USA > Pennsylvania > Blair County > Biographical and portrait cyclopedia of Blair County, Pennsylvania > Part 12
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The population of Woodbury township, by each United States census since 1850, has been as follows :
U. S. Census.
Population. White.
Colored.
1850
1450
1448
2
1860
1279
1279
0
1870
2107
2091 16
1880
894
... ..
..... ..
Cities and Boroughs .- Blair county con- tains one city - Altoona - and nine bor- oughs, which were laid out and organized in the years given :
Borough. Laid Out.
Organized.
Hollidaysburg
1790
1836
Altoona ( city ).
1849
1868
David Boyer.
Capt. Wm. Phillips.
Benjamin Beal. Wm. Phillips, jr.
David Coughenour.
Benjamin Tudor.
East Hollidaysburg ...
before 1890
Newry
1794 1876
-Frankstown was organized as a borough in 1832, but never elected any borough
1890
2112
121
OF BLAIR COUNTY.
officers after the year of its incorporation, and Williamsburg was incorporated as a borough in 1827, but in 1841 let its muni- cipal organization die and has figured since then as a village, although having over 900 of a population.
Hollidaysburg .- On the left bank of the Beaver Dam branch of the beautiful Juni- ata, is situated the borough of Hollidays- burg, founded by the pioneer and daring frontiersmen, Adam and William Holliday, and for fifty years the metropolis and great business center, of what is now Blair county, of which it has been the seat of justice since the county's formation. Geograph- ically, it is located in the northern part of Blair township, and is somewhat south of the center of the county.
Adam and William Holliday were broth- ers, and natives of the north of Ireland, from which they came, in 1750, to settle in Lancaster county, which they soon left on account of the bitter feuds existing between the German and Irish settlers of that connty, to seek a home in the Conochea- gue region. They remained there until 1768, and during that time served in the French and Indian war, and were with Armstrong in his march to Kittanning. Being frontiersmen and pioneers, they re- solved, in 1768, to push further westward, and on their way to cross the Alleghenies stopped at the site of Hollidaysburg, where Adam was so favorably impressed with the country that he decided to settle there. IIe also prevailed upon his brother, William, to remain, and while Adam built his cabin on the site of the town which grew up and bears his name, William crossed the river, and became the first settler on land that is now included in the borough limits of Gays- port.
It is a matter of dispute as to where Adam Holliday's cabin stood. Jones says that it was near the present "Ameri- can House," while II. II. Snyder claims that it stood on the southwest corner of Allegheny and Montgomery streets. Adam Holliday took up one thousand acres of land, but there was some flaw in his title, which Henry Gordon, a shrewd Scotchman, detected, and by course of law then won the land. " Gordon went to Europe when the revolutionary war commenced, and was afterward attainted as a traitor by the coun- cil of Pennsylvania, who confiscated his land, which was bought by Adam Holliday at a nominal price, as no one would bid against him, in view that Gordon had wronged him out of it. After the war Gordon came back, and, proving that he had never taken up arms against the col- onies, Congress agreed to purchase back his lands. "Thereupon, the commission- ers to adjust claims, after examining the lands, reported them worth sixteen dollars an acre, and this amount was paid to Adam Holliday, who suddenly found himself the greatest moneyed man in this region, having in his possession sixteen or seventeen thous- and dollars."
There is dispute as to what year Holli- daysburg was laid out. Africa's county history places the date at 1790, while H. H. Snyder claims that it was plotted as early as 1780. The original lots and their own- ers were as follows :
No. Owner.
