USA > Pennsylvania > Susquehanna County > The centennial of Susquehanna County > Part 7
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Bless the speakers of this day. Help them to bring to us some- thing that shall instruct and ennoble all who listen.
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Brothers and fathers and mothers-the old men and women-who have come to enjoy the festivities of this occasion. May their last days be their best days !
Let thy blessing rest on this celebration. May it not be charac- terized by drunkenness and debauchery, but by such acts as shall have the sanction of conscience, the approval of reason, and the " Well done" of God.
Reminded as we are by these gray heads, by these falling leaves and the autumnal moans of the dying year, of life's beauty, help us all to give earnest heed to the salvation of our souls.
Answer this our prayer for Christ's sake. Amen.
Hon. George A. Post, president of the day, then addressed the great throng as follows :
FELLOW-CITIZENS: Standing in this presence, I am obliged to con- fess that I was not born in Susquehanna County. But it was not my fault. For the accident of birth I am not responsible, and, besides, I came here just as soon as I wanted a good place in which to begin the battle of life. I am therefore an adopted son, but I can truth- fully say that I have always been treated like one of the family. To- day in all that may be said in laudation of this grand old county, in all the emotions of pride that may stir the hearts of those to the manor born, I shall know no different feeling than the natives of the county. In all that affects the material welfare of Susquehanna County I am deeply interested ; I have ever sought to identify myself with her people, and, by an extensive contact with them I have be- come thoroughly impregnated with the local pride with which they are imbued. As the naturalized citizen of foreign birth becomes en- amored of our benign institutions, so that when danger menaces them he shoulders his musket and braves the horrors of war for their pro- tection, and mingles his blood with that of the natives to show the strength of his devotion to the land of his adoption, so I, though but an adopted son of this county, rejoice in its history, take fraternal pleasure in the honors achieved by its sons and daughters, and in this Centennial jubilee join heart and soul, as we celebrate the work of the pioneers who blazed the way to the transformation of an area of dense forest into a county wherein upward of forty thousand people dwell in pleasant homes and pursue the myriad avocations incident to the civilization and advancement of the evening of the nineteenth century. Other counties there are in our Commonwealth greater in square miles of territory, more densely populated, more opulent, more fortunate in the geological formations underneath the surface of the soil, and more favored as natural or artificial centers of trade and manufactures, but I fearlessly assert that there is not one county in all Pennsylvania whose citizens are more loyal, honest, and intelligent. Among the best and foremost citizens of many States
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in the Union are found those whose first breath inhaled the pure air of our county, and who, wherever they are, have a warm place in their hearts for the clime of their kindred.
The coming together at this time of our citizens from near and far to exchange neighborly greetings is fraught with great interest, and such an occasion must have a wide-reaching influence for good. As this beautiful borough is thronged with hundreds of our substan- tial yeomanry, and we note the high intellectual character of our people as stamped unmistakably upon their faces, we cannot but feel that old Susquehanna is indeed a good community to live in, and that peopled as it is by so sturdy and worthy a body of inhabitants it is no wonder that it has always ranked high in the estimation of its sister counties in the State.
Brought together under the happy auspices of this Centennial cel- ebration, here in the vicinity where a century ago Ozias Strong made the first settlement, and where first the giants of the forests suc- combed to the settlers ax, in the territory now comprising our county, as our minds go back to the hardships, privations, loneliness. and dreary surroundings of those who established the sway of civili- zation here, let us draw a lesson and an inspiration from their trials and the vicissitudes of pioneer life, and if there be any who would repine because they are not as pleasantly situated as they desire, I would point to yon log cabin and ask, would you exchange places with those who a hundred years ago were dwellers in such rude struct- ures, and would you think it bearable to live as they, isolated from their fellows and exposed to innumerable dangers? I know your answer, and yet it is the sacrifices and irksome toil of those old set- tlers that we celebrate this day, and in memory of them we hold a carnival of good cheer, and from hill and dale we come with light hearts to begin a new century of human endeavor to this historic spot, now no longer a trackless, dreary waste, but the habitation of several hundred souls enjoying the blessings of cosy homes, good society, education, religious worship, and the beneficent government then but launched upon the sea of national existence, now the proudest nation on earth
Let us then be of good cheer, for ours is a goodly heritage. A health then to old Susquehanna. May her future years be crowded with the records of glorious prosperity, and may her sons and daught- ers ever be true men and women, steadfast in the right, scorning money, industrious and persevering, and as we now in grand diapason sound the praise of those who have gone before us, so may our prog- eny lift their voices in our honor when comes another hundred years.
