Local History: Chapter VIII: Material Improvements : Bean's 1884 History of Montgomery Co, PA Contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by Susan Walters USGENWEB NOTICE: Printing this file by non-commercial individuals and libraries is encouraged, as long as all notices and submitter information is included. Any other use, including copying files to other sites requires permission from the submitters PRIOR to uploading to any other sites. We encourage links to the state and county table of contents. บบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบ BEAN'S HISTORY OF MONTGOMERY COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA บบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบ 102 (cont.) CHAPTER VIII. MATERIAL IMPROVEMENTS TO show at a glance what marvels God bath wrought through teeming brain and brawny arm of civilized man, let imagination summon before us the Montgomery County of three centuries ago. Silence brooded over the land, broken only by yells of savage men and more savage wild beasts, relieved perhaps by the murmuring brooklet and roar of the waterfall. Primeval nature reigned supreme; traversed in its whole length by a noble river and confluent creeks, our territory offered nothing to the emigrant-but towering forests, spontaneous shrubbery, and wild game. Rocks and fallen timber encumbered the ground, but limestone, marble, iron, copper, and clay, which now as by magic take protean forms of usefulness, were hidden beneath the soil, almost unknown to civilized man. Our river and great creeks were obstructed by driftwood, rocks, and shoals, and the simple red man knew only foot-paths or birch canoes as means of travel from one hunting- or fishing-place to another. Our European ancestors also, with the mere rudiments of civilization, fleeing from civil and religious 103 oppression of the Old World, were mainly intent on liberty and abundant food. They were mostly peasant farmers, with a few artisans indispensable to the agriculturist. As, however, settlers of various nationalities, attracted by Penn's liberal institutions, became seated along our valleys, they were drawn to the river and creeks not only by the fertility of the land but for supplies of game and fish. They therefore set about improving the streams with rude dams, weirs, and other contrivances for catching the migratory species, which soon led to contests with other occupants above who needed the river for transportation and travel. The law soon interfered in favor of the latter party; but even thus protected as a high-say the river could only be so used safely in spring or in time of high water. Thus, unlike the present, they were hemmed in and obliged to live almost entirely on farm products. Still the territory filled up with a constant stream of pilgrim religionists, a rugged, industrious people, who came with two chief aims, -civil liberty and the right to worship God unawed by governmental interference. Thus situated our fathers felt the need of improvements of every description, public, private, and social, but the time for the full fruition of these had not yet come. Having thus briefly epitomized our early settlement and civilization, we return to narrate more in detail what was founded looking to intercommunication, productive industry, and the erection of churches, schools, and other public buildings. To found these required the gathering of materials, such as timber, stone, and lime, unaided by modern machinery, as also the opening of roads, bridging of streams, utilizing water-courses, building mills, clearing navigable streams, and the like. Our topic, then, for the remainder of this chapter will be to describe what our fathers first founded and built up of a material kind, denominated in law betterments, or public improvements. The nature of the undertaking, historically divides itself into three eras, -the colonial dependent, national formative, labor-saving or improvement ages. The first embraces the time from the landing of the Hollanders, Swedes, and British to the Revolution, or between 1640 and 1780, one hundred and forty years; the second, from independence to 1830, fifty years; and the third from thence to the present, about fifty-five years. The first two exhibit us chiefly as an agricultural people, striving to secure comfort and independence by rigid industry and frugal living; the last finds us reaching out after domestic grandeur and continental empire. This opening and two succeeding chapters, therefore, will be devoted to improvements of a strictly material kind, leaving to other and succeeding ones those of a social, moral, industrial, and political character. The object here shall be to give a summary of the material growth and social development of the county during distinct eras, covering our whole history, rather than statistics of date, cost, and so forth, inasmuch as this review is but introductory to what is to follow in other chapters of the work. PART I. - THE COLONIAL DEPENDENT ERA. At the commencement of the colonial age our ancestors were like half-taught youth, let loose from school almost untrained in the practical life that lay before them. In a strange wild country, new domestic habits had to be learned afresh. Most of them had been accustomed to a serving condition of life, charged with no responsibilities beyond daily tasks, and the rule of law left behind them everywhere meant force, arbitrary force. But they came here on a mission of peace to all men, to establish justice and love. Instead, therefore, of fighting the natives, as did Cortez and Pizarro, they attacked the forests and cumbering rocks, which fell or were removed from before them on every side. The first wan' was habitations of shelter from the elements and prowling beasts, but they built no "block-houses" of defense even against the savage. Seeking out, therefore, near a spring a southern declivity, to give protection from the cold, a rude cabin of logs was built, or perhaps, at