History of Luzerne, Lackawanna, and Wyoming counties, Pa.; with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of their prominent men and pioneers, Part 99

Author: Munsell, W.W., & Co., New York
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: New York, W.W. Munsell & co.
Number of Pages: 900

USA > Pennsylvania > Luzerne County > History of Luzerne, Lackawanna, and Wyoming counties, Pa.; with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of their prominent men and pioneers > Part 99
USA > Pennsylvania > Lackawanna County > History of Luzerne, Lackawanna, and Wyoming counties, Pa.; with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of their prominent men and pioneers > Part 99
USA > Pennsylvania > Wyoming County > History of Luzerne, Lackawanna, and Wyoming counties, Pa.; with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of their prominent men and pioneers > Part 99

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

A Workingman's AAssociation was organized in April, 1869, with John L. Davis president, James Burns vice- president, Richard Richards secretary. After passing through various vicissitudes, and playing an important part in the strifes between the men and the company, the association was disbanded in 1872.

PITTSTON TOWNSHIP.

HIS is one of the original Connecticut town- ships which retained its name at the time of the second division, in 1790. It was first called Pittston in honor of Sir William Pitt. It is situated on the left bank of the Susque- hanna, immediately below the mouth of the Lack- awanna, and contains the remaining thirty-six square miles of old Pittston, one of the five townships which the Susquehanna Land Company, in 1768, resolved to survey in the heart of Wyoming valley. The flood of March, 1784, swept away the surveyor's landmarks, and on the 17th of that month an act was passed to provide for ascertaining and confirming to certain persons, called Connecticut settlers, the title gained prior to the decree of Trenton. The lands in Pittston township certified to be in constructive possesion of Connecticut settlers be- came certified Pittston. In 1790 John Phillips, David Brown, J. Blanchard, Caleb Bates, John Davidson and J. Rosin appear as a board with authority to lay out public highways in the township.

The pioneers of Pittston were principally Connecticut Yankees, with a small complement of New Jersey people, some of whom came here by way of the older settlements farther down the valley. The settlements on this side of the river must date from as early as 1770, for in 1772 John Jenkins, Isaac Tripp, Jonathan Dean and others established a ferry across the river to connect this with the settlement at Wyoming and Exeter; and the following year James Brown, Lemuel Harding and Caleb Bates were constituted directors of the township, with authority to assess and collect taxes.

A list of the people who were assessed in 1796 in what was then Pittston preserves the names of a large part of the settlers prior to that date. The list, as copied by Mr. Pearce in his Annals of Luzerne, is appended:

James Armstrong, Enos Brown, David Brown, Elisha Bell, Waterman Baldwin, Jeremiah Blanchard, John Benedict, Ishmael Bennett, A. Bowen, James Brown, jr., Anthony Benschoter, R. Billings, Conrad Berger, J. Blanchard, jr., Samuel Cary, John Clark, George Cooper, James Christy, Jedediah Collins, John Davidson, David Dimock, As Dimock, Robert. Faulkner, Solomon Finn, Nathaniel Giddings, Isaac Gould, Ezekiel Gobal, Joslma Grillin, Daniel Gould, Jesse Gardner, Richard Halstead, Isaac Hewitt, Daniel Hewitt, John Houival, Joseph Hazard, Abraham Hess, Jonathan Hutchins, John Herman, Lewis ,Jones, Joseph Kuapp, Samuel Miller, William Miller, Samnet Miller, jr., Ebene- zer Marey, Jonathan Marey, Isaac Miles, Cornelius Nephew, John Phil- lips, James Scott, John Scott, William I. Smith, Rodger Scarle, William

328

HISTORY OF LUZERNE COUNTY.

Searle, Miner Searle, James Stephens, Elijah Sitsby, Elijah Silsby, ir .. Comfort Shaw, Jonathan Stark, James Thompson, Isaac Wilson, John Warden, Crandall Wilcox, Thomas Wright.

The settlers on this side of the river in 1778 bore their part in the common defence, for we find records and traditions of at least two forts or stockades here, one near Patterson's lumber-yards and the other not far from the stone grist-mill at the ferry bridge.

