USA > Pennsylvania > Clearfield County > History of Clearfield County, Pennsylvania : with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of its prominent men and pioneers > Part 74
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The boundary lines of the new township. as reported by the commission- ers, were as follows : On the east Moshannon Creek; on the south the Hunt- ingdon county line (now Cambria county); on the west Muddy Run to its con- fluence with Clearfield Creek, thence along that creek to line of (now) Boggs township; on the north Boggs township, thence along line of warrants to John Vrought, Casper Haines, Thomas Wharton, William Sheaff, Benjamin Johnson, William Holliday, Henry Shafner, Hugh Rallston, John Cannon, Mary Sandwich, E. Hoolman, George Whitehead, H. Fannon, and Joseph For- rest ; on the north and east to the place of beginning.
The major portion of the lands in this township were owned by Hardman Philips, and were settled upon by the same class of people who settled Decatur township, and who bought their lands from Mr. Philips.
This gentleman sold his lands to these pioneers on credit, and as they were very poor he never expected to get very much out of them in payment, but would take a sack of meal, a bushel of potatoes, or oats, or wheat, or anything they could spare in settlement of what they owed him. Or, if they could not pay anything, it was all the same. On his return to England he placed his accounts in the hands of Josiah W. Smith, esq., of Clearfield, who was as lenient as the owner.
One of the oldest settlers in this township was Henry Cross, an Irishman, who settled on a farm now in sight of Beulah Church, in 1818. The farm is now owned by John M. Jordan.
Another old settler was the father of Mathew McCully, who settled near Mr. Cross, in 1827, on a piece of land now immediately in front of Beulah Church, and now owned by T. C. Heims. Mr. McCully lives at present in Osceola Mills, and he loves to chat of his pioneer days. He was but two years old when his father carried him to that farm, or rather that spot in the forest, and he has spent a long and happy life in the wilds of Clearfield county-
Robert Stewart moved into the Wheatland Settlement in 1829, having come from Chester county. He died during the year 1886, aged nearly one hundred and five years.
führen Chase
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WOODWARD TOWNSHIP.
In 1837 Hugh Henderson moved from Philipsburg to a piece of land he had purchased from James Allport, one hundred and forty-seven acres, near what is now called the Sanborn Settlement. Mr. Henderson had emigrated ten years before from the parish of Donahachie, County Tyrone, Ireland. He was the father of six children - five boys and one girl - Thomas, Robert, William, Samuel, James, and Margaret. Thomas, William, and Margaret still live on the old homestead ; Robert lives in the Nittany Valley, James, on Buf- falo Run, Centre county, and Samuel at Fostoria, Blair county.
The boys of this family, being hard workers, soon acquired sufficient means to purchase additional lands, and marrying, they branched out for themselves, buying lands near the parent farm, and thus helping to clear this township. As proved afterwards, all the lands in this and Decatur township were under- laid with coal, though these old settlers never dreamt of such a thing, or at least if they knew it, did not suppose it would be of any value to them. Coal was opened and worked for smithing, and local consumption as early as 1804, on the Hawkins place, near Philipsburg, but was not accounted of much value to its owner.
The farm bought by Samuel Henderson at the head of Goss Run, was sold in 1873 to John Whitehead, and the celebrated Ocean colliery was opened upon it.
James Hegarty was another pioneer of this township, emigrating with his father from Ireland when eleven years old, in 1808, and settling on lands now known as the "X Roads " farm, in 1820. This farm comprised one hun- dred and thirty acres. He afterwards purchased three hundred acres in what is now known as Geulich township. Mr. Hegarty died on the 3Ist of May, 1846, leaving a family of four children.
Rev. John M. Chase is another old settler, having early cleared a farm on Clearfield Creek, in Happy Valley. Mr. Chase is a minister of the Baptist Church, having been ordained a pastor of the church near his place in 1871. He owns large tracts of lands in different parts of the county.
Christian Shoff, now living in Osceola Mills, may be called another old set- tler of this township. Mr. Shoff's grandfather settled near the village of Pu- seyville, at the lower ford, near the present bridge, very early. The exact date has been lost. That his father, Samuel Shoff, settled near Glen Hope in 18II, is known, and Christian was born there in 1830. When five years old his father moved to Wheatland, now called Amesville. This, then, may be called the first settlement of the hamlet of Amesville. Shoff, the father, moved in company with Benjamin Wright, Billy Myrtle, Abraham Kady, Robert Haggerty, and John Whiteside, the descendants of whom still inhabit the farms in and around this place.
