USA > Pennsylvania > Berks County > Kutztown > The centennial history of Kutztown, Pennsylvania : celebrating the centennial of the incorporation of the borough, 1815-1915 > Part 10
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The old wooden house on the south side of West Main street, once the home of the late Isaac Hottenstein and now the home of his son Charles, is said to have been a hotel in that early time. Relations concern- ing it are, however, not consistent. Thc late John G. Wink was authority for the statement that it was called "The Emaus," and that it was open as a hotel for only a short time. Others sav that it was called "The Jackson Housc." In Ermentrout's "Historical Sketch" (p. 8) the interested may read :
"Where Isaac Hottenstein now resides, lived in 1823-24, Michael Hendel, whose swinging sign with Andrew Jackson emblazoned on it, told the weary traveler, as he trudged or rode up the street, that within he could find in winter re- freshments to warm his freezing body, and in summer to abate the burning heat."
And, if the word of some elderly resi- dents is to be taken, this old house bore yet another name, that of "The Bunker Hill." These apparent inconsistencies of tradition are possibly to be straightened out by the supposition that the name of the hostelry underwent successive changes in- der successive proprictors. First a host, possibly under Moravian influence, dis-
1 Mrs. Wickert afterwards married John Levan.
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CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF KUTZTOWN
pensed hospitality in it under the Scrip. tural name. Then, in the exciting days of the Revolution, an ardent patriot, flaming with zeal for his country and hoping to at- tract patronage from travelers of like opin- ion as to British tyranny, substitued "Bunk- er Hill" for "Emaus" on the sign. And,
One other very old hostelry still stands, "The Full Moon," long changed to other uses and years ago removed from its ori- ginal site. It is the wooden building, the property of the John Lesher estate , stand- ing now on the lot immediately east of the fine, three story brick residence of Mr.
OLD STEPHEN ESSER HOUSE (FRONT VIEW) - DEMOLISHED
Mr. Steven Esser, long a resident in this old house, which was demolished a number of years ago to make way in part for the hardware store of E. P. DeTurk, insists that the old house was erected in the year 1700.
OLD STEPHEN ESSER HOUSE ( REAR VIEW)-DEMOLISHED
surely, it is evidence of the thrifty shrewd- ness of a subsequent proprietor that, in this citadel of steadfast Democracy and at the heyday of the fame of "Old Hickory," he took down the patriotic signboard and elevated in its stead a new one painted with the portrait and bearing the name of "An- drew Jackson."
C. W. Miller, at the head of West Main street. Once it stood where the Miller home now stands and was removed to its present site in 1855 by William Hine, who erected the Miller house on the spot where the hotel stood. Forty-three years ago the building was occupied by Edward Dike- man as a tobacco store. According to
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CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF KUTZTOWN
Ermentrout the tavern was noted for its "Apple Jack and Old Rye." Its landlord, for a time at least, was one David Moyer, who, it is recorded, "astonished the na- tives by the erection of a clover mill which was operated by ox power." He was a wood turner by trade, making ax handles, pick handles, and the like. His lathe was run by a tread mill, of which the motive power was a tame bear. Possibly the "ox- power" just mentioned was really this "bear-power."
The other hotels in town are of more re- cent origin. First is to be mentioncd "The Washington House." It was built in 1811 by George W. Fister who purchased lots 17, 18, and a part of 19, on the town plot, from Jacob and Maria Humbert.
Mr. Fister was formerly, as has been told above, proprietor of the old Pennsylvania House. His son and successor was David Fister who was a member of the firm of Fister, Graff and Seagraves, successors to the Coleman Brothers, as operators of the stage coach line running between Reading and Easton. The Washington House was the station for arrival and departure of the stages and for changing of the horses. The stage yard, stables, and shedding were on the opposite side of Main street where now stand the homes of Mr. Benjamin F. Dei- bert and Dr. U. S. G. Bieber. The house was owned by the Fisters until 1853 when the property passed into the hands of Jacob Reichart. In the management of the hotel. however, the Fisters were succeeded in 1837, the year of the birth of the late Col. T. D. Fister, by Charles Fauber. Later the hotel was kept by Ulrich Miller who bought the property in 1865 from John Haak. Its present landlord is William D. Yoder.
In 1840 the Washington House was known as Fauber's Hotel. It is of record that during the presidential campaign of 1840 one of the most exciting events inl Kutztown was the visit and the political speech of "The Buckeye Blacksmith" who is said to have been "an orator of great power and success in advocating the Whig doctrines of that dav. He made a horse - shoe in the shop of Nathan Wink, and then spoke to an immense crowd of people as- sembled in front of Fauber's Hotel, keep- ing [the assemblage] in good humor in spite of a purpose on the part of many to molest him."