1. Peter MeLaughlin.
2. James Reynolds.
3. Sarah Holliday.
4. Lazarus B. McLain.
5. Peter Wort.
6. William Clark.
-
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BIOGRAPHY AND HISTORY
7. William Henry.
8. Isaac Whetsel. 9. John Irwin.
10. Rev. D. Bard.
11. James Sommerville.
12. Martin Thompson.
13. Joseph Galbraith. 14. James McMurtrie, jr.
15. Alexander Holliday.
16. Samuel Galbraith.
17. Thomas Whittiker.
18. MeMurtrie & Provines.
19. Robert Lawrence.
20. McMurtrie & Provines.
21 Joseph Patton.
22. McMurtrie & Co.
23. John Barber.
24. Adam Holliday.
25. John Holliday.
26. Alexander Young.
27. William Anderson. 28. James Morton.
29. Samuel Davis. 30. James Curry.
31. James Kerr & Lowry. 32. John Blair.
33. John Marshall.
34. Benjamin Elliottt.
35. John Cadwallader.
36. Thomas Blair. 37. Daniel Rothrock. 38 Samuel Holliday. 39. John Waggoner. 10. Adam Holliday.
41. John Parks.
42. Peter Titus. 48. John Titus.
44 Thomas Provines.
45 John Parks.
46. Andrew Henderson.
47. Adam Holliday. 48. John Reynolds.
49. Adam Mahood.
50. Maj. John Holliday. 51. John Holliday, jr. 52. Robert Galbraith. 53. Benjamin Bears.
54. Samuel Marshall. 55. John Marshall.
56. Thomas Stewart. 57. Joseph Moore.
58. Robert Allison.
59. Andrew Divinny.
60. D. G. Wilson. 61. John Holliday.
62. Samuel Holliday.
63. John Thompson.
64. John Brown.
65. Sebastian Bouslough.
66. Richard Smith, Esq.
67. Lazarus Lowry.
68. Rev. D. Bard.
69. William Moore.
70. Andrew Henderson.
71. John Cadwallader.
72. Philip Christian.
73. William McConnell.
74. James Kerr.
75. McMurtrie & Provines.
76. Samuel Kerr.
77. Lazarus Lowry.
78. Samuel Davis.
79. Robert Galbraith.
80. Jean Holliday. .
81. William Divinny.
82. William Campbell.
83. William Reynolds, jr.
84. Swank and R. Provines.
85. Maxwell McDowell. 86. William Holliday. 87. William Reynolds. 88. Samuel Holliday. 89. Peter MeLaughlin. 90. John Holliday.
123
OF BLAIR COUNTY.
Hollidaysburg seems to have grown but very slowly from 1790 to 1814. John Adams' tavern was a favorite resort as early as 1800. In 1814 the town contained eight buildings : John Adams' and John Hollidays' taverns, John Agnew's house, a store, smith shop, and the log dwelling of Christian Garber, and the first house of the town, which was built by Adam Holliday. The completion of the turnpike, in 1818, helped the growth and prosperity of the village, and by 1829 there were over twenty resi- dent families. The building of the canal caused the village to grow into a town, and its establishment as the county seat, in 1846, added to its prosperity. The building of the Pennsylvania railroad, in 1852, gave it a check, from which it did not recover until the Hollidaysburg branch of the Pennsyl- vania railroad was completed.
.
The population of Hollidaysburg since 1850 has been as follows :
U. S. Census.
Population.
White.
Colored.
1850
2430
2289
141
1860 2469. 2354 115
1870
2952
2815 137
1880
3150
1890 2975
"On the morning of the 19th of June, 1838, the town was visited by a terrible storm and flood. The rain began to fall about midnight, and continued, in unceasing torrents, until about six o'clock in the morn- ing. The waters descended furiously in every direction from the high grounds, in innense columns, until all that portion of Gaysport lying between the railroad and the river was covered with a wild and al- most irresistible flood. The Juniata had risen about fourteen feet above its ordinary level. The water in the dwellings near the river had risen as high as from four to five
feet. This terrible flood did much damage to the canal between Hollidaysburg and Huntingdon, amounting to about one mil- lion dollars." The town was visited by a second terrible freshet. October 7, 1847, when, by three o'clock, the water was over the banks of the river and nearly four feet deep in the buildings nearest the stream in Gaysport. Serious damage was done to the canal, and the farmers along the river lost heavily.
Hollidaysburg was organized as a bor- ough in August, 1836, and on September 13th of that year, its first borough officers were elected. They were : Dr. James Coffey, burgess; and Joseph Reed, John Walker, William McFarland, D. Mitchell, and S. F. Henry, councilmen ; and Simon Brotherline, constable.
The first postmaster was William IIolli- day, who served as early as 1779, and the first canal boat that came to town was the John Blair, that made its first appearance in 1833.
The Washington Greys, organized Oc- tober 5, 1839, was the first military organ- ization of Hollidaysburg. They were suc- ceeded by the Hollidaysburg Fencibles in 1856, and the Juniata Rifles, which were organized October 22, 1858. The Fencibles became Co. A of the 3d Pennsylvania in- fantry during the late war, and the Juniata Rifles was Co. H of the 2d Pennsylvania infantry, which served in the Army of the Potomac. Under the old militia system of the State, two weekly encampments were made at Hollidaysburg; the first one of six companies, commencing October 18, 1841; and the second, of seventeen companies, commencing October 11, 1843.
The reservoir was built in 1840 by Henry L. Patterson, the old market house was
124
BIOGRAPHY AND HISTORY
erected in 1841, and the Hollidaysburg Gas and Water Company was incorporated in 1854, but the town was not lighted by gas until 1856, and the company did not succeed in their efforts to erect water works.