Dr. Nathaniel Giddings was the first physician in the settlement. He came from Connecticut in 1787, and practiced medicine here until his death, in 1851. He set one of the first orchards in the township on his farm, near the Ravine shaft. About the time he came Z. Knapp, grandfather of Dr. A. Knapp, located in that vicinity. William Searle came from Connecticut before the massacre, and occupied a farm near those just men- tioned. Rodger Searle's first house stood where the Ravine shaft is, but in 1789 he moved to Pleasant Valley. David Brown, mentioned as assessed in 1796, had settled the D. D. Mosier place as early as 1790. Some of the trees he set for an orchard on this farm are still standing, and mark the spot where he lived. Ilis son, Richard Brown, settled Thomas Benedict's farm. Samuel Miller's farm was in this immediate vicinity. His date is 1789. Elijah Silsbee was here in 1778. His residence was on the north side of Parsonage street, opposite James L. Giddings. William Slocum lived where Edward Morgan now does, and the Benedict family lived near Mr. Mor- gan's stone quarry. One of the first clearings in what is now the lower part of Pittston borough was made where the depot and the Farnham House now are. One of the early orchards was here. Another was set by Mr. Ben- edict near where the Pittston knitting-mill stands, and Rodger Searle set another at the same time on his place.

For sixty years after the settlements were begun in Pittston the Yankee element predominated in the popu- lation of the township, but with the discovery of coal began the great influx of the various European nationali- ties that make up the heterogeneous population as it is found to-day.

The Scotch came in large numbers in 1850-55, al- though many of the most experienced miners came to America before coming to Pittston, attracted by the gold mining of California.

The inroad of the Welsh was more gradual, as they had previously come to the older mines at Carbondale, and came down the valley as the coal fields were developed.

The English element, less numerous than the others, came here at various times with the growth of the place.

Old Erin and Germany are represented here by pros- perous and substantial people.

The population of the township is 2,666.

MINING IN PITTSTON BOROUGH AND TOWNSHIP.

The growth of Pittston and the boroughs surrounding it are as purely the result of the discovery of coal here as is the prosperity of any place in the anthracite region. Before the opening of the canal in 1832, Calvin Stock-

bridge and Col. James W. Johnson had sent considerable quantities of coal down the river to tide water in "arks" as they were called. These arks were roughly built boats eighteen feet wide and eighty or ninety feet long, and would carry eighty tons. They were usually built and loaded on the shore during low water and "run" during the freshets, after the manner of rafting.

Col. Johnson sold his works to William R. Griffith and associates, who also purchased the franchises of the Washington Railroad Company and, by a consolidation of charters, formed the Pennsylvania Coal Company, a corporation which operates a large proportion of all the collieries in this vicinity.

The Erie railroad owns, under the name of the Hillside Coal and Iron Company, an extensive colliery at Pleasant Valley.

The Ontario colliery, at Pleasant Valley, consisting of two tunnels, one slope and a shaft, is owned by the Lehigh Valley Coal Company.

The Pittston Coal Company was organized in 1875 by parties who had bought the property of the old Pittston and Elmira Company. They operate the Seneca slope, the Ravine shaft and the twins.

The Columbia mine, at the head of the canal, opened in 1862, is worked by Grove Bros., Danville, Pa. The Phoenix Coal Company is operating in this vicinity.

J. McFarlane & Co. sunk the Eagle shaft at Tomp- kins colliery in 1850. Alvah Tompkins, the present owner, succeeded them in 1855.

The Butler Coal Company is operating the old' Butler mines, which were opened in 1835 by John L. & Lord But- ler. Judge Mallory, of Philadelphia, a brother-in-law of the Butlers, became a partner, and their canal shipping port at Pittston thus came to be called Port Mallory-a name also applied to the old hotel at that point. The company has about one hundred and fifty acres, with one shaft and one breaker. About twenty acres of their old workings are on fire, and the pillars and abandoned coal are burning. No value is being destroyed, although a good deal has been written of the burning mine. They are working the Marcy vein immediately under the fire.

HUGHESTOWN BOROUGII.