The Alexander family are later additions to the township, but still can be styled old settlers.
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HISTORY OF CLEARFIELD COUNTY.
Lumbering occupied the time of these old pioneers as much as farming. The township being covered with a most magnificent pine and hemlock forest, they, in winter, felled the pine trees, squared them, rafted the timber, and ran it to market by way of Clearfield Creek and the Susquehanna River. Wages for hewers in those days was sixty-two and one-half cents per day of twelve hours.
Logging, or cutting the trees into logs different lengths, was not commenced for some time after the lumbering, or the making of square timber, and when the first logs were placed in the creek to be run out on the first flood, the an- ger of the lumbermen was so raised against the loggers that a number of them proceeded to chop the logs to pieces, while others drove nails and spikes into the logs so that they could not be sawed. A lawsuit was the result, which was gained by the loggers, and thereafter logs and rafts had equal rights to the water. William R. Dickinson was the first man to run logs, and his logs were the ones destroyed.
In 1847 a very heavy flood occurred in the waters leading from the coun- ty, the river being ten feet higher than has been known since. In 1865 an- other flood occurred, but not so disastrous as the preceding one.
Mills for the manufacturing of lumber were built as early as the forties, but it was not until 1854 that the first mill was built in the township. This was Houtz, Reed & Co.'s mill at Houtzville (now Brisbin). Another mill was built above Houtzdale, about a mile, by Dull & Kessler, in 1867. The lum- ber from these two mills was hauled by tram-road to Moshannon mines in 1868, and shipped by rail.
The Reeds built another mill in what is now Houtzdale in 1869, and from that date on numerous mills were built, notably Heim's mill, in 1871, situated two miles west of Osceola Mills; Kephart & Bailey's " bill mill," in 1873, one mile west of the same place. Isaac Taylor also built a mill on Coal Run in 1869, and S. S. Kephart has a mill there yet. Jesse Diggins built a mill on Goss Run, a little below Houtz, Reed & Co.'s mill, in 1873, and a man named McOmber had a portable mill at the head of Goss Run as early as 1868, while J. A. G. White built the first shingle-mill near Osceola Mills in 1867.
Thomas Henderson also built a mill near his farm in 1877, and a Mr. Al- port one at the head of Coal Run the same year. McCaulley & Ramey built a mill at Stirling in 1870, and another one at a point now called Ramey in 1874. The timber of this region was so fine that sticks 'squared one foot, and seven- ty-six feet long, were furnished for the Centennial buildings, and seventy-two feet long for the insane asylum at Norristown.
Beyer & Kirk built a mill near Morgan Run in 1882, and another near Madera in 1885. Messrs. Fryberger & Fee had a shingle-mill.in operation near Houtzdale in 1881, and Walker Brothers one on Morgan Run, and William Luther one at Madera, while Frederick Ramey had another at Osceola Mills.
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WOODWARD TOWNSHIP.
There was another saw-mill one mile south of Osceola Mills, and another three miles west of the same place, and though these last two were in Centre county, just over the line, yet they helped to clear the forests of this side of the county line.
Mr. Mays and John Hamerly built a planing-mill one mile west of Houtz- dale in 1874. This mill was afterwards sold to Samuel T. Henderson, and by him to Giles Walker in 1885, but Mr. Walker re-sold the mill to Henderson in 1886, by whom it is now operated.
The shipment of lumber from this region from 1867 to 1884 was 1,082,- 742 tons, averaging two tons per thousand feet, aggregating 541,371,000 feet of lumber. This only represents the amount manufactured in the townships under review. There was a large amount of logs cut and floated to market. Jacob Kepler logged the southern side of the A. B. Long tract as early as 1858, while Howard Matley and John Bordeaux logged the Moshannon Coal Company's tract in 1869.
Of course there was not much business done in the township until the Mo- shannon Branch Railroad was built in 1869, but from that time improvements have followed each other very fast. The population in 1872, when Houtzdale was taken from it, was eighteen hundred, while in 1885 it was over ten thou- sand, by adding the boroughs and townships erected within its borders since the former date.
This is also historic ground. A most sanguinary battle, so tradition has it, was fought between General Anthony Wayne and the Indians, about half a mile south of Houtzdale, and the graves of the slain can be distinctly traced. Many relics, bones, arrow-heads and other relics have been picked up around the spot, and the trees bore many a mark of the conflict. In fact, when these trees were felled and hauled to the mills to be sawed they often destroyed the saws and endangered the life of the sawyer by coming in contact with some stone implement or arrow-head imbedded in the wood.
