USA > Pennsylvania > Berks County > Kutztown > The centennial history of Kutztown, Pennsylvania : celebrating the centennial of the incorporation of the borough, 1815-1915 > Part 2
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).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32
CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF KUTZTOWN
MAXATAWNY
The history of Kutztown is very closely bound up with that of Maxatawny town- ship within the limits of which the town was founded and from the territory of which the area included within the boun- daries of the borough, now one hundred years old, was carved.
Mavatarony is an Indian name. The name as now spelled is said by philological antiquarians to be a corruption of Machsit- hanne or Machksit-hanne. Its meaning is said to be "Bear's-Path creek" or stream. Originally the term must have been applied by the aborigines to the Saucony creek, the stream flowing through our town, having its source in the mountain south of Topton and Bowers ("Topton Mountain") between Henningsville and Dryville. In the Indian language Saucony or Sakunk, as they pro- nounced it, meant a place of outlet, the place where a smaller stream enters into a larger one. The Saucony flows into the Ontelaunee or Maiden Creek, so that "Sau- con" was really the point of junction of the two streams at Virginville. At that place was a noted Indian village called, for the reasons given, "Sakunk." After the white men came, possibly because these did not understand the distinctions made by the Indians, the name Saucony was ap- plied to the stream formerly known as "Machksithanne" and the name Maxataw- ny came to be used as meaning the area of country drained by the waters of the stream.
As applied to the country instead of to the stream Maxatawny for a long time meant the area drained by the Saucony and its tributary rivulets, and embraced, in general. the territory between Macungie (the dis- trict formerly known by that name), Onte- launee ( the section lying farther west along the Maiden Creek ), and the Oley Hills (Top- ton Mountain and those parts of the South Mountain forming the watershed between the Manatawny and the Saucony creeks.) The earliest writers, speaking of Maxa- tawny as a political division, regarded it as including the entire territory drained bv the Ontelaunee and its tributaries. In early writings it is sometimes called the "New section."
When the white men came they found
the valley, now called the East Penn Valley, of which Maxatawny is a part, from the foot of the South Mountain ( Topton moun- tain and Oley Hills) to the base of the op- posite, loftier range ( Kittatinny1 Mountain, North Mountain or Blue Ridge), and from the Schuylkill river to the Lehigh ( Lecha, it was called in early times), covered with a dense growth of low trees, "scrub oak," intersected by Indian trails connecting the Indian villages. Nowhere were there any considerable areas of tall timber. Here and there an oak or a small clump of scattered oaks of large dimensions rose above the general "bush." A few of the great trees were spared as the lower growth was cleared away. One of these, its lower branches cut away, yet stands by the side- walk in front of the Keystone State Normal School. A companion, less mutilated, stands on the campus near "West Cottage," formerly the home of John G. Wink but now occupied by Dr. James S. Grim, pro- fessor of biological sciences in the Normal School. But the most massive of these remnants and reminders of the early time is the great "Centennial Oak," standing in a field on the farm of Dr. U. S. G. Bieber, a short distance east of Kutztown. None of these trees, evidently, had close com- panions, since each is rounded in head, hav- ing now, or having had, in earlier years, low, spreading branches ; they do not have tall, slender trunks, without low growing and wide-spreading branches, as is the case with the lofty trees growing compactly in a forest. Tradition and written records unite to confirm this inference. Elderly resi- dents have told how that in youth thev heard their elders tell that when the old Union Church (St. John's) was built of logs in 1791 there was no heavy timber in this locality. In consequence of such lack the logs of which its walls were constructed were of pine, hauled with great labor and at considerable expense, except where the hauling was done gratuitously. from the pine forests bevond the Blue Mountains. As a matter of some interest in this con- nection it may be recorded here that Philin Schaeffer, the grandfather of Dr. Nathan
1"Kittatinny" is a corruption of the Indian word "Kau-ta-tin-chunk," meaning "endless."
2
CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF KUTZTOWN
C. Schaeffer, long our townsman and now the cminent Superintendent of Public In- struction of the State of Pennsylvania, is said to have been one of the teamsters en- gaged in this arduous labor. Mr. John Deisher (deceased in 1912), father of Mr. Henry K. Deisher, related to his son how that when he, the father, was a little boy, about 1834, he heard an old lady, "Mother Rhoad," then over seventy years of age, tell that when she was a girl (thus carry- ing the relation back to at least Revolu- tionary times) she went with her parents on a visit to relatives in Allentown and that then all the land through which they jour- neved was covered with scrub-oak, while large trees were to be seen only here and there, far removed from one another.
stand very close together; the dry soil of these hills does not give any superfluous nourishment. And this was confirmed by the accounts of the inhabitants who say they rarely find an oak more than six inches through. Hence they are obliged to fetch their fence-rails 4-6 miles, split chestnut rails being used for this purpose, the oak rotting faster, cspecially if the bark is left on.'