HIS new borough was formed from the part of Pittston township situated between Pleas- ant Valley on the east and Pittston borough on the west. It was chartered on the 19th of April, 1879, and the same month the first borough election was held.

J. J. Schmaltz, was elected burgess; Cuthbert Snowdon, Gotlieb Schmaltz, John B. Clarke, Charles Mathewson, George Gill and John W. Williams, council- men; T. J. Snowdon, clerk; Aaron Oliver, chief of police; Daniel S. Mosier, treasurer, and John B. Mosier, justice.

329

EARLY HISTORY OF PITTSTON BOROUGH-HOTELS-MAILS.

The principal business of the borough is that carried on in connection with the Pennsylvania Coal Company's extensive collieries located here. The population is 1,200.

PITTSTON BOROUGHI.

N the 5th of January, 1853, the grand jury of Luzerne county was petitioned by a majority of the freeholders to incorporate a portion of Pittston township as a borough. The judg- ment of the grand jury was favorable to the peti- tioners, and April 11th, 1833, the court con- firmed the judgment of the grand jury and the borough was organized, and the following year the boundaries were extended.

Although several of the earliest settlements of the town- ship were within the present borough lines, yet in 1828 there were but fourteen heads of families living within the present limits of the borough. These were John Al- ment, Calvin T. Richardson, Calvin Stockbridge, John Stewart, who kept a hotel, Nathaniel Giddings, John Bene- dict, Jacob Lance, who came from New Jersey in 1820, Samuel Miller, Solomon Brown, a blacksmith, Adam Bel- cher, Amos Fell, Ishmael Bennett, a blacksmith, and Frank Belcher.

When the borough was laid out there was a deep ravine crossing Main street, near the present office of the Penn- sylvania Coal Company. This was bridged by a tressle forty or fifty feet high, and since then, after at least one stage load of passengers had been precipitated through it, the whole ravine has been graded in, and a well paved street and substantial buildings cover the spot. When the Pittston and Wilkes-Barre plank road was built, in 1851, a large tressle work was put in near Patterson's lumber yard, to straighten the street by crossing the ravine. Grading here too has since taken the place of the tressle. Parsonage street, by the way of Hughestown, was the old original Scranton road. The formation of the municipal government was completed on the 30th of April, 1853, by the election of John Hosie, burgess; J. V. L. Dewitt, H. P. Messenger, George Daman, Theodore Strong and James McFarlane, councilmen; John Kelchner, constable; D. P. Richards, John Sax and Ralph D. Lacoe, assessors; Smith Sutherland, Valentine Rowe, overseers of poor; Alvah Tompkins, Nathaniel Giddings, James M. Brown, Levi Barnes, J. A. Hann, John Love, school directors; Jesse Williams, C. R. Gorman, H. S Phillips, auditors; Nathaniel Giddings, Joseph Knapp, Michael Reap, inspectors of election.

The following is as complete a list of burgesses as the imperfect condition of the borough records can furnish: E. B. Evans, 1854; William Furgeson, 1855; Charles R. Gorman, 1856, 1857; J. B. Fisher, Abram Price; M. Reap, 1861-65; James Brown; P. Sheridan, 1867; John B. Smith, 1868; James Walsh, 1869; Andrew Law, 1870; J. P. Schooley, 1871; James L. McMillan, 1872; James

McKane, 1873; Michael Reap, 1874-76; Joseph Cool, 1877; Patrick Henrey, 1878: James O'Donnell, 1879; 1 .. B. Ensign, 1880.

The population of the borough in 1880 was 7,472 against 6,760 in 1870.

HOTELS.