Nathan Wink was a brother to the late John G. Wink and Augustus Wink. and father of Mr. George T. Wink, the skilled sign painter and en- thusiastic antiquarian of Reading. His black- smith shop stood on South White Oak street where is now the residence of Achilles Hunsicker,
while his residence was on the site now occupied by the home of Mr. David W. James. A piece of Mr. Wink's handiwork, an iron hasp bearing his initials, "N. W." may yet be seen on the door of an old barn formerly owned by Jonas Hoch, father of Messrs. Zach T. and Jefferson C. Hoch and now the property of Charles K. . Deisher.
"The Black Horse Hotel," at the south- east corner of East Main and Noble streets, is one of the oldest existing hotels of the town. The present brick building, erected in 1845, by Jacob Fisher, who as proprietor was succeeded by Daniel Zimmerman, is the second structure on the site. The ori- ginal hotel, built very early in the last cen- tury, was one of log, weatherboarded. It covered an area of about 24 by 40 feet. Killian Borst (his descendants spell the name "Bast") was one of the early land - lords. The old log building, taken down to permit of the crection of its successor, was removed to the Neff farm now owned by Maria Strasser. Famous in the early days of the log structure, this hostelry had wide renown, particularly for its excellent cook- ing in the decade from 1855 to 1865. Among the various landlords in the new house were: Jacob Fisher, Daniel Zimmer- man, Jacob Zimmerman, Joel Dietrich, Thomas Y. Haus, Peter Wentzel, Henry Bauer, Lewis Stoudt, Lewis Walters, Mor- ris Rentschler, Oliver Sittler, Wm. Bauk- necht, Francis Levan, and J. T. Fritch. The present landlord is J. Edwin Wenz.
One peculiarity of this hostelry is its picture signboard-a painted horse and the name of the house besides. In the early days different classes of wavside inns were clearly distinguished. Each kind of hotel catered to a different class of way- farers. The better class of hotels were known as "stage stands," where travelers of higher social rank going by public stage or private conveyance stopped for refreshments or for rest. A little lower in the scale were the "wagon stands," taverns which drew their patronage mainly from wagoners and teamsters, who halted only for the night, "putting up" as the phrase ran, feeding their weary horses (by day these were fed, gen- erally, as has been described, by the roadside, from the great troughs carried by the Conestoga wa- gons and "Pitt-fuehren") from supplies, except hay, carried in their wagons, and then seeking rest themselves upon bags of hay thrown upon the floor of bar-roon or even of the barn. A third class was called "drove stands." Here drovers stopped for watering, feeding, or pastur- ing, over night or from Saturday night to Sun- day morning, of their cattle which, in those early days, were driven to market in great droves. Lowest of all in the scale of taverns was the "tap-house." This catered to the lowest class of patrons, though doubtless occasionally folks of higher rank than the customary patron would stop for the liquid refreshment always on tap by the tender of the bar who, especially in other parts of the state, was usually an Irishman. Usually. also, the lines between the classes of tavern, and the classes of patrons as well, were so closely drawn that "no stage tavern would on any ac- count permit a teamster to put up there for
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CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF KUTZTOWN
the night, for if it became known that a wagoner had stopped there it would be considered a last- ing disgrace and would result in the loss of the better class of patrons. (J. F. Sachse in "The Wayside Inns on the Lancaster Roadside").
Mr. Sachse, from whom the last quota- tion is drawn, writes informingly of the signboards such as "The Black Horse Ho- tel" yet displays. He says :
"Another feature of these old inns was their signboards which swung and creaked in their yoke. . These signboards were all fig- urative and in some cases painted by artists of note. The cause for the figurative feature was two-fold: First, they were more ornate and could be better understood by the two different nationalities which make up our population than signs lettered in either German or English. Thus, take for instance, "The Black Bear,' a representa- tion of this animal was known at once to either German or Irishman, while the words 'Black Bear' would have troubled the former [and] the latter certainly would never have recognized his stopping place if the sign bore the legend 'Der Schwartze Bar.' Secondly, but few of the teams- ters or wagoners, irrespective of race, could read ; nearly all had their orders to stop at certain houses, and they knew them by the [picture on the] signboard when they came to them."