first, only a cave dug into a bank and covered with hewn slabs or bark served for a habitation. Provided also with a few tools of iron and steel and some vessels of tin and wood, their toil began, while the generous Indian looked on admiring and pleased with his new "brother." A habitation thus finished, a small clearing made, with a few domestic animals, and a supply of seeds for planting, the enfranchised emigrant felt himself "lord of the manor." But his beloved children, so necessary to assist in developing the homestead and future of the family, were the next source of solicitude. The greatest want of the settlement now, therefore, was a rude school-house, which might also serve as a place for religious meetings; it was soon up, in like manner of logs, by the joint effort of the neighborhood. Contemporaneous with the first public institution just described came the neighborhood smith-shop to make and repair farm implements, and the rude mill to prepare the new grain for food. These were all established, not much more advanced in architecture than the family domicile, but they served the age. The next want of a public nature was the cart-road needful for business and travel. Many of these, however, were but well-worn horse or foot-paths through timber-lands or clearings, for, perhaps, the cart was not even yet provided. We have little, information that the Hollanders and Swedes laid out and established any permanent highways previous to Penn's proprietary government, although their coming antedates his by many years. But no sooner had the latter landed founded his city and "the three counties," than roads and civilization began to radiate from Philadelphia. We break the thread of narrative here to remark that it is creditable to our ancestors that, notwithstanding Mexico, South America, and the islands of the coast 104 had been already hunted, as by ravaging beasts, for precious metals, our fathers went in to plowing and reaping, as though America had never been reported the "land of gold." There is scarcely a record adverse to this statement in all our early history. Philadelphia City and County, founded 1682, of which we were a part for a century, early began to stretch its arms towards the interior, and our borders soon commenced to throng with settlers, as before described. As settlements spread, highways were ordered to be surveyed and opened from the city in nearly every inland direction. Of course these were what we now call "dirt-roads". Many of them little wider than sufficient for carts to pass each other on the way. And often, with the view of accommodating land-owners, they were run out of direction to the objective-point in order to follow line fences; or, if striving to make a straight one, they would carry it over almost inaccessible hills and through deep valleys, instead of winding along streams in the general direction, as is done by judicious surveyors of the present day. [See NOTE 8-1.] [NOTE 8-1.] In illustration of this latter remark, the author knows of a township in a neighboring county where nearly all the highways, as first located, have been recently vacated and laid out as above. [FINIS NOTE 8-1.] Within forty years after Penn's government was founded great roads were laid out leading from the city to the interior, a particular description of which, with dates and objective-points, shall be given in another chapter, to which the reader is referred. It may be remarked here, however, that the Proprietary had no sooner arranged with the Indians for the territory than his surveyors were at work laying out highways, running the lines upon new purchases, until by 1740 most of the land of the present Montgomery County had been parceled out and nearly settled by Swedes, Welsh, and English on the southern and central borders, and by Germans on the northwest, with a sprinkling of Hollanders, French, and Scotch-Irish distributed from the Delaware westward, the centre. The roads just laid out and the Schuylkill, as stated before, were the only avenues to and from the city, or local points on the way. Having become masters of their homes, and the territory laid off into townships, the people soon had municipal governments to regulate their improvements and public wants. A ready method of crossing streams was early looked after, but beyond canoes, ferries, and a few wooden bridges and footlogs, fords were the only modes of transit from one side to another. Except the university, established near the close of the colonial age, few high schools of learning bad been founded, only the primary school for children and youth bad been erected; the locality and fitness of such at this time it would be impossible to point out. But of the church buildings and grist-mills (both public institutions or improvements)we have more definite information; the churches will now be partially located and described in the order of their erection, from the best information at hand. CHURCH BUILDINGS OF THE COLONIAL AGE. -The first church edifice erected beyond city limits in Pennsylvania and located in our county was Friends' Welsh meeting-house, at Merion, 1695. Enlarged 1713. [See NOTE 8-2.] Abington, Friends, Abington, 1697. Enlarged 1786 Gwynedd, Friends, 1700. Rebuilt 1715. St. Thomas, Episcopal, White Marsh, 1710. Rebuilt 1817 and 1870. Plymouth, Friends, Plymouth, 1712. Partially rebuilt. Abington, Presbyterian, Abington, 1714. Rebuilt. Old Goshenhoppen, Lutheran Reformed, Upper Salford, 1716. Baptist, Montgomery township, 1720. St. James', Episcopal, Evansburg, 1721. Rebuilt. Horsham, Friends, Horshamville, 1724. Rebuilt 1803. Norriton, Presbyterian, 1730. Providence, Presbyterian, 1737. New Goshenhoppen, Lutheran, 1739. Rebuilt. Boehm's, Reformed, Whitpaine, 1740. Falkner's Swamp, Lutheran, New Hanover, 1740. St. Augustus', Lutheran, Trappe, 1743. Standing, but a new one built. Upper Providence, Friends, 1743. Rebuilt 1828. Reformed, Upper Salford, 1744. Reformed, New Hanover, 1747. Rebuilt 1790. St. Luke's, Reformed, Trappe, 