The first attempt at tavern keeping at Pittston was made about 1799, by Colonel Waterman Baldwin, on the lower side of Main street, above the Seneca store. Un- der the huge antlers that surmounted the bar, Miner Searle, Jacob Bedford, John Sax and Calvin T. Richard- son have since stood and ministered to the demands of thirsty travelers. The Baltimore House was the next. It stood on the east side of Main street, near House's saloon. Beginning with 1805 the landlords of old times were Peter Decker, Eleazer Cary, Asaph Pratt and William Hart. The Bull's Head was built by John Benedict, sen., near Edward Morgan's stone quarry. Thomas Benedict's father kept it several years, and finally it was occupied by John C. Doty as a dwelling. The Stockbridge Hotel was built in 1830 by Calvin Stockbridge, a contractor on the canal. The Butler Coal Company became the owners, and Judge Garret Mallory, a partner in the company, named the hotel Port Mallory. Subsequently a large swan was displayed as the sign, and it came to be known as the Swan Hotel. George Lazarus kept it until 1848, when he built the Eagle Hotel, now kept by Julius Scott. James D. Fonsman next kept the Swan, and subsequently Mrs. Ehret has kept it as the Farmers' Hotel. Mr. Fons- man in 1849 built the Butler House, now kept by Robert Green. The principal hotels now are the Farnham House, by L. F. Farnham, and the Eagle Hotel, both well fur- nished and well kept as first-class houses of the modern style.

POSTAL FACILITIES.

When the weekly mail route was established, in 1799, between Wilkes-Barre and Owego, the mail for Pitts- ton was distributed from the houses of William Slocum and Doctor Giddings, and this irregular arrangement continued until ISto as a sort of branch, by way of the ferry, from the regular mail route, which was on the oppo- site side of the Susquehanna. In 1811 a post-office was es- tablished and Eleazer Cary was appointed postmaster. A route from Scranton to Wilkes-Barre supplied the office with a weekly mail. Deodat Smith and Zephaniah Knapp were the mail carriers on this route until about 1821. Zephaniah Knapp, the second post-master here, caused the removal of the office to Babylon, and soon afterwards the Pittston Ferry post-office was established, with John Alment as post-master. Alment was an Irish Quaker, blind in one eye and deaf in one ear. He had kept an early store in a log house near the Hughestown ceme- tery. The boys had robbed him and made his business quite unprofitable, so he bought a frame building on Parsonage street and moved it to the site of Pugh Bros.' store on Main street. In this building he kept the post- office, and at that time it was the most southerly building but one on Main street. The successive postmasters

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HISTORY OF LUZERNE COUNTY.

have been Abram Bird, Dr. Anson G. Curtis, William S. Ridin, Charles R. Gorman, James Searle, James Walsh, George M. Richart, Benjamin Ensign and J. B. Shiffer, the present incumbent.

JOURNALISM IN PITTSTON.

The Pittston Gasette was established in August, 1850, by G. M. Richart and I. S. Phillips, both practic: 1 printers. It was a twenty-eight-column paper, twenty- four by thirty-eight, and received from the first a cordial support. The paper was Whig in politics until the Whig party was supplanted by the Republican, when it took a leading position' in the new ranks. In November, 1853, Mr. Richart bought out his partner. He published the paper until March, 1857, at which time he sold to Dr. John Henry Puleston, of New York. Dr. Puleston, who is now a member of the British Parliament, was a Welsh- man of refined manners and liberal education, and his labors in the Fremont campaign had given him a wide and favorable reputation. He was a ready and forcible writer, so that under his management the good standing of the Gazette was fully sustained. In the spring of 1860 Dr. Puleston sold to G. M. Richart, Benjamin D. Beyea and Abel C. Thompson. The firm of Richart, Beyea & Thompson contended until the fall of 1863, when Mr. Richart for the second time assumed the sole proprietor- ship of the paper. In June, 1869, Mr. Richart leased for one year to J. W. Freeman, and again took possession in June, 1870. In June, 1874, a half interest in the Gazette office was sold to Theo. Hart, jr. The firm of Richart & Hart continued until the Ist of May, 1878. Mr. Hart has since been the sole editor and proprietor. Under his management the Gazette is wielding strong influence in the public affairs of the Wyoming valley, and maintains its position as a substantial factor in local journalism. It is now the oldest paper under its original title in the Lackawanna and Wyoming valleys. Up to the winter of 1867 the Gazette was printed on a No. 4 Washington hand press, when Mr. Richart purchased a new cylinder, and enlarged to thirty-two and subsequently thirty-six columns. As early as 1854 he put into the Gazette office a ruling machine, and in 1858 added to his job print- ing office a power job press. These two machines were the pioneers of their kind in the Lackawanna and Wyo. ming valleys.