At the conclusion of this speech, which was heartily applauded, the Hallstead Band rendered another selection, when President Post introduced Judge McCollum as one who was born and reared upon a
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farm in this county, who had always resided within its confines and who had achieved the highest distinction within the gift of his fellow- citizens-the president-judgeship of his native county. Judge Mc- Collum was received with great enthusiasm by the multitude, who listened with marked attention to the following valuable and inter- esting historical address :
A hundred years ago Ozias Strong, from Lee. Mass .. settled here. He was the first white inhabitant of the territory contained in this county. Around him was a wilderness occupied by wild beasts and traversed by Indians. On the banks of this beautiful river and in the shadow of these grand hills he built a log cabin and made a clearing. He was on a generous soil and in the midst of scenery attractive and inspiring, but without the advantages and protection afforded by civilized society. He was a pioneer in the work of subduing the forests and developing the resources of a new country. Of his life, his struggles, but his achievements here but little is now known. The public records inform us that in June, 1790, he bought of Tench Francis. a tract of land lying on the north side of the river in the vicinity of the present bridge : and he afterwards sold from it a farm to Johnathan Dimon, who settled here in 1791. In 1795 he removed from this settlement to Homer, N. Y., where he died in 1807.
In the same year that Ozias Strong bought of Francis a tract on the north side of the river Benajah Strong bought of the same landholder a tract on the south side of the river, containing 601 acres, lying on both sides of Salt Lick Creek. On the 21st of September, 1791, Benajah Strong sold his tract to M. Du Bois and Seth Putman. A portion, at least, of the present borough of Hallstead is within the lines of this tract. Du Bois afterwards became the exclusive owner of it and resided upon it. At one time, and near this point, he kept a tavern, where the early settlers were entertained on their journeys to and from the wilderness south of us where they were then building their log huts and making their first earnings. A large share of this tract is now owned by and in possession of his descendants, who unite with us in the festivities of this day.
In that portion of the Susquehanna Valley lying within our county and from which the townships of Great Bend, Harmony, and Oak- land were erected, there were, in 1787, evidences of the prior occu- pation of it by the Indians. Near us were the " three apple trees " which formed the rallying point and headquarters of all the Indians in the neighborhood. As early as 1779 these trees bore the marks of great age. Near them, in the summer of that year, sixteen hun - dred soldiers of the Revolution encamped en route to join the army of General Sullivan at the mouth of the Chemung River, in his memorable campaign against the Indians, who, incited by British
WYM Cochim
THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY.
ASTOR, LENOX AND TILDEN FOUNDATIONS
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agents and British gold, had united with the Tories in their murder- ous attacks upon the border settlements. These soldiers descended the Susquehanna upon rafts and landed here to pass the night. In the neighborhood of their camp was an Indian burying-ground. In the river not half a mile above us was an island which was a resort for Indian fishing and hunting parties. In Oakland, upon the West- fall farm, traces of an Indian village were found.
While at the time of the settlement of this valley by the whites the Indians were not in the actual occupancy of it, they frequently passed along and across it in considerable numbers.
In 1788 Daniel Buck and his sons, Ichabod and Benjamin, were settled on the north side of the river, about two miles above the present borough of Great Bend, at a point now known as Red Rock. It was stated in a newspaper article by the late Joseph Du Bois that "this romantic locality was known to the early settlers as the Painted Rock, from the fact that high up on the face of one of the cliffs, and far above the reach of man, was the painted figure of an Indian chief." J. B. Buck, in writing of the same locality, said that when his " father came to Red Rock it was all wild. But on examination marks were found that could not be accounted for. The rocks upon the river were painted red, and on the island was found the founda- tion of a house." These statements by descendants of pioneers of this valley point to the presence and work of civilized man in it be- fore any known settlement of it.