The Hollidaysburg water works were built by the borough authorities, in 1866 and 1867, at a cost of nearly $50,000. The water is brought in pipes of wood wrapped with iron, from a beautiful spring of free- stone water on the Brush mountain farm of Hon. Thaddeus Banks, a distance of two and three-fourths miles from the borough limits. The first reservoir was soon found to be too small, and the present one, with a capacity of two and one-half million gal- lons, was then erected at a cost of $15,000. It is from sixty to one hundred and twenty feet in elevation above all points in the borough.
In February, 1837, the borough purchased for $225 a fire engine which proved to be of little value, and in 1841 the Diamond En- gine company was formed as the successor of an attempted company in 1838. During 1841 and 1842 the borough purchased, for $1,900, two good fire engines, called re- spectively the Juniata and the Allegheny ; and in 1871 bought the steamer Phoenix, at a cost of $2,500. The present fire con- panies are the Phoenix, Allegheny Hook and Ladder, and the Good Will Hose. On April 14, 1880, an incendiary fire originated in an unoccupied barn on Wayne, between Allegheny and Mulberry streets, and before it was extinguished destroyed property to the value of twenty thousand dollars, upon which there was insurance to the amount of ten thousand dollars.
Among the more prominent events in . the history of Hollidaysburg may be men- tioned the railroad war at the tunnel in
1851, among the Irish laborers employed there, which was suppressed without loss of life by the Hollidaysburg Guards; and the visit of the distinguished Hungarian pa- triot, Louis Kossuth, in 1852.
The iron manufacturing industries of Hollidaysburg were inaugurated in 1855, when James Denison and others, under the firm name of Watson, White & Co., built Hollidaysburg furnace, No. 1, in Gaysport, at a cost of $60,000. In the same year Gardner, Osterloh & Co. built Chimney Rock, now Hollidaysburg furnace, No. 2. About 1863 both of these furnaces became the property of the Cambria Iron Company. The IIol- lidaysburg Juniata Rolling mill was built at a cost of one half million dollars, and in 1879 was leased by the Blair Iron and Coal Company, and the Hollidaysburg Iron Nail Company rolling mill was built in 1860 by B. M. and Robert B. Johnson, and John L. Hemphill and Hugh McNeal.
The educational facilities of Hollidays- burg are good. It possesses an efficient sys- tem of public schools, while the Hollidays- burg Female seminary, which was erected in 1869, at a cost of $75,000, is recognized as one of the leading institutions in the State for the education of women.
The present fine court house at Hollidays- burg is described by its architect, David S. Gendell, as follows:
" The building is in the modern Gothic style of architecture, with the Italian treat- ment. This style, while it is directly founded upon mediaval Gothic, omits many of the details of the latter, or adapts them to modern requirements. The exterior walls of the building are of stone. The facing is of cut stone (the greater portion of which is from the Massillon quarries). The color of the main body of the work is
PHOTO BY BONINE.
BLAIR COUNTY COURT HOUSE.
125
OF BLAIR COUNTY.
a warm, rich, sunny buff, while the alternate arch stones, with the hood mouldings over the arches, the string-courses, cornices, and many of the other ornamental portions of the work are of a beautiful deep peach- bloom color. The two colors present a sufficiently strong, and yet a very agreeable contrast. While the different points are thus sufficiently emphasized, the effect of the whole is exceedingly harmonious and pleasing, and free from that "patch-work" appearance which is the bane of much modern architecture where stones of two or more colors are employed. Inside the ex- terior stone walls are four and one-half inch brick walls, erected separately from the stone-work, to which they are tied with wrought-iron anchors. There is an air space of one and one-half inches between the stone walls and the brick lining. Thus, freedom from dampness is secured. The plan of the structure bears some resemblance to the letter T. In width it is seventy feet on the front, eighty-three and one-half feet on the rear, and fifty-five and one-half feet across the narrow part. Its total depth is one hundred and thirty-two and one-half fest. The front portion of the building is two stories in height, surmounted with a high slated roof. The rear part is three stories high, the upper story being con- tained within a mansard roof, having orna- mental gabled stone dormers. The build- ing is surmounted by two front and one main tower. The ventilating shaft is six and a half feet square, eighty feet high, and gives perfect ventilation to the whole building. The various county offices, court and jury rooms are in perfect keeping with the other beautiful and perfect architectural designs of this model structure."
Hollidaysburg is a pretty and healthful
town, with well shaded streets, and would make a very desirable summer resort.