The physical geography and geology of the township has been studied and described variously from the time of these earliest recorded observations of Doctor Schoepf. This territory was included in the geologi- cal map (published 1858) of the First Geo- logical Survey of Pennsylvania, made by Prof. H. D. Rogers in the years 1836 to
THE CENTENNIAL OAK
In his "Travels in the Confederation" (published at Erlangen in 1788) descriptive of his journey through this valley in 1783, Dr. Johann David Schocpf, in narrating the incidents of his trio and recounting experi- ences and observations, tells a tale essential- ly the same. On pages 193-196 ( English translation ) one may read :
"The road from here [ Allentown to Reading ] leads over the ridges of connect- ed hills which are counted a part of the afore-mentioned Dry Land. . . . America is indeed the land of the oak. All the for- ests are largely oak, but the trees are no- where either large or strong. What we have seen yesterday and to-day would be counted young wood. but this is hardly probable, because we observed no old stumps. Besides, the thin trunks do not
1857. Dr. John P. Hiester published a "Geological Map of Berks County" in 1854. This was copied from the Rogers' survey. (A reproduction of this map appears op- posite p. 26 of Morton L. Montgomery's "History of Berks County," published in 1886.)
In 1911 the United States Department of Agriculture, Bureau of Soils, cooperating with the Pennsylvania State College School of Agriculture and Experiment Station, is- sued a "Soil Survey of Berks County, Penn- sylvania," the result of field operations conducted by the Bureau of Soils in 1909.
This survey was accompanied by a map showing the elevations, water courses, soils, roads, and the location of towns and rural dwellings. According to this publication, Maxatawny and Kutztown lie "within that
3
CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF KUTZTOWN
physiographic division of the United States known as the Piedmont [ foot of the moun- tains ] plateau. The soils are all residual, having been derived direct- ly, through weathering and decomposition from the original rocks." The part of "the Great Valley," varying in width from 12 to 18 miles "consists of two distinct divis= ions-one of limestone, the other of shale. The belt of limestone land extends across the township from southwest to northeast and averages three and one-half miles in breadth. In this limestone belt, within the limits of the township are two varieties of soil, known as "Hagerstown loam" and "Hagerstown stony loam." The former covers the larger part of the township; of the latter there is a small area in the south- ern corner of the township about Bowers and on the rising land beyond Lyons.
The limestone ledges cropping out here and there are sources of wealth to their owners. All through this belt are quarries, some very extensive and worked for many years. These supply crushed stone for the furnaces and the roads, wagon, steam, and trolley. At most of the quarries are lime- kilns in which the stone is burned to lime for building purposes and for putting on the farmers' fields. In this belt, too, are many deposits of brown hematite iron ore, worked formerly more extensively than they are at present, as "most of the ore that occurred in workable quantities has been taken out."
Across the northern part of the town- ship runs the Hudson River shale, the ex- posed and undecomposed rocks of which exhibit, even within a distance of a few yards, varied colors: yellow, brown, blue, purple, drab, and Indian red, differences due, as has been suggested, to differences in hydration of the rock. Of the Hudson River shale there are two varieties: the Berks shale loam, occupying by far the larger part of the belt, and the Berks silt loam, found in the extreme western end of the township, a quite limited area, at the foot of the hills, a mile to a mile and a half directly west of Kutztown.
In the extreme southern end of the town- ship, on the hills above Lyons, on each side of the road to Dryville, is a patch of Pots- dam sandstone, which, by weathering has formed a soil to which has been given the name of DeKalb stony loam.
The surface of the township is gently rolling, particularly in the southern portion, considerably broken with steep and round- ed hills in the northern part. The eleva- tion above sea level varies from 390 feet at the point where the Saucony crosses the
Greenwich township line to 840 feet on a hill north of Siegfried's Dale near the ex- treme northern corner of the township. The Saucony at the Main street bridge is 400 feet above the sea level. In the brick work of a pilaster in the front wall of the Girls' Dormitory of the Keystone State Normal School, was set in 1908 a disk of metal, three feet five inches from the surface of the ground, bearing a bench mark with the subjoined inscription surrounding a point within a small triangle :
U. S. GEOLOGICAL SURVEY IN CO-OPERATION WITH THE STATE OF PENNSYLVANIA ELEVATION 1
ABOVE SEA
514 FEET DATUM 1908
This would make the surface of the Eas- ton Road in front of the residence of the late Col. T. D. Fister, approximately 515 feet.