The Pittston Herald, a small Democratic paper, was started in the winter of 1855 by Edward S. Neibell, a young printer from Wayne county. In a few weeks some persons unknown invaded the office at night and "pied " the type. Soon afterward an incendiary fire com- pletely demoralized things again, and Mr. Neibell sold his material to Mr. Richart, of the Gazette, and removed.

The Pittsion Free Press, a seven-column weekly, in- dependent in politics, was published a few months in 1859 by Lieutenant Arnold C. Lewis.

The Wyoming Valley Journal was established in 1871 by J. M. Armstrong, B. F. Hughes and George D. Leis- enring. It was a well-equipped paper at the outset. After a few months Mr. Armstrong bought out his part-

ners, and employed at different times as editors Col. D. C. Kitchen, W. J. Bruce, Col. W. W. Shore and others. He also issued for a short time a small evening paper called the Daily Journal. These papers were independ- ent in politics, and in moral sentiment always high-toned. After some two years the concern was leased to J. W. Freeman, who consolidated it with the Pittston Comet, which he had started in 1870. The consolidated paper was known as the Pittston Comet and Wyoming Valley Journal, and was a decidedly live element in local jour- nalism. It acquired a large circulation and a State repu- tation. In 1877 it was discontinued and the material sold to Lewis Gordon.

Next in order comes the Luserne Leader, a Democratic paper, started in 1876 by E. A. Niven and Charles H. Chamberlin. After some months' existence here it was bought by parties in Wilkes-Barre, to which place it was removed. It was subsequently consolidated with the Luzerne Union, and, as the Union-Leader, has become the leading Democratic paper of Luzerne county.

The Evening Press was started in 1877 by W. B. Kel- ler, in the job printing office of Lewis Gordon. Mr. Keller retired after a few months, being succeeded by Messrs. Yost & Sutton, later by Messrs. Tinker & Rus- sell, and in the spring of 1880 by Lewis Gordon, the present publisher.

The Sunday Plain Dealer was established in 1878 by J. C. Coon, and in a few months removed to Wilkes- Barre, where the paper is still published by Mr. Coon under the title of the Sunday News Dealer. It is issued simultaneously in Scranton and Wilkes-Barre.

The Pittston Express, a very neat evening paper, was published during the latter half of August, 1878, by J. T. Sutton and W. H. Rutledge.

The publication of the Daily Watchman, a five-column local evening paper, was begun May 26th, 1885, by Charles Tinker and S. J. Richards.

FERRIES AND BRIDGES.

The first bridge across the Susquehanna between Wilkes-Barre and Tunkhannock was built here in 1850 by the Pitts Ferry Bridge Company, succeeding the old rope ferry near the same point. This first bridge was re- placed in 1864 by a covered wooden bridge, which was destroyed in the ice flood of 1875. Within eleven months the King Iron Bridge Company, of Cleveland, put up the beautiful iron bridge now standing. It belongs to the Ferry Bridge Company and cost about $72,000.

The Depot Bridge Company in 1874 built another bridge to span the river at Pittston. It cost $75,000 and was partially destroyed on the 17th of February, 1875. It was rebuilt the same year, at a cost of $45,000.

The iron bridge belonging to the Bloomsburg railroad was built in 1874, in the place of a covered wooden bridge which had been built when the railroad was opened. This was also seriously damaged in the flood of 1875 and rebuilt.

The destruction of these means of river transit made room for two or three steamboats for a short time.

Daniel Harding

GENEALOGICAL AND PERSONAL RECORD,

EXETER AND PITTSTON TOWNSHIPS, HUGHESTOWN, PITTSTON, PLEASANT VALLEY AND WEST PITTSTON BOROUGHS.

Susan EDickinson

MISS SUSAN EVELYN DICKINSON.