"The American House" at the intersec- tion of Greenwich and Main streets, has a briefer history. The present fine "flat-iron" building of brick, replaces an older struc- ture of stone, which was built over sixty years ago, by Philip Bobst, who served as first landlord. During the Civil War and afterward Peter Krause was the proprietor Later landlords were : Benjamin Leiby,
Jonas Billig, John Gernerd, John Wagaman. Henry Bauer, Allen Gernerd, and Wilson Hoch, in the old hotel. The present pro- prietors, William and Charles Hoch, rent the new building from its owner, John Barbey, of Reading, who bought the old house from Allen Gernerd and, in 1908, erected the new structure.
"The Keystone House," on the southeast corner of Main and White Oak streets, is the largest of the hotels in town. Erected in 1859 by Henry Sanders it is less im- portant, historically, than the older and smaller hotels of the town. Henry Sanders was the first landlord and owner as well
Its ownership passed into the hands of Dr. J. S. Trexler, who remodeled and greatly improved it. After the death of Doctor Trexler it was sold to John Barbey, the wealthy brewer of Reading. Among the bonifaces of this hotel mention may be made of: Lewis Custer, Allen Steinberger, Wil- liam Keim, James Frey, Joseph Levan, Frank Kurtz, Harry Schmoyer, Daniel Dries, and the present proprietor, Worth Dries.
Where Sharadin and Sharadin's depart- ment store now stands, northeast corner of Main and White Oak streets, there was, in early times, a tavern kept by Charles Levan, of unsavory fame, whose family has long since died out or removed from this section of the country. The house was a pebble- dashed stone building. There was strife between the tavern-keeper, who was com monly accused of various deeds of dark- ness and violence, and the Lutheran pastor of St. John's Union Church. When Pfarrer Knoske, Lutheran pastor of St. John's, would hold communion in the church, the ir- reverent landlord would line the "rummies" of town about his bar and to them sacrilig- iously "dealt out communion,"1 as he is re- ported to have said. Shortly before his death, terrified at the prospect, he sent for the preacher in order to make confession. The minister declined to hear in private and sent for "Squire" Graff, ( foster father of John G. Wink) and to the two the dying man acknowledged his misdeeds. So far as known the preacher and the justice never di- vulged the incidents of the grewsome tale they heard that day. After the death of Le- van the old hotel was torn down. On its site Charles Fauber erected the brick structure now the store, and in it for some years kept hotel. Failing in his undertaking, he sold out to Heidenreich and Kutz, who changing the building to a store, were the first of a long line of merchants doing business there. Fauber went to the Washington House as proprietor, as has been related, and some years later moved to Reading.
1"Nachtmol aus gedehlt."
CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF KUTZTOWN
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NOTED VISITORS
Besides the noted visitors of whom men - tion has been made in earlier pages there passed through the town or visited it for a short time other distinguished personages, both in the stage coach days and in more recent times.
In 1833 President Martin Van Buren was guest for a single meal at the Wash- ington House, kept at that time by Chris- tian Kupp. In the same year Col. Richard M. Johnson, then Vice-President of the United States, was in the town, making a speech that was "vociferously cheered." He was a noted orator from the South, had
in the town, a guest at Fister's Washington House, which was long the favorite stop- ping place of wayfaring statesmen.
After the railroad came there were yet other great men who honored the town with their presence. In October, 1873, the great editor, Horace Greeley, then Democratic candidate for the presidency of the United States, was the guest of Col. T. D. Fister for two days, while he made two addresses, one at the fair and one in the Normal School.
In 1874. the Hon, Alexander Ramsey, once teacher in Kutztown, in the old Frank -
MEAT MARKET
KUTZTOWN PA. MAIN STREET LOOKING
FROM NOBLE STREET
been colonel of a Kentucky regiment, had fought along with General Harrison against the Indians, and had gained fame because of his reputed killing of the great chief, Tecumseh. ( Was he the "Buckeye Black- smith" spoken of on a preceding page?)
In 1836 Kutztown was visited by Gover- nor Joseph Ritner, the Hon. H. A. Muhlen- berg, and General William Henry Harrison. Coming from Easton they were entertained at the Fauber Hotel. "In the evening after supper, 'Old Tippecanoe' made a two-hour speech, after which he was entertained at a banquet at which Mine Host Fauber pre- sented a 'Spohn Seicha' with a red apple in his mouth which the old hiero enjoyed heartily."