1750. Twice rebuilt. Friends', Pottstown, 1753. Rebuilt. Puff's Lutheran, Upper Dublin, 1753. Mennonist, Lower Salford, 1755. German Baptist, near Fairview, 1755. Reformed and Lutheran (Union), Pottstown, 1760. Christ's, Swedes, Swedes' Ford, 1760. St. Peter's, Lutheran, Barren Hill, 1761. Rebuilt. Schwenkfelder's, near Kulpsville, 1765. St. Paul's, Lutheran, Lower Merion, 1769. Twice rebuilt. St. John's, Lutheran, Centre Square, 1769. Rebuilt 1828. Bethel, Methodist Episcopal, Whitpaine, 1770. New Goshenhoppen, Reformed, Upper Hanover, 1770. Lutheran and Reformed, Gwynedd, 1774. [NOTE 8-2.] This claim of priority is plausibly and earnestly contested in favor of Norriton Presbyterian Church edifice, near Fairview, which, externally, bears the strongest evidence of its being erected as early as the landing of Penn at Philadelphia. It is believed by intelligent persons familiar with the locality that it was originally built of logs by Hollenders, and some short time after rebuilt of stone when the Scotch-Irish joined them, about 1700 or 1720. There were ancient tombstones, according to the recollections of persons recently deceased, holding dates before 1700, which were used by masons many years ago in making repairs about the building. The records of the church, if there were any, have been lost, so that this questionable claim rests solely upon tradition. It is proper to add, however, that persons, through whom these traditions come, affirmed that within their memory the house had a hip-roof, which the present does not have. [FINIS NOTE 8-2.] 105 The following (as others necessarily overlooked) are believed to date back to the colonial age, but the exact period cannot be obtained: Mennonist, Towamencin; Schwenkfelder, Worcester; Reformed, near Telford, Franconia; German Baptist, Norriton; Schwenkfelder, New Hanover; German Baptist, Indian Creek, Lower Salford; Mennonist, Upper Providence; Schwenkfelder, Upper Hanover; Mennonist, Lower Salford; Schwenkfelder, Marlborough. Perhaps many of the structures above recorded were at first but rude buildings of logs. Most of them were rebuilt within a generation of their erection, and some several times, as will be noted hereafter. THE ANCIENT GRIST-MILLS. -To prepare grain to bread the people and feed domestic animals was one of the most indispensable wants of a newly-settled people; but to prepare a full list of the early mills of the county is still more difficult than of the churches, for the former had no records as the latter to supply the information. Without attempting, therefore, the exact dates, or being sure that near all are included, we name the more famous of them, with the time of their erection and their founders, so far as known. Of course, much of this information rests upon tradition alone. As prepared timber was also one of the most important factors in our early industry, the saw-mill was attached to nearly every grist-mill, but was often seen by itself on petty streams that only furnished power in spring or wet weather. There were probably three or four sawmills in our county then where one exists today they have disappeared with our old-time forests. There were also numerous oil- and bark-mills in the German districts, and some for preparing clover and plaster, and a few in the south and east for carding wool for home spinning and weaving. The following, therefore, is a very incomplete list of the early flouring and chopping-mills existing in our part of Philadelphia County previous to the Revolution: Farmer's grist-mill, on Wissahickon, near Flourtown, about 1705; grist-mill by Edward Lane, on the Perkiomen, near stone bridge, 1708; Norris' Egypt Mill at (now) Norristown, probably 1715; Potts' on Manatawny, Pottstown, 1725; Gulf Mills, 1747; Spring Mill, in White Marsh, probably about 1750; Hunsberger's, on Perkiomen, 1725; two mills on Skippack, near Evansburg, probably about 1740; Pennypacker's, on Skippack; Moyer's, on Upper Perkiomen; Shoemaker's (now Bosler's), at Shoemakertown, 1758; Potts', on Valley Creek, Valley Forge, about 1760; Davis', in Upper Dublin, 1750; Samuel Shuler's, on Swamp Creek, 1742 (now in ruins) ; Jacob Graeff's, at Perkiomenville, 1760; mill at the mouth of Mingo Creek; Hillegas' mill, on Macoby Creek, Upper Hanover; Tyson's mill, on Stony Creek, near Norristown; Butler's mill, on Butler's road; Wertzner's, on Morris road; Detwiler's, on Wissahickon; several grist mills and a fulling-mill on the Tacony, in Cheltenham; several grist-mills in Moreland township before 1785. The foregoing list does not probably contain more than half the grist- and chopping-mills in service during the colonial age. For it must be remembered that while our English rulers were extremely jealous of all attempts at manufacturing iron or cloths in America, they were glad to receive from us cargoes of flour; hence grinding and preparing flour for exportation was a leading and extensive business at that early day. While the colonial inhabitants of our county, during the first halfcentury of their history, were busy clearing the land and substituting stone and framed houses of wood for the log cabins first occupied, they bad little time or means to found public institutions other than school-houses, churches, mills, and attend to the opening of public roads, as has been imperfectly described. They were exclusively an agricultural people, and lacked nearly every mechanical appliance now so universally employed to provide for comfortable living. The mother-country kept our fathers in leading-strings till it grew into a cant sarcasm "that it was not lawful to fabricate anything in America more valuable than a hob-nail;" and, compared with the present, farming was of true rudest description. Plows were of the unwieldy pattern used in England, many of them having wooden mould-boards to turn the soil; wheat was cut with a sickle, gathered and thrashed by hand; hay was cut with a scythe, fastened to a straight sauth, requiring the laborer