The township, it may be added, is drained by the Saucony Creek and its tributaries, the principal of which is Mill Creek, which having its sources in Lehigh County and in the eastern corner of Greenwich Town- ship, enters Maxatawny Township at its northern corner and flows with a curve to the south and west through Mill Creek Valley, past Eagle Point, into Greenwich Township, where mingling its waters at Liscum, with those of a brook from the north, it turns south and joins the Saucony below the "second dam." In the extreme eastern corner of the township is a water shed from which gather the head waters of Kline's Run, a creek, to flow across the border into Lehigh County.
Within the last few years the State of Pennsylvania has been conducting investi- gations into the "chestnut blight," a dis- ease destructive of chestnut trees. In course of the studies made in connection with these investigations the question arose as to the relation between soils and the sus- cevtibility of the trees to the blight or the immunity from it variously manifested in different localities. This led to other stud . ies, of soils and rocks, the results of which have considerably modified the conclusions arrived at by the carlier geologists. Dr. F. P. Gulliver, formerly connected with the Chestnut Blight Commission, has been carrving on these studies with accuracy and persistence. As these studies embody the very latest discoveries, it is with pleasure that the compilers of this history insert at this place the following interesting and valuable contribution from his pen :
4
CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF KUTZTOWN
GEOLOGY
Kutztown and vieinity is one of the Garden Spots of the World. There are few places where it is as easy to live so comfortably and well or where the mass of the population is so happy and so content= ed with the lot to which God has ealled them. Recently it has been shown that there is limestone of three Geologie ages in the Kutztown valley : The Cambro- Ordovicion limestone on the southeast side of the valley, seen at Topton, Fleetwood, ete. ; the Lower Silurian limestone, found in the eentral portions of the valley ; and the Upper Silurian limestone, underlying Kutz- town.
The northern rim of the Kutztown val- ley is formed by the Hudson River shales
Cambrian quartzite. In some places there still remain the old shoreline beach deposits which may be shoveled up and earted away for use as sand. Sueh deposits are now found at Fleetwood, Temple, and on Mt. Penn. In other places the beaches are changed into sandstone.
In the majority of places however the sand has been changed into quartzite by the aetion of water, heat, and pressure.
A special form of this quartzite is found at the old Indian quarry just above Bowers station. Here alkaline waters eoming up from below have changed the quartzite in- to Jasper with many other varieties of quartz. (See account of H. K. Deisher, page 8.) It is an interesting faet that about
THE KRAMER FARM, IN GREENWICH TOWNSHIP
which overlies the three limestones. These shales with some sandy layers do not weath- er as fast as the limestone and therefore rise to several hundred feet above the level of the valley floor. Everywhere beneath the shales will be found the limestones. In some places as at the Crystal Cave and Umbrella Hill the limestone has been arch- ed up and is found well up the steep slopes of the shale hills. In all the bottoms of the streams the limestone is only a short distanee below the surface if it does not show in the bed of the stream itself.
South of the belt of three limestones which forms Kutztown Valley one finds an old shoreline, whose sand beaches are now mainly converted into quartzite, called the
a mile from the center of this old quarry the chestnut trees are healthy and seem to resist the action of the blight fungus. On the Cambrian quartzite in general all the chestnut trees are either dead or rapidly dying from the blight.
To the southeast of this Cambrian quartz- ite there is an area of very old roeks, part- ly formed from sediments laid down in water and in part formed from rocks due to voleanie aetion. The soils from these roeks differ widely and it is a great mis- take to group them together as has been done in the soil survey of Berks county where differing soils are grouped together as Dekalb loam and stoney loam.
F. P. GULLIVER
5
CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF KUTZTOWN
INDIAN HISTORY
THE ABORIGINAL INHABITANTS
They waste us; ay, like the April snow In the warm noon we shrink away ; And fast they follow as we go Torward the setting day ; Till they shall fill the land, as we Are driven into the western sea. -Bryant
Very little is known about the Indians of this immediate vicinity. The mute stone implements of family life, agriculture, chase, and war are, however, evidence that this section at some time was thickly in- habited by aboriginal Indians.