Before the advent of the railroad, however, Dr. Houtz, who had bought large tracts of lands in the township, and on which Houtzdale, Brisbin, and a number of villages stand, determined to make a way to get his lumber to market, and, with this end in view, he deputized his son-in-law, George M. Brisbin, to come into the township and see what could be done. Mr. Brisbin came here, then, before the advent of railroads, though the Tyrone and Clear- field railway was talked about. He proposed and actually surveyed a route for a plank road from Osceola Mills to Jeansville, and Madera, about ten miles. This was to be supplemented by a tramroad, so as to enable them to haul their lumber to the railroad. This plank and tramroad was never des- tined to be built, however, for when Mr. Brisbin had everything ready to com- mence, the Messrs. Knight, who owned the extensive coal lands at Moshannon, came along and asked Dr. Houtz to join with them and build a railroad three
84
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HISTORY OF CLEARFIELD COUNTY.
miles long. The doctor agreed to this, as it would bring his lands within one mile of an outlet, and the road was built. This was the first of the Moshan- non Branch. Mr. Brisbin then built a tramroad from the mills at " Houtz- ville," as it was then called, to Moshannon, one mile long, and hauled his lumber to that point and shipped it. In 1868 the railroad was graded to Dr. Houtz's lands, and thus, step by step, this Moshannon Branch was built, until to day it is seventeen miles long, running from Osceola Mills to Pine Run, or Belle Scena, with one branch six miles long, one four miles long, three branches one mile long, one branch two miles, and double-tracked for five miles. All this was accomplished within twenty-one years.
The cause of the sudden increase of population was the opening the coal beds. It has not been all prosperity, however. The miners did not always work, but created an occasional disturbance by striking. The first general strike occurred in January, 1869, but it did not last very long. Wages were advanced about fifteen per cent. The next strike commenced November 15, 1872, and lasted until February, 1873. The men were receiving seventy cents per ton of 2,240 pounds for digging coal, but were not satisfied, and struck for eighty cents. Some rioting occurred during this strike, and the tipple of the Stirling mine was destroyed by fire.
The men rested satisfied until 1875, when, in May and June of that year, master and men locked horns once more against a reduction, but the men were beaten. During this strike a large amount of rioting occurred, and the military were ordered out to protect property, but through the efficiency of the then sheriff, W. R. McPherson, all trouble was stopped without having re- course to that arm of the law.
The next strike occurred in 1877, during what is known as the railroad strike, but was not for any principle or price connected with the mining of coal, but in sympathy with the railroad hands. The price of mining, however, had been reduced to forty cents by this time, but was raised to fifty cents in 1878.
In 1880 another strike took place, the men wanting sixty cents per ton, but they did not get it. Thus matters progressed until 1882, when it was deemed advisable to try another strike for sixty cents, but the men were again defeat- ed, the price remaining at fifty cents. In April, 1884, the price for mining was again reduced to forty cents ; and in 1886 another strike was made to get ten cents per ton advance, but again failure attended the efforts of the miners, and the price remained forty cents per ton until March 1, 1887, when the op- erators voluntarily advanced the price to fifty cents per ton.
There are a number of houses of worship in the township outside of the boroughs, the oldest being known as " Beulah," organized May 25, 1859, and situated about half a mile from the village of Ramey, and belonging to the Presbyterian Society. It was an off-shoot from the Mount Pleasant Church,
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WOODWARD TOWNSHIP.
Hegarty's " X Roads." It was about the first church erected in the township. Its first pastor was Rev. A. N. Holloway, who officiated from 1863 to 1867; Rev. William Prideaux from 1867 to 1872, and Rev. William Gemmil from 1872 until August, 1887. Rev. A. N. Bird followed Mr. Gemmil.
The Methodist Episcopal Society dedicated a church at Ramey, January 7, 1883, and in 1885 they opened another at Centre, Decatur township.
The Primitive Methodists have a church at West Moshannon, and the Anglicans one at Victor Mines. Besides these regular consecrated houses of worship, the ministers of the different denominations go through the town- ship and hold services at the school-houses, or in private houses.
There are a large number of school-buildings in the township. In the beginning of 1882 there were over eleven hundred children attending the schools, but the number has increased over thirty-three per cent. since.