to work a long summer day, stooping nearly to the ground; and when harvested, and his small surplus prepared for market, it must be borne over miry roads in springless wagons to the city for exchange for the few groceries and British manufactured goods he could afford to purchase in return. Nearly all the consumption of the family, however, was raised upon the farm. Flax, grown, rotted, swingled, spun at home, and woven by the village weaver, supplied shirting, bedding, and summer wear, -the last often ornamented as checks or plaids by copperas and butternut dyes. Sheep yielded their carcasses for food and for winter flannels; and after the laboring ox had done the summer hauling and been fattened the flesh was consumed or sold, and the hide went to the tannery to be converted into leather for home use. Autumn was a busy time with the farmer and his family the winter grain being sown, corn-husking, cider-making, and quilting-parties were in order, each household making a "bee" in succession, till the neighborhood corn was husked, and the winter bedding quilted by the females of the locality. As winter approached, piles of wood surrounded the homestead. The butchering being done, soap made of lye, leached in the "gum" (a hollow log set on a bench), candles made ("tallow dips"), with apples, cider, and root crops all in the cellar or buried in the garden. And they are ready for the village tailor and shoemaker, who each was expected to "whip the cat," -that is, bring his tools and board with the family while making up the 106 home material into shoes and clothing for the family. These rude mechanics were expected also to do their work in the kitchen with the family, and work until bedtime. By light of the aforesaid "dips," for there were no ten-hour regulations in those days, as most indoor tradesmen worked till nine at night, and field hands from "sun to sun." This description of farmer life in the olden time only needs the further picturing of the rustic (fireplace, half across the room, on which green back-log, expected to last a week, or perchance an elongated rock, before and over which hickory cord-wood was piled, where it crackled and blazed, while, perchance, an imaginative little boy or girl sat before bedtime in the corner listening to the "salamander" piping its plaintive note in the simmering fire. Or we may imagine further that the infantile members of the family are warmly blanketed for the night, possibly in the open, unceiled garret, and the mother has taken the great singing wheel and is spinning stocking-yarn, while the daughters or "help" sit around knitting by the faint light of one of the "dips, twelve in a pound." On the other side of the uncarpeted kitchen the father and elder son are seated upon spades, placed over and resting upon half-bushel measures, into which they are shelling the yellow corn by the light of the kitchen fire. A half grown boy and smaller sister gather the flying cobs and work them into a "make-believe" school-house or dwelling; presently the elder brother, intent on fun, flings a cob at the juvenile edifice, making it fall about their ears, as air-castles do at the feet of anxious builders in maturer life. A laugh from the sisters, added to the chagrin of the young architects, produces a modern "confusion of tongues," when the mother steps forth to quell the row, makes peace, as only mothers can, find the work goes on as before. But these things have passed away from all our borders, and the book, paper, piano, and sewing machine have taken their place. In those days power-help, and even band implement, except the plow, harrow, cider-mill, and some flax-dressing and spinning contrivances, were unknown on the farm or in the household; and the few mechanic workshops that, with the tavern and store, made up the cross-road village were of the humblest kind. Of these, also, there were rarely more than the blacksmith, wheelwright, shoemaker, tailor, and a, some important places the joiner or carpenter, with the hatter and saddler, all working with rude tools, and almost without labor-saving fixtures of any kind The foregoing description indicates to the people of our time bow our fathers and mothers worked and lived a hundred years ago. Thus circumstanced, our people still united with Philadelphia, though heterogeneous in nationality, had nevertheless become reasonably homogeneous in language and civilization, when the throes of impending revolution began to be felt on every hand. Soon the storm of "grim visaged" war burst, and most of our people went into the contest for independence, though many of our best citizens stood aloof in obedience to religious convictions; but we had a future of material development, which opens in the next chapter. PART II-NATIONAL FORMATIVE ERA. The war being virtually ended 1781, and two years later acknowledged by Great Britain, our fathers, loaded with debt, public and private, and burdened with depreciated currency, set to work to repair the waste and disaster of the great struggle. Seven years' abstraction of the laboring population from the farm and workshop had run down the cleared land; with repeated croppings, and beside left us almost without skilled workmen of any kind. Heavy State and national debts were also to be provided for, as well as inchoate governments brought into unison with the great declaration of 1776. Pennsylvania having in 1780 adopted a new Constitution abolishing slavery and providing for future expansion, the people began in earnest to lay broad and deep the foundation of our present improved condition by dividing it into more convenient territorial divisions. Accordingly, one year after the treaty of peace, our county was set apart from Philadelphia, and we began to improve our heritage anew. But while the farm, roadway, and bridge had each been neglected during the war, and all needed immediate attention, the unsettled character of our national government and its foreign complications, with war raging in