Altoona .- Napoleon's daring march across the Alps has been preserved in history ; but the name of the engineer who located and built his wonderful road across those snow and ice-covered mountains is not known. Altoona, the Metropolis of the Alleghenies, came into existence as the terminal of the low grade of the Pennsylvania railroad in the Juniata valley, which fact has been pre- served in the history of Blair county; but the name of the engineer who located the spot for the low grade terminal, and the site of the city, is not known.
Altoona is situated in 40° and 32' north latitude; and 78° and 24' west longitude from Greenwich, England. The altitude of Altoona is 1208 feet above sea level. It is 236 miles from Philadelphia, 136 miles from Pittsburg, 164 miles from Buffalo, 125 miles from Wheeling, and 136 miles from Wash- ington city. It contains the largest car and machine shops in the world, and is one of the most important railroad centers in North America.
" Altoona, well named the 'Mountain City,' is situated at the eastern base of the Allegheny mountains. Its name is not de- rived from the Latin word, altus, nor from the French word, alto, as has frequently been asserted and published, but from the beautiful liquid and expressive Cherokee word, ' Allatoona.' This is on the author- ity of the person who bestowed the name, Mr. Wright, of Philadelphia, who was long a resident of the Cherokee country, in Georgia, and an admirer of the musical names of that Indian language. ' Alla- toona,' literally the 'high lands of great worth.' Upon the christening, Mr. Kneass suggested that the name was too long, and
126
BIOGRAPHY AND HISTORY
it was shortened ( by omitting the second syllable ) to Altoona. It has a very roman- tic and un-city-like location upon the hill- side, and is surrounded on all sides by some of the finest mountain scenery on the American continent. Within a radius of a few miles are Bell's Gap, Sinking Spring valley, with its subterranean streams and immense caverns, the Roaring Springs, Al- legrippus, the famous Horse-Shoe Bend, and Cresson Springs beyond. The whole vicinage is popular as a place of resort for tourists during the summer months. The view from the top of Gospel Hill is a very finie one, and is thus described by a recent writer : ' We then climbed to the top of Gospel Itill, and got a glorious view for miles away. Here, standing on the Allegheny mountain side, we saw the city spread out at our feet, its houses scattered over a long, narrow strip of ground on the sloping sides of the valley, with the railroad and its shops and great buildings spread along the center. Far away to the southward, in the Inekground, with the dark green ridge, known as Brush mountain, with the notch in it called the Kettle, through which could be seen the grayer, the more distant moun- tamis behind. Turning to the northward, was seen the distant slope of the Allegheny mountains, rising higher than any of the others, as they spread out, a series of flat- topped mountains, far away to the south- west, with the sun setting in the clouds be- hind. Such is Altoona; and the distant beil and whistle, and the long lines of smoke far down in the valley tell the story of the railway that has brought this busy city out of the wilderness.'"
One hundred and twenty-two acres of ground are occupied for business purposes by the Pennsylvania Railroad Company.
Its buildings are substantially constructed, on the most approved plans, and the tools and machinery used in them are the best that can be procured. As a consequence, the work is of the highest standard, and at the minimum cost. "It is a fact universally conceded that this company is the leader of the van of progress. Every month, every year it institutes the most exact scientific researches, tests, experiments, and observa- tions, governed by the sole idea of obtain- ing railroad perfection; and the benefit of each year's chrystallized experience forms the basis of the operations, constantly pro- gressive, of the following twelve months. A corps of scientists, regularly in the em- ploy of the company, devotes its entire time, intelligence, acumen, and energy in determining what is best in everything, and the result is not only to furnish the road with what is wanted, but to gradually raise and purify the products of manu- facturers of railroad supplies."
This company has the most perfect sys- tem of running trains in the world, and the immense business of its road is transacted with precision and regularity. Trains at every hour of the day and night arrive and depart from Altoona, but under the super- vision of William C. Snyder, the present train master, and one of the most efficient railway men in the State, perfect system prevails, and passengers and freight are speedily handled without confusion or mis- take.
William Clark describes the shops of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company as follows : "In them are manufactured, or repaired every year, thousands of the best freight, and finest passenger cars in the world, and hundreds of the largest and most powerful as well as most perfect locomotive engines.
197
OF BLAIR COUNTY.