Miss Susan Evelyn Dickinson, whose initials are familiar in the pages of the New York Graphic, the Philadelphia Press and other prominent journals, where her delightful letters from the interior of Pennsylvania ure eagerly seanned by a large clientage, is one of the most diligent workers of the day, and has done more than any other writer to pre- sent to the world the bright and best side of life in the coal regions. Previous to her advent to the Wyoming valley many metropolitan readers were inclined to doubt whether there was any bright side to the coal fields. The dark side had been given in all its sombre depth, and it remained for Miss Dickinson to show the silver lining. From her home among the willows of West Pittston she took long trips up and down the valley in quest of information for whatever theme she pro- posed writing upon, deeming no amount of personal privation or incon- venience too great in getting at some new phrase in the social condition of the mining masses. No one could be more industrious than this fair little women, pushing her way like a messenger of light among the grime and dust of coal breakers, the roar of machinery, or along the subterranean chambers of the mine; while her face is familiar at all the Eisteddfodan or literary and musical gatherings of the Welsh, as well as the Father Matthew and other temperance conventions of the Irish. The result of her observation and research is shown in her admirable letters to the papers already named. She writes with the earnestness of profound conviction, and her style is incomparable for its amplitude and elegance. She has not sought the surface, like many of her sex of mnuch inferior ability, who have become noted writers of fashion and gossip; because she feels it her duty even in the ordinary pursuit of life to be doing good-righting some wrong, correcting some error, suggest- ing some reform by which men and women would be their better selves.

She has not ventured on the uncertain sea of popular applause, but, en- joying life most when she worked the hardest, has preferred that sphere --

" That can, the world eluding, be itself A world enjoyed, that wants no witnesses But its own sharers and approving heaven: That, like a flower deep hid in rocky cleft, Smiles, though 'tis looking only at the sky."

Susan Evelyn Dickinson was born at the old homestead in Berks county, but as her life from childhood was passed in Philadelphia she delights in being known as a Philadelphian. Her ancestors came to this country in William Penn's time, and she was brought up in the Society of Friends, but joined the Protestant Episcopal church after leaving school. Her talent as a writer was developed early-even as a school girl-and hier verses over the signatures of " Ethie Evergreen " and " Ada Vernon," in the Philadelphia Saturday Erening Post, and " Violet May " in the Boston True Flag attracted attention and favor- able comment. Subsequently she discontinued writing for several years, the carlier ones being occupied as teacher in the public schools of Philadelphia. In 1872 her pen was employed during the Greeley cam- paign, and in 1874 she accepted an engagement on the New York Herald staff, beginning with the admirable report of the great Empire mine fire at Wilkes-Barre. Since then she has done some excellent. special department work on that journal, and furnished it with occa- sional correspondence from the coal region, besides contributing a valuable series of northeastern Pennsylvania letters to the Graphic and Philadelphia Press and writing several pleasant sketches and short stories. Justly proud of her sister Anna's brilliant talents, Miss Susan E. Dick- inson in another and equally important sphere is still exerting, by means of her facile pen, her power for good on the public mind, and residing with her venerable mother in the romantic retirement of fair Wyoming.

ANDREW BRYDEN.

Andrew Bryden, whose portrait appears in this work, is a native of Ayrshire, Scotland. He was born Jannary 27th, 1827. After coming to this country he engaged in mining, and married Miss Ann Law, of Car- bondale, Pa. Mr. Bryden is now employed by the Pennsylvania Coal Company and is associated with William Law as mine superintendent at Pittston.

E. L. ELLITHORP.

Emmet L. Ellithorp was born in Edinburgh, Saratoga county, N. Y., December 6th, 1840, and was married to Miss Susan Gilmore, of Cohoes, Albany county, N. Y. Mr. Ellithorp served as lieutenant during the Rebellion and has filled various official positions. He is engaged in the manufacture of knit shirts and drawers at the West Pittston Knitting Mills.

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History of Luzerne, Lackawanna, and Wyoming counties, Pa.; with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of their prominent men and pioneers, Part 99

Author: Munsell, W.W., & Co., New York Publication date: 1880 Publisher: New York, W.W. Munsell & co. Number of Pages: 900

Author: Munsell, W.W., & Co., New York
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: New York, W.W. Munsell & co.
Number of Pages: 900