Europe, soon drew the public mind away from home development. The period we are considering now was, therefore, eminently formative and reconstructive, as to political effort and civilization. Our industry, as before stated, was exclusively agricultural, and the first effort towards material improvement was in further clearing the land, opening roads, building bridges, mills, schools, churches, and dwellings for a growing population. Our national constitution no sooner adopted and the government put into operation than the want of intercommunication by water between the east and west of our State was felt, and some of our statesmen and engineers set about making the Schuylkill available as an outlet to the Susquehanna, as also available for freight and travel along its border, and towards the great west. Accordingly, a colonial project (conceived so early as 1761, and an act then passed to improve the navigation of our river, which came to nothing) was revived by a new law, passed Sept. 29, 1791, which organized a company to open canal navigation to its upper waters, as also to connect such works with the Susquehanna by a union canal, as was done some years later. This project had the active co-operation of Robert Morris, David Rittenhouse, Dr. Smith, of the university, as most other of our early statesmen. The scheme as first devised was to unite the two rivers by what has since been called the "Union Canal"; but early the next 107 year the projectors at Philadelphia, to make the junction more sure, began in 1792 to excavate a channel up the river, and it was almost accomplished to the mouth of Stony Creek, but 1794 discouraged the company by reason of lack of funds, and the work was abandoned, after expending nearly half a million of money. Contemporaneously with this afterwards abandoned work it was resolved to turnpike a great road leading towards "Fort Pitt," as our western metropolis was then called. Accordingly, the first macadamized highway in the State was begun from Philadelphia to Lancaster in 1792, and finished two years later, at a cost of seven thousand five hundred dollars per mile. This great work, which was then regarded of national importance. As it led from what was then the capital to the great West, was laid out nearly parallel with the old Lancaster road, but upon selected grades to avoid hills and ravines, And most of the large streams were covered with stone bridges. This improvement crosses our county nearly five miles. Within seven years of its completion a similar one was chartered, and began to turnpike the "Old York road", as it was called, now entitled Cheltenham and Willow Grove turnpike, starting from Fourth and Vine, Philadelphia, passing through Willow Grove and Hatborough to the Delaware, in the direction of New York, chartered 1803, and finished 1804. A year or two earlier another company was organized called the Germantown and Perkiomen, passing out of the city by way of Second Street, through Germantown to Chestnut Hill, thence (taking the bed of the old road laid out to Plymouth Meeting, 1687) to Perkiomen bridge. To cooperate with this last important work the great stone bridge over the Perkiomen, still existing in good condition, was undertaken. It was the joint work of the Turnpike Company and the county, assisted with funds raised by a lottery authorized by law. Some of the tickets of this drawing are extant, bearing the sign-manual of Gen. Peter Muhlenberg, of Revolutionary fame. This road of about twenty-five miles, costing two hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars, or eleven thousand dollars per mile, begun 1798, was finished 1802. A few years later, 1815, another company from the Stone Bridge just described to the latter place completed the Perkiomen and Reading. About the same time, or a little later, the Ridge road was turnpiked by a corporation called the Ridge Turnpike Company, commencing work at Ninth and Vine Streets, Philadelphia, via Roxborough, Barren Hill, and Norristown, to the same noted terminus, Perkiomen bridge. It was completed in 1816. In 1814 the pike, intersecting with the Philadelphia and Perkiomen at Chestnut Hill, deflected to the northward to Spring House, in Gwynedd township, from which, in 1814, it was continued to Bethlehem, in what is now Lehigh County. The foregoing comprise nearly all the highways leading, through our county which were turnpiked during the second era, now under consideration. While these improvements were going forward, however, numerous lateral and bisecting public roads, by order of court, were laid out and opened, but being of modern construction they will not be here named. From the earliest colonial age law that the poor should be cared for by "overseers", of which each township elected one or more. Very soon counties in the every part of the State began to found almshouses. In 1806 our influential member of the Assembly, N. B. Boieau, procured a law for the erection of one in our county, which was soon built upon a farm of two hundred and sixty-five acres, situated on the Schuylkill, in Upper Providence township. The establishment consisted of several detached buildings, which were in 1878 rebuilt and enlarged, with all the modern conveniences, and it now compares favorably with any institution of the kind in the State. We will now go back and record the founding of the public buildings, consequent upon the location of the county-seat here by the-act of Sept. 10, 1784. In order to do this understandingly it will be necessary to outline the plot of the town of "Norris," -so written on the draft on file in the recorder's office, as laid out in 1785 by William Moore Smith, whose father, on behalf of Pennsylvania University, held the remaining part of the tract of land. The law specified that the place should be selected "on the East Side of the Schuylkill, near Stony Run;" they therefore chose the ridge between that stream and sawmill Run a half-mile eastward. Taking Egypt road (so named