The machine or upper shops as they are usually called to distinguish them from the car shops or lower shops, are presided over directly by master mechanic G. W. Strattan. They are located in the triangular plot of ground bounded by Ninth and Tenth ave- nues and Ninth street and Sixteenth street, the greater part of them being close to Twelfth street and between it and Six- teenth. These shops consist of three round houses, two erecting shops, two wheel foun- dries, a soft iron foundry, brass foundry, blacksmith shop, cab and tender shop, tin and sheet-iron shop, boiler shop, flue shop, a two-story lathe shop, a vise shop, wheel shop, telegraph shop, and air brake shop, a large storehouse, and office buildings. They have a floor surface of about twelve acres, and occupy thirty - one acres of ground. Three thousand men are employed, and the monthly pay roll is nearly two hundred thousand dollars. A new engine costs about nine thousand to construct. The car or lower shops, of which John P. Levan is general foreman, are located along Chestnut avenue from below city limits to Seventh street, and occupy the space between Chest- nut avenue and the tracks of the main line P. R. R., on the line of Ninth avenue. They include a large round house which covers over three acres of ground, including the circle of four hundred feet diameter, which it encloses, which is not under roof, and in which is a one hundred foot turn-table, run by steam power, on which two of the largest freight cars and an engine can be turned with ease. There are also two large plan- ing mills, a blacksmith shop, plumber's shop, upholsterer's shop, hair picking room, two paint shops, machine shop, truck shop (build- ing iron car trucks ), a cabinet shop in which the finest car furniture, etc., is made, a pas-
senger car shop, freight car shop-which occupies the round-house principally -and a very extensive lumber yard, in which is piled all the time from 10,000,000 to 30,000,- 000 feet of the best lumber, of nearly all kinds, besides square timber-60 to 100 men being constantly employed handling lumber. Nearly 2,000 men are employed at the car shops.
" East of the car shops are the Juniata Locomotive- Works recently completed, the shops and buildings of which occupy a tract of over 50 acres of ground, and are said to be the most extensive of their kind in the world. They employ about 1,000 men now but the number is to be largely increased, and they will soon be able to build many hundred locomotive engines yearly. They are the property of the Pennsylvania Rail- road Company, and their continued opera- tion will doubtless add 10,000 to Altoona's. population in a few years."
Of the other manufacturing industries of the city, are the Altoona iron and manu- facturing companies.
The Altoona Iron Company, of which James Gardner is president; H. K. Mc- Cauley, secretary ; T. S. Gardner, treasurer and correspondent; and Robert Smiley, mill manager, has a large rolling mill just south of the city limits, on the Hollidays- burg branch of the Pennsylvania railroad, Allegheny station, where all kinds of mer- chant bar iron is manufactured. The cap- ital stock of the company is one hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and the plant is valued at one hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars. 135 to 150 men are em- ployed here.
The Altoona Manufacturing Company (formerly "Car Works"), are located on Broad and Twenty -sixth streets, at the
198
BIOGRAPHY AND HISTORY
southern limit of the city. They were first built in 1868, were burned down May 23, 1879, but at once re-built, and the company is now in a very flourishing condition. They employ about one hundred and fifty nien. They have no connection with the Pennsylvania railroad, except by their own tracks, and while they have the facilities for building cars and do make some freight cars, and repair cars for several coal com- panies, their principal business is that of a machine shop, the manufacture of castings, engines, and improved machinery, hoisting engines, etc., having every facility for the purpose. The officers of the company are : M. A. Green, president; Wm. B. Wigton, secretary, and John Lloyd, treasurer.
Altoona was laid out in 1849, by Archibald Wright, of Philadelphia, was organized as a borough February 6, 1854, and incorpor- ated as a city in February, 1868.
There is a romantic story about Mr. Wright sending a Mr. Cadwalader to purchase the David Robison farm for the town site, and that Mr. Cadwalader dropped his letter of instructions, directing him to pay $10,000 rather than fail to get the farm, which letter Mrs. Robison was said to have found, and as a result, Mr. Robison asked and received $10,000 for the farm which he had intended to have parted with for $6,000.
After the Robison farm had been laid out in lots, the adjoining farms of Andrew Green and John Loudon were laid out by their owners into town lots, and Green's addition, on the east, was named Greens- burg, while Loudon's was called Loudons- burg. Several additions since then have been made, and the growth of Altoona from a hamlet to an important city, has been rapid, steady, and substantial. The streets, with one exception, originally bore
feminine names-given in honor of the sweethearts of the members of the engineer corps that located the railroad. The first building on the site of the town was the old Robison farm house, and the next one was a small frame, near the railroad, used as an engineer's office, for Strickland, Kneass and others. In 1851 there were less than a dozen buildings in the place, and among them were the Union church and school building, Adlum & Irvin's and Figarts' stores, Kneass' office, Dr. Thomas' residence, a tavern, and a brick building, in course of erection, on Virginia street (Eleventh avenue ), for railroad offices.
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