Moses Comstock was the first settler at the east bend of the Susque- hanna, near the pleasant village of Lanesborough, and it is believed that he was located there in November, 1787. He and his sons for a dozen years at least occupied and improved lands there which he was eventually compelled to relinquish on demand of the Pennsyl- vania claimant, as he had no title to the land which the Pennsylvania authorities recognized. There is little doubt from the evidence at- taintable on this subject that Ozias Strong and Moses Comstock, with their families, were the only white inhabitants of this valley in that year. Jonathan Bennett stopped in Oakland a short time be- fore, locating in Great Bend in 1788, and afterwards sold an improve- ment there to lsaac Hale. who came there in 1790; but whether he made the improvement before settling in Great Bend cannot be stated. In Miss Blackman's history of the county four townships are designated as " settled" in 1787. These are mentioned in the order of their settlement, and are Great Bend, Harmony, Oakland, and Brooklyn. It is stated, however, in the same history, that there was not à house in Oakland prior to 1788, and that Jonathan Bennett arrived there that year. I cannot discover that Oakland had a white inhabitant in 1787, but as my researches on this subject have not been exhaustive the statement of the history referred to is not dis- puted. I merely say that I have not found the evidence on which it rests.
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The first settlement in Brooklyn was along the Hopbottom on lands of John Nicholson. These lands, in 1787, Nicholson attempted to colonize, and in five years he collected about forty Irish and German families from Philadelphia and " down the Susquehanna," who were induced to move upon the lands by his promises of supplies and as- sistance. Adam Miller, Richard McNamara, and Robert Patterson were first settlers there. As Nicholson failed to redeem his promises many of these settlers became discouraged and abandoned the lands.
In 1787 not more than six white families were settled in the county, and the clearings of that year would not equal in extent the improved land upon an average " hundred-acre farm " of to-day.
There were no settlements in the county prior to 1789 except those in this valley and along the Hopbottom in Brooklyn. In that year settlements were made in New Milford and Herrick, and before 1800 settlements were made in twenty-one of the twenty-seven townships in the county. Before the date last mentioned there were no settle- ments in the towships of Apolacon, Choconut, Silver Lake, Jackson. Ararat, and Thomson. These were settled in the order named, and the first settlement in Thomson was made in 1820.
It would be interesting to note the growth of these settlements from the first dwellings made in them to well-regulated and prosperous communities in the enjoyment of the advantages and the security which the highest civilization affords ; and it would be pleasant and appropriate to this occasion to consider the part of each actor in their organization and development, and to award to each the tribute of respect and gratitude justly due. But a moment's reflection will con- vince any one that this cannot be done within the limits of an ad- dress admissible to-day. It is not alone the few settlers here in 1787 who are entitled to the rank and consideration of pioneers in the work of creating from a wilderness a grand county, now filled with happy homes, and in which we have a justifiable pride. It was thirty-three years from the first settlement in Great Bend Township to the first settlement in Thomson Township. It was nearly twenty- three years after the first clearing was made in this valley that the act creating our county was passed, and it was nearly twenty-five years before its organization was completed by the election of offi- vers. All who participated in the work of felling the forests, clear- ing the lands, and planting civilization and local governments here were pioneers ; and all who bore an honorable part in this work are entitled to high praise for the courage and endurance exhibited in wrestling with the perils and privations involved in it.
In 1790 the territory, now constituting the county of Susquehanna, was embraced in the townships of Tioga and Wyalusing, Luzerne County. In 1791 the court of Luzerne ordered the creation of the township of Willingborough from the northeast corner of Tioga. Its boundaries were defined in 1793. and these made the township 6 miles
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north and south by 15 miles east and west, and included the present townships of Great Bend, Harmony, and Oakland, with the boroughs created from them. In the same year Ichabod Buck was appointed constable of the new township. Horatio Strong and Johnathan Ben- nett were appointed supervisors, and Ichabod Buck and Elisha Leon- ard were appointed overseers of the poor. These were the first offi- cers of the first township entirely within the lines of the county. It embraced all the settlements in the Susquehanna Valley. Its growth in wealth and population was not rapid. In 1800 it contained ninety taxables, and the amount of taxes levied that year were $810.58. In 18ro the total population of the valley settlements then contained in the townships of Great Bend and Harmony were four hundred and thirty-one. At that time Oakland was a part of Harmony, from which it was taken in 1853.