because it led to fertile country called the "fatlands," about the Perkiomen) as his baseline, and making it eighty feet wide, he marked a parallel street five hundred and fifty feet distant and northward, and called it Airy Street, sixty-six feet wide. Placing the county lot between, and extending to each of those streets, on the dividing-line or water-shed between those two confluents of the river, he proceeded to mark at right angles two perpendicular streets, also sixty-six feet wide, at the distance of five hundred and fifty feet from each other; the one on the west (and bounding the county lot) was called Swede Street, and the other, eastward, De Kalb Street. In the rear of each of these, except Airy, and two hundred and fifty feet distant, be laid out parallel alleys, each twenty-eight feet wide, the one on the south (since) called Lafayette, that on the west Cherry, and the other on the east Green. Between Egypt and Airy, equidistant from both, and running westward from Green, be marked another alley, twenty-eight feet wide (Penn Street), but only extending to the county lot, where it ended. (This was cut through the public grounds, and widened to present dimensions, and extended to Barbados Street in pursuance of an act of Assembly passed Feb. 24, 1834. This work, including several feet of excavation, was done in 1835 or 1836.) 108 On this public lot of one hundred and forty feet on Egypt, the same on Airy, and extending both having a depth of five hundred and fifty feet, the prison was erected, at the corner of Airy and Swede Streets. It was a low stone building at first, covering but a little of the ground, which extended as an open lawn down to Penn Street and the courthouse. After some years a two-story addition was made to it, much larger than the original building, built Up against its southern face. In the rear of the old jail stood the whipping-post, [See NOTE 8-3.] an institution now justly departed forever. Thus Norristown, as originally laid out, consisted of four rectangular streets, as already described. One of eighty and three sixty-six feet wide, with three rear alleys, east, west, and south, twenty-eight feet wide, and a like bisecting alley between Egypt and Airy, but only extending from Green to the county grounds. [NOTE 8-3.] Elizabeth Thomson, who recently died here, nearly a centenarian, resided long with the first keeper of the prison. She "remembered witnessing that punishment repeatedly." She also narrated of John Brown, who was hanged for burglary in 1788 (the old penalty still existing), "that Col. Thomas Craige, one of the two lawyers of the town, and a very resolute man, would not allow the gallows erected on the public grounds; and as no one would proffer private property, it was planted out 'jail lane' (Swede Street) on the highway; and that as soon as Brown was dead he sent his man to cut it down, --he was so disgusted at the severity of the punishment." She further related that during the famous "wheelbarrow law" she had seen numbers of prisoners under the care of the keeper, with a heavy ball and chain attached to one leg, working in his track-patch, northwest corner of Airy and Swede Streets, lifting the iron balls and casting them forward in the direction they were working. [FINIS NOTE 8-3.] Providing for the public buildings, on the west end of the town plot, with a tier of eleven lots (fifty by two hundred and fifty feet) on Swede Street, facing the public grounds (between Main and Airy). Smith laid out the residue of sixty-four lots, uniformly fifty by two hundred and fifty feet, on the said four streets, as follows. Ten on the south side of Airy Street, between De Kalb and the county lot, and all the remainder (except five on De Kalb, above Penn), thirty-eight in number on both sides of Egypt or Main, between Cherry and Green Alleys. The original courthouse, a stone building, two stories high, was erected a few feet back from the northwest corner of the present public square, it being part of the county lot, but the unoccupied lower part being conveyed also for public use as an open, square forever; some years after its completion an addition of twenty or thirty feet was made to the west end of the building, uniform with the principal structure, except that a recess on the north face was added to afford a platform-seat for the judges. The old prison and courthouse, as originally built, cost about twenty-one thousand dollars, and were finished in 1787. A building similar in form, and also of stone, was erected some thirty feet east of the court building for the accommodation of the public records and the officers having them in charge. This building was put up in 1791, and was also enlarged some years later. The earliest sessions of the court were held, so tradition informs us, in what was known some years ago as the "Dykes house," occupying the site of the first office and dwelling on the northeast side of Penn Street, adjoining the courthouse, the building then being a tavern. The Potter's Field of the prison, as also the garden of the jailer, was located northwest of Airy and Swede Streets. The place is marked on the original plot, two hundred feet on the latter and two hundred and fifty feet back from the former. [See NOTE 8-5.] This lot is the only ground marked on that draft north of Airy Street. [NOTE 8-4.] Subsequent to 1830, when those lots were sold for improvement, in digging cellars a few skeletons were exhumed. [FINIS NOTE 8-4.] At the time of the founding of the county seat, here the improvements consisted only of the county buildings, a mill (foot of Swede Street), schoolhouse, two stores, three taverns, and about a dozen dwellings, with less than a hundred inhabitants. The public buildings being erected on the natural grade of the earth, Swede Street, descending to Egypt, was so steep as to be difficult of use; accordingly, years afterwards, it was excavated some depth, leaving the "court-house yard, as it used to be called, several feet above the