor Findlay ap- pointed William Beale, Jacob Buchner, and David Maclay, as commis- sioners, and immediately a spirited rivalry started among different locali- ties for the county seat. Ten contestants entered the race, viz: Landis- burg, Cedar Run (then in Toboyne but now in Madison township), Douglas' place near Greenpark, Elliottsburg, Captain William Power's place, Casper Lupfer's farm near the present town of New Bloomfield, George Barnett's place, Reider's Ferry (now Newport), a site on the south side of the Juniata river opposite Millerstown, and Clark's Ferry. Meetings were held in the interests of each of the proposed sites, and in some instances funds were raised by subscription for the purpose of defraying the expense of erecting public buildings. The Landisburg sub- scription list was signed by fifty-eight persons and aggregated $1,610. Helfenstine and Ury, the chief promoters of the Cedar Run site, headed a list signed by thirty-one persons, promising to pay $2,907, and further agreed to raise the amount to $5,000 in the event their site was chosen. Casper Lupfer, in a communication to the commissioners, offered to donate a certain amount of land and to "execute a deed of conveyance to the commissioners of Perry county, or to any person or persons lawfully authorized to receive title for the site for the court-house, prison, and county offices, gratis and without any fee or reward whatever, to be for the only proper use, benefit, and behoof of the county of Perry forever."
After two weeks spent in examining the various proposed sites, the commissioners, on August 17, 1820, announced their selection as the farm of Captain William Power, about two miles west of the present town of New Bloomfield. This action seemed to meet with general dis- approval. On August 26th a public meeting at Landisburg adopted a resolution protesting against the site selected, on the ground that it was "a place having no intersection of roads, no direct intercourse with adjacent counties, destitute of good water, good mills, or even good mill seats."
The contest was now reopened and the fight began in earnest. Dur- ing the fall and early winter a petition to the legislature asking for the
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appointment of another commission was circulated throughout the county and received a large number of signatures. In response to this petition the legislature passed an act on April 2, 1821, directing the appointment of a new commission before May 1, 1821, and provided that the final report of such commission should be in the hands of the governor not later than the first of June. The names of the commis- sioners appointed under this act cannot be ascertained, but it is known that they recommended Reider's Ferry (Newport) as a location for the county seat. As this point is several miles north and east of the center of the county, the choice aroused more dissatisfaction than did that of the first commission. Again the question was brought before the legis- lature and, on March II, 1822, Governor Hiester approved an act in which Moses Rankin, of York county; James Hindman, of Chester county ; Peter Frailey, of Schuylkill county ; David Fullerton, of Frank- lin county, and James Agnew, of the county of Bedford, were named as commissioners, with instructions to select a site for a county seat and report by June 1, 1822.
These commissioners decided in favor of Landisburg, which is about as far from the center of the county as Reider's Ferry, but in the opposite direction. The selection, therefore, did not suit the people of the eastern part of the county. On June 5, 1822, only a few days after the report of the commission was made public, the citizens of the five eastern townships held a meeting at the house of John Koch, in what is now Juniata town- ship, to make formal protest. Frazer Montgomery, William Waugh, and John Harper were chosen as a committee to prepare an address to the people of the county showing why the action of the commissioners should be repudiated. The address was a rather lengthy one, but its burden was that Landisburg was within three miles of the Cumberland county line, and that the selection of such a place for a county seat was unjust to the county at large. No further agitation of the subject oc- curred until October 16, 1822, when a meeting of the citizens of Juniata and Buffalo townships was held at the house of Meredith Darlington for a general consideration of the county seat question. At this meeting a resolution favoring the first location-Captain Power's farm in the Limestone valley-was adopted and a petition was drawn up setting forth the facts that three commissions had been appointed under acts of the legislature; that the last commission had recommended the loca-
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tion of the county seat at Landisburg, and requested that the site chosen by the first commission be made the seat of justice.
The action of this meeting stirred the other portions of the county to activity. On November 16th a meeting was held at Bark Tavern in Rye township, at which it was proposed that the citizens of the several townships each elect two delegates on December 7th, the delegates so selected to meet at the Bark Tavern on the Ioth to decide upon a location for a county seat and then circulate a petition asking the legislature to pass an act fixing the seat of justice upon the site thus selected. No record has been preserved of the meeting of the delegates on December Ioth, but when the legislature assembled shortly afterward Mr. Mitchell. a member of the house of representatives, introduced in that body a number of petitions, signed by some eight hundred citizens of the county, asking that the county seat be established upon the site selected by the first commission. After much discussion the proposition was finally defeated in the house on February 24, 1823, and a few days later the senate began the consideration of a bill authorizing the appointment of a fourth commission. This measure passed both branches of the legis- lature and was approved by the governor on March 31, 1823. Soon after that date Governor Hiester appointed Joseph Huston, of Fayette county ; Dr. Phineas Jenks, of Bucks; Abner Leacock, of Beaver ; Henry Sheets, of Montgomery, and Cromwell Pearce, of Chester, as commis- sioners.
Four of these commissioners met at the house of Meredith Darling- ton on Wednesday, May 28, 1823, Mr. Huston being absent. Owing to inclement weather nothing was done until the following Friday, when the commissioners visited Landisburg, after which they looked at other locations and ultimately decided in favor of George Barnett's farm, in Juniata township, about two miles east of the site selected by the first commission nearly three years before. Their report to this effect was made to the governor and, in January, 1824, was laid before the legisla- ture. Jacob Huggins, then the representative from Perry county, pre- sented several petitions asking for the confirmation of the re- port ; and also petitions from the advocates of Landisburg praying that the county seat might be located at that point. The report of the com- mission was finally confirmed by the legislature and, on April 12, 1824, George Barnett executed a deed conveying to the commissioners of
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Perry county a tract of nearly nine acres of land-the site chosen by the commission in May, 1823. Thus, after a contest of nearly four years, the seat of justice in Perry county was permanently established.
Section 10 of the organic act which authorized the county conimis- sioners to accept the title of the site chosen, also authorized them to "assess, levy, and collect money to build a court-house and prison." Section 16 provided that "all prisoners of Perry county shall be kept in the Cumberland county jail for the term of three years, or until the commissioners of Perry county shall have certified to the court that a jail is erected and approved by the court and grand jury."
To carry out these provisions, so far as they related to the erection of a court-house and jail, the Perry county commissioners-Robert Elliott, Samuel Linn, and John Maxwell-advertised on May 17, 1824, that twenty-five lots on the public ground recently conveyed to the county by George Barnett would be sold at public outcry on Wednesday, June 23d, following. What the results of that auction sale were the writer has been unable to learn, but on July 7, 1824, the commissioners adver- tised for proposals for the erection of a stone jail, the dimensions of which were to be 32 by 50 feet, with walls two and a half feet in thick- ness, two stories in height, with four rooms on the lower floor and six on the upper. The contract for the erection of this jail was awarded to John Rice for $2,400, but when it was completed the following year the total cost was slightly in excess of $2,600. Soon after its completion the few Perry county prisoners were brought from the Cumberland county jail and confined within its walls. On October 1. 1827, John Hipple was awarded a contract to build a stone wall inclosing the jail yard for $950. This wall was completed the following year.
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