The Harford settlement, or as it was known, "Nine Partners" settlement, was located in 1790, but the proprietors did not bring their families there until the spring of 1792. It was organized as a town- ship in 1808, and its population in 1810 was 477.
When our county was created by legislative enactment it was embraced in ten townships of old Luzerne, and these were Willing- borough, Nicholson, Lawsville, Braintrim, Rush, Clifford, Bridge- water, New Milford, Harford, and Harmony. Of these Willingbor- ough, Harford, Harmony, New Milford, and Lawsville were entirely within the present boundaries of this county. The remaining town- ships were divided by the southern and western lines of the new county, and the census of 1810 did not disclose the number of inhabi- tants then residing in that portion of them brought into the new county of Susquehanna. The population of the five townships men- tioned as within the lines of the county in 1810 was 1, 255. Bridge- water then had a population of 1,418, and but a very few of those were in Luzerne County. It should be stated in this connection that at that time Bridgewater embraced, besides its present area, all of Brooklyn, Lathrop, Springville, Dimock, Silver Lake, and Montrose, the eastern parts of Jessup and Forest Lake, and the south part of Franklin.
Clifford Township, as it existed in 1810, had a population of 675, but what proportion of this was south of the present county line is not known. New Milford in that year had 174 inhabitants, and Lawsville had 169. The exact population of our county at the time of its creation could not, for the reasons already stated, be ascer- tained. The first census, after its organization, was taken by Bela Jones, and showed a population of 9,958. While the act creating our county was passed February 21, 1810, its organization was not completed until 1812. Its first officers were : Davis Dimock and William Thomson, associate judges; Edward Fuller, sheriff ; Chas. Fraser, prothonotary, clerk of the courts and register and recorder ;
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Isaac Post, treasurer ; Bartlett Hinds, Labon Capron, and Isaac Brownson, commissioners ; Jonah Brewster, commissioners' clerk, and Stephen Wilson, coroner. The county seat was located at Mont- rose in 1811 ; the corner-stone of the first court-house was laid in 1812, but the building was not erected until 1813. The first court was held January, 1813, in the ball-room of Isaac Post's tavern, John Bannister Gibson, afterward chief justice of Pennsylvania, and among the ablest jurists the country has produced, presiding with his asso- ciates, Dimock and Thomson.
Wm. Jessup was the first president judge of our courts who resided in the county, and Almon H. Read and Benjamin T. Case were the first practicing attorneys located here.
The first constables of the different townships under the new county organization were qualified in open court April 26th, 1813. The first assessment of taxes by the new county was for 1813, and the amount of the duplicates issued to the collectors was $3, 154.
Philander Stephens was the first Representative in Congress from this county, Charles Fraser the first State senator and Jabez Hyde, jr., the first representative in the lower house of the State legislature.
In 1874 our county became a separate judicial district, and at the expiration of the terms of the then incumbents the office of associate judge ceased to exist in it. Before that period we were connected with neighboring counties in a judicial district. In the seventy-five years of our complete county life the office of president judge of our courts has been filled by citizens of our own country a little more than thirty-two years.
We have always been connected with neighboring counties in Con- gressional and senatorial districts, and sometimes in legislative dis- tricts. We have been represented in Congress by our own citizens twenty-two years, in the State senate twenty-six years, and in the house of representatives at Harrisburg seventy-one years. The second Speaker of the American Congress from Pennsylvania was a citizen of Susquehanna County. It is gratifying to know that the record made by these Representatives of the people in the legislative bodies of the State and nation is a clean and creditable one. It is a record of fidelity to public trust and ability, in the execution of it in which the county has pride and satisfaction to-day.