street, and a retaining wall erected against the bank, which remained until about 1855, when the square was graded, terraced, and enclosed by the borough of Norristown. At the time the wall improvement was made (supposed about 1804) a small one-storied stone building was erected at the southwestern corner of the square, on Main Street, for the accommodation of the "Pat Lyon" fire-engine, in which it remained stored until the removal of the old court-house and improvement of the public square, before stated. We turn now to describe the first awakening of improvement under the second, or rather first strictly American era. As the earliest want of colonial times was the schoolhouse, so now the earliest thought of the people was for better institutions of learning. At the commencement of the century we were fortunate in having so able a man as Nathaniel B. Boileau in the General Assembly, who should be credited with many of our earliest public institutions. He procured an act, and an appropriation of two thousand dollars from the State, to found an academy at Norristown, which was erected in 1805 on Airy, at the head of De Kalb Street, thirty by forty-five feet, two stories high, and built of brick. Six years later by aid of a sum bequeathed for the purpose by Judge Robert Lollar, of Hatborough, his friend, Mr. Boileau erected Lollar Academy at that place, at a cost of eleven thousand dollars. These and one founded in Lower Merion, at Athensville, some years later, were the only educational buildings then dedicated to other than common school purposes. The few years succeeding our separation from Philadelphia few evidences of improvement were 109 noticeable in any part of the county; it is proper however, to turn back a few years to state that John Markley, who was sheriff 1798 to 1801, about the time he went out of office, purchased the remainder of the University tract of five hundred and forty-three acres, and became the first Norristown lot-seller and improver after those laid out and sold by William Moore Smith in 1785. Markley did also considerable building and parceling of land; he founded what is now Egypt Mill, at the foot of Mill Street (Heebner's), 1809, forming it and the surrounding farm-land into what was for many years known as "Maj. Matthias Holstein's mill-property." He also built a fine mansion on the present site of Oakland Seminary, long known as the residence of Judge Bird Wilson, and sold lots for improvements on both sides of Egypt, between Cherry and Barbados Streets. These last were laid out and a plot of them placed in the recorder's office in 1801, to the number of thirty-one being laid out uniform with Smith's plot, on both sides, of Egypt Street above Cherry, extending to Barbados, which latter street, he laid out and opened. There were eleven of those lots on the south side, ten on the north side of the street, and ten fronting on Airy Street west of Cherry, extending back to Penn, which latter he opened from Swede to Barbados, the same width as on Smith's plot, twenty-eight feet. Some time after he sold to Levi Pawling the original "Egypt or Norris Mill," at the foot of Swede Street, with most of the remainder of the land he had purchased of the University. This was known for many years also as the "Pawling farm," the dwelling and barn standing near what is now Green and Oak Streets. It remained in his possession until about 1835, when it passed into the possession of some half dozen persons, who assumed the title of the "Norristown Land Company," and who in 1835-37 organized the second enlargement of the borough limits. On the 31st of March 1812, Norristown was incorporated into a borough. And the following year St. John's Episcopal Church was built, and five years later the First Presbyterian Church edifice, a plain building, also erected on Airy Street, the only houses of worship in the borough for twelve years after. During this period a few other churches were erected in the county, as follows: by Mennonists, below Kulpsville, in 1805, Baptists of Lower Merion, and German Baptists of Worcester, 1809; Friends at Jarrettown, 1814; Lutherans of Limerick Square, I817, since rebuilt. The second era, the national formative, was a period of bitter political strife, when old English ideas and jurisprudence were contesting with our Revolutionary theories for the mastery in State and national governments. These fierce contests were lulled for a time, during our second war with Great Britain; still our social, legal, and industrial character was in but a formative state. These things drew popular attention from domestic improvements, for up to our second foreign war we had been exclusively an agricultural people, wasting our resources by shipping land products abroad with which to purchase the manufactures we needed. This and constant cropping from the same land, with little return of fertilizers, caused much of it to become thin and unproductive, hence our farmers were comparatively poor. But the salutary effects of lime and plaster becoming known, kilns were erected from the eastern border and all along the limestone valleys to beyond our limits into Chester County, and while timber-lands were cleared for the needful wood, vast quantities of lime were procured and applied to the soil, soon making it as productive as at the beginning. The hauling of wood to the kilns and lime back to the fields more than ever made public roads and bridges an indispensable necessity to the people. Accordingly, (luring the period we are considering, in addition to the great turnpikes leading from Philadelphia and their connecting bridges, many lateral or transverse highways were projected and opened to travel. But there were only ferries to cross the river, except Flat Rock bridge, between Lower Merion and Manayunk, erected 1810, and Pawling's bridge same date, for the Ridge road, between Lower Providence and Schuylkill townships, Chester Co. These, with the few stone structures built by turnpike companies