The population of the township increased so rapidly that it was impossible to receive the votes at one polling place, therefore the court was petitioned to appoint a commission to inquire into the expediency of creating three more polling places. On the 10th of March, 1882, this commission, consisting of John I. Patterson and S. C. Smith, of the borough of Clearfield, and George M. Brisbin, of the borough of Osceola Mills, met at Houtzdale, and, with the advice and assistance of the voters of the township, determined to ask the court to confirm the wish of the citizens, that three more polling places be made, and at the fall term of court for that year their desire was granted. The first district was called the Madera district; the second the Happy Valley district; the third the West Houtzdale district, and the fourth the North Houtzdale district.
MADERA.
Madera is a village situated on the east side of Clearfield Creek, four miles from Houtzdale. It was formerly called Puseyville, after Charles Pusey, who owned the land upon which it was built, and who erected saw-mills and a large grist-mill near the town site. The town is surrounded with hills in which are numerous coal beds. There are a number of fine residences in the town, nota- bly the Hagerty houses. The extension of the Moshannon Branch Railroad to the place gave the town an impetus that will in a very short time place it on a level with the others in the coal regions.
HOUTZDALE.
The borough of Houtzdale is the outcome of the energy and enterprise of George M. Brisbin, who, feeling assured that it was only a question of time when railroads would be built to and open up the region, caused the town to be surveyed in 1869, and commenced selling lots. The town was named in honor of Dr. Daniel Houtz, of Alexandria, Pa., so often named in this history
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HISTORY OF CLEARFIELD COUNTY.
as owning a vast number of acres of land in this vicinity, and upon a portion of whose lands the town was projected.
Up to the year 1869 there was no trace of a habitation further than a lum- ber camp. There were no roads, literally nothing, except big pine and hem- lock trees, and rhododendron underbrush, commonly known as "big" laurel.
L. G. Lingle (now deceased) was the engineer who laid out the town, and a person who now looks upon its streets can have no idea of what it was to lay out and survey for a town on this site. The pine trees had been cut down during the spring of 1869, and the logs which they made were hauled to the mill, but their tops and butts, together with old fallen logs, standing hemlock trees, and the aforesaid underbrush, made it nearly impassable; but to the credit of Mr. Lingle, thirteen years afterwards when the borough was re-sur- veyed, the streets then being opened, there was very little difference in the two plots.
Houtzdale is situated on the Moshannon Branch Railroad, six miles from Osceola Mills, where the road ends, and is the center of the semi-bituminous coal region. It was made a borough on the 20th day of March, 1872, and now, 1887, contains a population of about two thousand. The borough is sur- rounded with numerous smaller towns, which join up to her limits, so that a stranger cannot tell where the town begins or ends. For three miles along the railroad the traveler is continuously passing through towns and villages-Stir- ling on the east, West Houtzdale on the west, Loraine joining West Houtzdale further west, and Atlantic joining Loraine still further west, while Brisbin bor- ough's south line is Houtzdale's north line. The population tributary to the post-office at Houtzdale is, therefore, in the neighborhood of ten thousand souls.
The first house built in the borough is the log house now owned by P. J. Mccullough, on Brisbin street, and which was formerly a lumbering camp. The second house in the borough limits was the boarding shanty that stood just east of the residence of Dr. D. A. Hogue, and which is now destroyed. The houses the mill company built on the eastern line of the town were the next addition, though at the time the houses mentioned were built, there was no borough, or had the survey been made. Therefore the first house built after the town had been laid out, was the house next to the present opera house, and which was erected by Jesse Diggins, and afterwards sold to Tim- othy McCarthy.
George Charlton, sr., Richard Jays, Charles Charlton, Benjamin Charlton, William Charlton, Thomas Gleghorn, Mrs. Ann Higgins, William Hollings- worth, Arthur Hoaxley, and John Argyle were the next to purchase lots and erect houses-in fact these parties all bought and built at the same time. George M. Brisbin next erected the store building now occupied by R. R. Fleming, and also built the first depot and warehouse, with a town hall over-
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WOODWARD TOWNSHIP.
head ; the latter building occupied the ground where stands the handsome brick store built by Frank, Liveright & Co., but now owned by the Eureka Supply Company.
The first hotel was built by David Persing on the corner of Hannah and Brisbin streets. This hotel was burnt in 1872, and for a while thereafter a shanty occupied the ground, built by Jesse Williams; but the ground being afterwards bought by James Dunn, he erected the present Exchange Hotel on it, afterwards selling it to Morris Lang.