As the Indians moved beyond the Blue Mountains prior to the settlement of white people in this fair valley, though there may have been squatters here and there, yet they left no record. A condensed gen- eral history of the tribe once the inhabit-
ants of this place may, nevertheless, be of interest to the reader.
The Indians living here at the time of discovery and until their removal to the West were the Leni Lenape, meaning, "real men" or "true men," commonly called Dela- ware Indians. According to the "Hand- book of American Indians," they were a confederacy of three clans and were fore- most of the Algonquin tribes, occupying Eastern Pennsylvania, Southeastern New York, and all of New Jersey and Dela- ware.
In remote times they were recognized as "Grand Father," by neighboring tribes, until 1720 when the Iroquois or Six Na- tions, through trickery assumed dominion over them; made "women" of them as they called it, forbidding them to make war or sell land.
According to Morgan they were com- posed of three principal tribes, called Un-
amis or turtle, Unalachtigo or turkey, and Munsee, or Minsi, the wolf. According to Brinton they were named by their totemic emblems and geographic division, Took- seat (round paw wolf), which had twelve sub=tribes: Poke Hooungo, (crawling tir- tle,) with ten sub-tribes ; and Pullaook, (non-chewing turkey,) with twelve sub- tribes. Rutenber states that the Gachwech-
nagechgo or Lehigh Indians were probably of the Unami tribe and it may be inferred that they lived along the Delaware river from the "forks," ( Lehigh and Delaware rivers, at Easton,) south beyond Philadel- phia. The Wolf tribe is attributed to the head waters of the Delaware and south as far as the Lehigh river, but this author does not state how far west. It is fair, however, to assume that the Wolf tribe inhabited this vicinity and west beyond the Schuylkill river.
According to Morgan the names of the sub-tribes of the Wolf clan were as fol- lows: Maangreet, big feet ; Weesowhetko,
yellow tree: Pasakunamon, pulling corn ; Weyarnihkato, cave enterer: Tooshwarka- ma, across the river ; Olumane, vermillion ; Punarvon, dog standing by fireside ; Kwine- ekch, long body: Moonhartarne, digging : Nonharmin, pulling up stream: Longhis- harkartto, brush dog; and Mawsootoh. bringing along. The reader may guess which of these occupied our town site along the Saucony Creek.
6
CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF KUTZTOWN
Saucony means outlet, as the outlet of a stream and may have been named at Virgin- ville, where the Saucony flows into the On- telaunee.
Maxatawny, according to Heckewelder, signifies bear's path stream, and this name was probably applied to what is now called Mill Creek. From this our township ob- tained the name of Maxatawny.
Moselem, another stream near town, sig- nifies trout stream and is well named as it continues one of the best trout fishing re- sorts to this dav.
Loskiel and Heckewelder, the Moravian
pitalitv even to strangers is regarded as a sacred duty. However their conduct tow= ard an enemy is cruel and when enraged, nothing short of murder and bloodshed is the result, and their fury knows no bounds." Much could be written about their dwelling, clothing, food, agriculture, hunting, war, trade, traveling, amusements, marriage, funerals, treaties, etc., but space does not permit.
Tamanend, commonly called Tamany, ac- cording to Heckewelder, was one of their ancient chiefs who never had an equal, and who may have lived as late as 1680.
LAP TA-WIN SOE
CHIEF LAPAWINSOE
missionaries, writing at length about Indian manners and customs, may here be quoted briefly. "Their skin is reddish brown, the hair black and coarse. Their smell, sight, and hearing is very acute and their mem- ory strong. In common life and conversa- tion the Indians observe great decency. They usually deal with one another and strangers with kindness and civility, and without empty compliments. Swearing and drunkenness was unknown prior to the ad- vent of the white man, and their vices were few. The aged are much respected ; hos-
Allumapes, also called Sassoonan, was chief from 1718 to 1728. Other chiefs of this tribe were Lingahonoa, Lapawinsoe, Tiscohan, Manangy, and Teedyuscung, the latter being made chief in 1756. Manangy is said to have been chief of the Schuyl- kill (roaring stream) Indians and may have sojourned here.
John D. Cremer writes that the Chiho- hockis, a sub-tribe of the Delawares, dwelt along the Schuylkill and west bank of the Delaware.
The famous Penn treaty was made in
7
CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF KUTZTOWN
1682, but after Penn's time the troubles of the Indians began. In 1737 the famous walking purchase took place at which time they were cheated out of much land. La- Dawinsoe and Tiscohan were signers of this walking purchase treaty.