There is tradition to the effect that James Buchanan, before he became president was
lin Academy, then United States Senator from Minnesota, at various times Governor of Minnesota, and Secretary of War and Secretary of the Navy under President R. B. Hayes, revisited the scenes of his early days and addressed the concourse at the fair. Other notable orators coming to Kutztown for the purpose last named were Gov. John F. Hartranft, Hon. David C. Humphreys, then Chief Justice of the Dis- trict Court of the District of Columbia, and in more recent times Governor Harmon, of Ohio. Some years ago Governor Beaver, of Pennsylvania, was entertained a: a pub- lic banquet at the Washington House, bv the late Walter B. Bieber. To name all the great inen who have passed through or visited the town in the years of its exist - ence would take no little space.
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CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF KUTZTOWN
.
EFFORTS TO MAKE KUTZTOWN A COUNTY SEAT
As previously remarked the territory em - braced in Kutztown was at the time of its purchase by Peter Wentz, a part of, or be- lieved to be a part of, New Castle county. Later it was found to be in Philadelphia county when the boundaries of that coun- ty were more strictly determined. On March II, 1752, by a law enacted by the Assembly of Pennsylvania Berks county was erected out of parts of Philadelphia, Chester and Lancaster counties, the portion east of the Schuylkill, in which lie Kutz- town and Maxatawny, being carved from Philadelphia county. At that time the new county of Berks (called after Berkshire in England) extended to the Susquehanna riv- er and included about one-tenth of the en- tire area of the province, about five times the present area of the county. In twenty years (1772) three-fifths of Berks county was cut off and made part of the new county of Northumberland with its county seat at Shamokin, at the junction of the north and west branches of the Susquehan- na, where some fifteen years before had been erected Fort Augusta, conspicuous during the French and Indian War. When Sha- mokin was made the county seat the name was changed to Sunbury. Many years later the present town of Shamokin, eighteen miles east of Sunbury, was laid out.
About forty years later, 1811, Berks county suffered reduction in area once more. The territory beyond the North or Blue Mountain was erected into Schuylkill coun- ty, so named from the river, the head waters of which are in that section.
For nearly forty years after this last reduction of territory efforts were made from time to time to have new counties formed from parts of Berks, or from a part of Berks and parts of other counties. The agitation for these projects was largely centered in Kutztown. In 1824 an effort was made to form a new county, to be known as Penn county, out of the following townships: Albany, Greenwich, Windsor (part), Maidencreek (part), Richmond, Maxatawny, Longswamp, Rockland, Rus- combmanor (part), and Oley (part) Kutztown was to be the county seat. Great opposition developed, which, together with the disagreement of the advocates of a new county, some of whom favored the above-mentioned scheme, others of whom desired that the new county should be com- posed of parts of Berks, Montgomery, Chester, and Lancaster, while still a third
party wanted a part of Berks cut off and annexed to Lehigh county, led to the fail- ure of the scheme. This failure, however, did not quench the spirit of those clamor- ing for division.
In 1825 the agitation was continued, gaining such strength that the advocates of dismemberment of Berks county succeed- ed in having three bills presented to the Legislature :
I. To erect parts of Berks into a new county, with Kutztown as the county seat.
2. To erect part of Berks and Mont- gomery into a new county, with Potts- town as the county seat.
3. To erect part of Berks, Chester and Lancaster into a new county, with Church- town as the county seat.
Besides the three propositions represent ed by these bills there was a fourth pro- posal, getting no farther than the circula- tion of petitions, for the annexation of part of Berks to Lebanon. The diversity of desire added to the vigorous opposition developed at Reading and all through the county led to the failure of these plans.
But the proposition was not altogether given up. For thirteen years the matter was in abeyance. Then, in January 1838, agitation was revived with increased in- tensity. Almost daily the Legislature heard either petitions for a new county or remons- trances against division. Feeling ran high. Besides the propositions made in 1825 a fourth one, to erect a new county, to be called Windsor, out of parts of Berks and Schuylkill, had quite a following and bills for all the four were presented to the Leg- islature.
In March 1838 the scheme for Penn county with Kutztown as the county seat came very nearly winning out. On the second of that month the bill for Penn county came to a vote in the Assembly. Thirty-nine members voted ave and thirty- nine said nay. The cause was defeated by the vote and influence of Samuel Fegely, a member from Maxatawny, who declared himself opposed. His opposition coupled with "his pleasing personal appearance and acknowledged good character" had great weight with the Legislature and, doubtless, led some, who otherwise might have fav- ored the bill to vote against it. For his at- titude in the matter Fegely was scathingly denounced by his fellow citizens of Kutz town and vicinity. Their indignation was so great that they made an effigy of their
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CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF KUTZTOWN
representative, hung it up in the square, and burned it, executing a war dance as it was being consumed. He was considered a traitor to his home town, and had bestowed upon him the sobriquet of "Hull," because, as they said, he was like General Hull who, during the War of 1812, had surrendered Detroit to the British without attempting a
House to the Senate where he served two terms-1841 to 1846.