The railroad reached Houtzdale in 1870. Previous to that all supplies for that point were delivered at Stirling, a half mile east, and then re loaded on trams and hauled to its destination. When the railroad reached the "burg," however, all this changed. The first passenger train consisted of a coach behind a coal train, but as the population increased, regular passenger trains were run, and now four daily trains each way are required to do the business and carry the people, and a local freight train of never less than ten cars is needed to bring in the supplies.
The town grew very rapidly from the beginning. The coal surrounding the borough was proven to be the best then, or now, known, and therefore capital rushed in to secure the prize. As the colleries multiplied, the population in- creased and houses went up as if by magic.
A post-office was granted the borough in 1870, John Brisbin being the first postmaster. He kept the office in the depot building. The first mails were semi-weekly. (The colleries had their mails carried from Osceola Mills, daily by private messenger.) Mr. Brisbin moved the office, soon after, to a building that is now situated immediately west of Dr. Hogue's. In the mean time the mill company had built a store immediately south of Dr. Hogue, and Mr. Bergstresser was store-keeper. Mr. Brisbin resigning the office, Mr. Bergstresser was appointed postmaster, and moved the office to the store. A daily mail was soon granted to the town thereafter. The office was retained in this store until Frank, Liveright & Co. built the (now) Telephone Exchange, when the office was moved into that building. In 1880 Mr. Bergstresser built an office on Good street and moved the office therein. This was burnt on the night of May 6th, 1881, and the office was opened temporarily in VanDusen's old store building opposite, and remained there until the burned building could be replaced, when the office was again moved to its old quarters. Theodore Van Dusen succeeded Mr. Bergstresser in 1883, and George W. Dickey suc- ceeded Mr. Van Dusen in 1887.
The first church building erected was on the corner of Charles and Clara streets, a union church, but it afterwards passed into the hands of the Metho- dist Episcopal society. This building, before completion, was destroyed by an incendiary fire, on the night of August 6th, 1872. The congregation imme- diately re-built, however, and on the 8th of December of the same year, the
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HISTORY OF CLEARFIELD COUNTY.
present building was dedicated. Rev. J. F. Bell was the minister at that time. The first Methodist services were held in Brisbin Hall, in 1871, and Houtzdale was connected with the Osceola circuit until 1884, the pulpit being supplied by the same ministers who supplied Osceola Mills. In the latter year the Houtzdale church was made a " station," with Rev. A. W. Guyer as pastor. He was followed by Rev. J. A. De Moyer.
In March, 1881, the Methodists sold this old church building to the German Reformed society for $400. This denomination supplied their pulpit by missionaries until August 27, 1882, when the Rev. C. W. E. Seigel was duly installed pastor of the congregation, resigning in 1887. Since this society purchased the old church, they have added a residence for their minister to the rear of the building, and have otherwise beautified the property.
The Methodists, before selling their first church, had erected an unique and tasteful church on their lot, corner of Good and Clara streets, which was dedicated December 4th, 1881. Under the charge of Rev. De Moyer they have built a parsonage back of this last church, and which was first occupied in 1886.
On December 15, 1874, the Rev. Martin Meagher, Roman Catholic mis- sionary, first celebrated mass in Brisbin Hall, and during that year the Rev. gentleman traveled from Osceola Mills, to minister to the wants of his people. In April, 1875, the foundation of the present St. Lawrence Church was com- menced. The Roman Catholic congregation was poor, however, and the work did not progress very fast. The building committee, P. J. Mccullough, Frank Bolger, David Buckley, James Dunn and John Garrity, entered into a contract with David C. Nelson, to erect a suitable church building for them ; said church to be ninety feet long, forty-five feet wide and thirty-eight feet high from the floor to the comb of the roof. The church was so far com- pleted by May II, 1876, that the contractor thought the congregation might occupy it for service, and so notified the committee. But unfortunately, he had not supported the floor properly, and the weight of a large number of people caused the joists to break immediately under the gallery at the rear, and the floor went down, carrying with it all that were in that por- tion, and the gallery. Mr. Nelson was immediately under the gallery, and was killed by the falling timbers, while numbers of others sustained broken bones and bruises. The church was repaired as soon as possible and pushed on to completion. It was consecrated in 1882, and is a very fine edifice, built in a Gothic form, with open roof timbers, and tastefully frescoed. On the 20th of August, 1879, H. C. Parks built a parsonage on the north end of the three lots occupied by this denomination, and which parsonage is occupied by the priest in charge (Rev. Meagher), who was their first and still remains pas- tor. In March, 1883, Father Meagher associated with him Rev. Father McGinley, who assisted in the arduous labors of this mission, but the outlying
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