Probably no other tribe of Indians cx- perienced so many vicissitudes, being driv- en from "post to pillar" and scattered with 110 permanent abode. Encroachment of white settlers compelled their removal to
Wyoming Valley in 1724, to Allengheny in 1742, to Ohio in 1751, to Indiana in 1770, to Missouri in 1789, later to Arkansas, to Texas in 1820, to Kansas in 1835, and, last- ly, to the Indian Territory in 1867, when united with the Cherokee Indians. Those who remained with the main body, num- bering 754 persons, appeared to be over their trouble and were assured of a perm- anent abode in their well earned "land of Canaan." They can look back contentedly upon the hardships of their exodus, as with their allotment of land and money held by the Government they are worth several thousand dollars per capita,-more than the average citizen of any civilized nation. However those who left the main body are scattered in Canada, Wisconsin and other states, and did not share in the allot- ment of land.
At some remote time they must have numbered many thousands, but during the last century this scattered tribe has at any one time comprised not more than 2400 to 3000 persons.
On September 7. 1732, Sassoonan and six other chiefs sold "all those lands lying and being on the said Schuylkill and the tributaries thereof, between the mountains called Lichai, ( Lchigh or South Moun- tains, ) to the south and the hills or moun- tains called, Keekochtatenni, ( Kittatinny or Blue Mountains, ) on the north between the branches of the Delaware river on the cast
and the water falling into the Susquehanna river on the west." This included our town site now celebrating its Centennial. The purchase price was as follows, namely :
20 brass kettles, 100 Stroudwater match coats of two yards each, 100 duffles, of two yards each; 100 blankets, 100 yards half tick, 60 linen shirts, 20 hats, 6 made coats, 12 pair shoes, 30 pair stockings, 300 pounds gun powder, 600 pounds lead, 20 fine guns, 12 gun locks, 50 tomahawks, 50 planting hoes, 120 knives, 60 pair scissors, 100 to- bacco tongs, 24 looking glasses, 40 tobacco boxes, 1000 flints, 5 pounds paint, 24 dozen garters, 6 dozen ribbons, 12 dozen rings, 200 awl blades, 400 tobacco pipes, 20 gal- lons rum, and 50 pounds money.
These land purchases suggest that when the Indians came into possession of iron hoes, knives, awls, etc., they cagerly ac- cepted these substitutes and discarded stone implements, which, no doubt, accounts for the many stone implements found on their camp sites.
When the French and Indian war broke out in 1755, many murders were committed bv Indians on the white settlers along the Blue Mountains. During this trying period a letter was written by Valentine Probst in Albany township, to Jacob Levan in Maxa- tawny, dated February 15, 1756, asking aid to defend themselves against these maraud-
ers. Mr. Levan was, no doubt, a large land holder and operator of Levan's Mill, near Eagle Point, built prior to 1740, now operated by a descendant of the same name. It is a matter of record that. "A road was laid out from Levan's Mill in Maxatawny to the King's Highway in Oley by John Yoder's fence." This road we may imagine followed an old Indian trail, and the writ- er remembers a number of remnants of this road from a point beyond the rail-
8
CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF KUTZTOWN
road cut to Bowers Station, existing forty years ago. It crossed a number of camp sites and beyond Bowers passed the famous Jasper quarries, ( where the Aborigines pro- cured the yellow, red and brown flint to make their best implements,) thence thru Forge Dale to Oley, which was also thick- ly settled by Indians.
Our townsman, A. N. Levan, relates an incident, the story of which was handed down in their family, that an Indian came stealthily to the mill and was shot by his ancestor and hurriedly buried under the porch steps of the old house which stood in what is now a little garden in front of the mill. Later two Indians came hunting for their partner but not finding him, re- treated.
It has also been handed down from gen-
eration to generation in the Kemp family and imparted to the writer by his friend, Nathan S. Kemp, that two Indians lingered in this section after their friends had left. One of them contracted small pox and was either accidentally or wilfully drowned in Benjamin Levan's mi'l race. The one re- maining whose name was Kneebuckle, left for parts unknown about 1760. During earlier years Indians often came to the De- walt Kemp home and slept by the log fire on the hearth, always departing before the family arose in the morning. Two prom- inent camp sites are located on this farm, a mile beyond Kemp's tavern. The writer on his first visit to this place about 1884, bor- rowed a basket to carry home his find of implements.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.