For the few facts and dates now presented concerning the first set- tlements in and the organization of our county I am mainly in- debted to Miss Blackman's history, and to it and the Centennial his- tory now, or soon to be, published by R. T. Peck & Co., reference must be had for detailed information respecting the growth and progress of the county, the individual actors in the work of settling and developing it, the privations endured and the obstacles overcome In them. These make a record of especial value to the descendants of the pioneers, and one that is full of entertainment and instruction
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for all who have an interest in and desire to know the county history. One of the tendencies of this festival is to increase the interest in this subject and the disposition in us to preserve and transmit to the next generation a faithful record of the events, experiences, and methods of our own. It is well that this interest should be quickened and this disposition strengthened, for without these an intelligent and complete history of a people is impossible.
As a class the early settlers of our county were brave men and women. They deliberately entered upon a work requiring, for its successful execution, courage, enterprise, and endurance; and these qualities they possessed in a high degree. Their purpose was to con- quer a wilderness, to clear the hill-sides and valleys of our rugged county and convert them into pleasant and productive grass and grain fields, and to build there comfortable homes for themselves and their posterity. It is not easy for us, in the full possession of the fruits of their labor and the conveniences and privileges enjoyed by populous and prosperous communities in our day, to comprehend the nature and magnitude of their undertaking. Before them was a pathless forest. Into it they resolutely entered with enough provisions for their immediate wants and a few household effects and rude imple- ments of husbandry, with perhaps a cow and yoke of oxen or pair of horses. These, with their robust manhood and womanhood and their unconquerable spirit, constituted the capital invested in the enterprise. They selected the land they proposed to occupy and improve, and upon it a site for a dwelling. Here they made the first clearing and from the trees felled to make it built a log cabin.
It was a rude structure compared with the dwellings that adorn the hills and valleys of our county now, but it sheltered them from the storm and was their home, and soon there clustered about it the at- tachments and attractions that belong to no other place in this world.
In 1787 there was one such cabin at this point, another near Lanesborough, and two or three along the Hopbottom in Brooklyn, and these were the only human habitations then existing in this county. Then communication between the inhabitants along the Hopbottom and the settlers in this valley involved a tedious journey on foot. There was an isolation in the life they led that the sons and daughters of this day could hardly bear. It alone was enough to ap- pal the stoutest heart, but it developed in those who were compelled to endure it a self-reliance and sturdy independence and strength of character essential to the success of a great undertaking. They had neither time nor disposition to indulge in useless murmurings and vain regrets or to contrast their condition with that of the inhabi- tants of the older communities. The situation exacted unremitting toil to supply their immediate wants, to make comfortable homes and provide a competence for their declining years. To accomplish these objects it was necessary for them to exercise good judgment and prac-
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tice strict economy in their expenditures and in the care, preserva- tion, and use of the products of their labor.
The utmost exertion on their part was necessary to provide the bare necessaries of life, and their food and clothing was often of the coarsest kind. If they raised grain sufficient to feed their families they had no conveniences for preparing it for use, as there were no grist mills within the county or their reach. It is related of Ichabod Buck. by his son, J. B. Buck, that for five years after his arrival at Red Rock he had to pound the grain in a mortar to make flour and bread. Many cases of the same or a similar character might be cited illustrating the necessities and expedients of the early settlers in their struggle for subsistence. But the record proves that amid all these privations and hardships their faith in ultimatesuccess did not waver. They believed that upon these hills and in these valleys patient and intelligent labor would finally have its reward in substantial homes and comforts for an honest and independent yeomanry.
This belief had full vindication in their achievements here. Those who were industrious and economical and did not meet with disas- trous reverses possessed in their declining years productive and well- stocked farms, with comfortable buildings upon them, and the neces- sary implements of husbandry to properly work them. Upon these farms they had raised large families, and to their sons and daughters they had given such an education, or at least the rudiments of it, as the district schools afforded. This was the average outcome of the life of the early settler here. Some fell short of this and others ex- ceeded it. But the average result was triumph enough, and could only have been achieved by qualities and spirit worthy of high com- mendation and lasting honor. The results mentioned, however, were not all that was achieved. They built roads and bridges, school houses, and churches, and maintained them ; and in all that pertains to citizenship in a free country acquitted themselves manfully.
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