He was succeeded in the House by Daniel B. Kutz, of Kutztown, who, in February 1841, introduced another bill for the erec- tion of a new county out of parts of Berks and Lehigh, also with Kutztown as county seat. By this scheme fourteen townships
MODERN HOMES ON LOWER MAIN STREET
defence. This epithet he bore until his death. But he had chosen wisely so far as his own interests were concerned. His ac- tion made for him fast friends among the politicians at Reading and in the parts of the county where the new county scheme was in disfavor, and his new friends soon rewarded him by promoting him from the
were to be cut from Berks. The bill, how- ever, was promptly tabled. Various other efforts were made until, in November 1849, the people of Hamburg caught the fever and wanted their town to be the county seat, and in March 1852, the folks of Bern- ville demanded the same for their town. Finally the agitation ceased.
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CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF KUTZTOWN
LAYING OUT OF KUTZTOWN
Mention has already been made (p. 20) of the laying out of the town in 1779, by George Kutz, who had purchased on June 16, 1755, a tract of 130 acres of land along the Saucony from the heirs of the original patents. As the story of the Easton Road has probably led the reader to conclude, Kutz recognized the advantageousness of the crossing of the Saucony as a town site. While, as the Schultz map shows, there were no houses on the site of Kutztown in 1755, there were evidently some, per- haps a number at the time Kutz laid out his purchase. Why Kutz waited for twenty- four years before laying out this town can- not now be told. Perhaps the develop-
Dietrich, and six in-lots and eleven out- lots to Henry Schweier, the inn-keeper. About the same time seventy-four acres and one hundred perches (of the one hund- red and thirty acres bought by George Kutz from Jacob Wentz, June 16, 1755) passed into the hands of George Kutz, Jr. Short- ly before 1800 the ownership of the town passed to Peter Kohler.
Early Kutztown consisted of two parts, Kutztown proper, and Freetown. Freetown extended west from Baldy's Lane, or Baldy street, as it is now called Freetown was an addition laid out after the laying out of the older part of the town. The lots in this addition were sold outright having
OLD LANDMARK, FORMERLY THE HENRY PETERSON HOME, WEST WHITEOAK ST.
ment of the settlement on the Saucony was such that he deemed it wise to lay plans for the change of a straggling hamlet to an orderly town. However that may be, he laid out the town in February 1779. The plan embraced one hundred and eight in- lots and one hundred and five out-lots, "all of which were subject to a perpetual ground rent. The lots located on Front, or Main street, were fifty feet wide and one hundred and sixty feet deep, subject to a rental of five shillings and three pence. On the [in-] lots on White Oak and other streets of the original town the rental was two shillings and 9 pence, and on the out-lots five shill- ings. In 1785, as has been stated, seven in- lots and ten out-lots were sold to Adam
no ground rents attached. From this cir- cumstance the name was derived-Free- town. Freetown seems to have been L- shaped, a portion of the present south- ern part of the town as well as that west of Baldy's Lane not being encumbered with ground rents. Baldy's Lane was so named after a blacksmith named Bal- dy (or Balty) who lived there. In Kutz- town proper ground rents were paid for many years. The first payment was May 27, 1779. Gradually most of these rents have been extinguished. A few, however, are still paid or were paid until quite re- cently.
In 1800 the stone house, at the southwest corner of Main and Baldy streets, long
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CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF KUTZTOWN
known as Siegfried's, now the property of H. H. Ahrens1 and recently almost entirely, except for the walls, modernized, was built by Adam Kutz who owned the land in Free- town on both sides of the street from Bal- dy's Lane to the western end of the bor- ough. The town grew slowly. Ermentrout says ( 1876) that in Freetown, on the north- ern side of Main street there had been built up to 1830 only three houses, those of Messrs. Baldy, Sander, and Strasser.
George Kutz, the founder of Kutztown, died within a few years after he had laid out the town, prior to April 22, 1788, on which date his will, of which a copv is sub- joined, was certified to by George Fister and Jacob Herman before Register Cor- amme Henry Christ in his office at Read- ing.
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