before described, were the only permanent ones in the county. In 1821, however, the Schuylkill wag spanned by another at Pottstown. As early as 1815 an act had been passed for one at Norristown, but for want of funds was not undertaken until 1828-29, when a fine arched foot and carriage-way of one thousand and fifty lineal feet, including the abutments, was built at a cost of thirty-one thousand two hundred dollars. Near the same date several other like bridges of inferior dimensions were placed over Perkiomen, Skippack, Neshaminy, and Wissahickon Creeks, and numerous grist-, oil-, clover-, and plaster-mills erected in different parts of the county not necessary to particularize. Up to this time, say 1820, the riverfront at Norristown was but farmed land. And previous to the erection and completion of De Kalb Street Bridge that street had not been opened much below Lafayette. And between the present line of Washington Street and the river it was only a rude cart-road. So steep as to be nearly; impassable to carriages. Up to that time ferries for high water and the fords at Pawling's mill (foot of Swede Street) and at Swedes' Ford were the only mode of transit across the river. The founding of De Kalb Street bridge filled up that street below Washington, and led to the opening of the river streets, as they now exist, from the new Egypt Mill, (Heebner's) to Stony Creek. 110 Up to 1816 Norristown and Pottstown, the only boroughs of the county, bad improved little beyond the traditional cross- roads village. In that year David Sower's weekly "Herald" records the extent Of Norristown progress thus: "Near one hundred houses, including public buildings, one clergyman, five lawyers, five taverns, and 'a daily stage to Philadelphia.'" We will now turn to another class of improvements as sources of wealth not inferior to those hitherto described the opening of ore-beds and quarries of stone. Colonial records inform us that quarries of limestone were worked in this county to supply lime for building purposes at Philadelphia so early as 1698, and we have information that Thomas Rutter and some of the Potts' mined iron Ore in some of the northwestern townships so early as 1720. About that time there was malleable iron manufactured on the Manatawny, which, when sent to England as a specimen of American skill, created so much jealousy there that a bill forbidding Its manufacture was introduced in Parliament, but not passed until 1750. Indications of copper ore were found not long after in Frederick and Lower Providence townships, and in the latter worked for a time, but not yielding a profit were abandoned. Marble was early discovered in White Marsh and Upper Merion, and the quarries have been successfully worked for a century at least. We have the record that Thomas Moore, the grandfather of Daniel 0. Hitner, first began in 1785 to raise marble from the quarries now owned by the latter. Nearby, Lentz's quarries were opened nearly as soon, and Daniel H. Dager, and later E. C. Potts, in Plymouth, and the Hendersons, in Upper Merion, have erected extensive machinery for producing marble. The working of lime-quarries and kilns all along the southern border of the county during many years has been, perhaps, the most extended and profitable form of domestic industry, other than farming, pursued in Montgomery County; in fact, it has been more permanently enriching than a like deposit of silver or gold would have been, the limestone formation extending wholly across our county, even out of the valley range, cropping out and coining down to our river, as at Port Kennedy and other places. Other rich-deposits of soapstone and bastard marble also, as in Lower Merion and Conshohocken, have led to extensive improvements for quarrying the same. At the era of which we are writing, the first quarter of the present century, the immense deposits of iron and clay since worked in the lower townships had not been discovered or opened by improvement; they will, however, be pertinent to the next chapter. It is proper here to refer generally to the enlarged barns and dwellings which gave place during the period named as against the stinted and inelegant buildings that superseded log edifices, so common the latter part of the past century. As farms increased in fertility, by the use of lime and more intelligent tillage, larger-barns were needed, and this invited the farm mansion to take a more, spacious and elegant form to correspond; but neither agriculturist nor artisan dreamed of the mighty changes soon to appear in the internal and domestic improvements of the laborsaving era, which was now at band. For generations our fathers, except the very wealthy, had walked upon uncarpeted floors; women were used to field-work, milking, and other drudgery, and he was a fortunate youth who could secure all the three winter months as a period of common-school instruction -but we anticipate. To explain the rise of the incoming era of manufacturing and commercial activity, and the prodigious improvements through invention, labor saving machinery driven by water and steam, new methods of production, and so forth, we must glance backward a few years and point out some of the agencies that spurred the popular mind in that direction. The last war with England for the time almost closed our ports to the admission of foreign manufactures. Showing our statesmen how helpless we were as an exclusively agricultural nation; the debt caused by that war also had to be provided for. Within a few years after its close, therefore, Congress laid considerable imposts on foreign goods to increase the revenues, but chiefly to encourage home manufactures. It was not long, therefore, until cotton, woolen, and other mills sprang into existence all over the country to supply the home demand for textile fabrics, and of iron, steel, and other things. To handle the finances, also, a national bank was chartered for the Union, supplemented in our State (1814) by the incorporating of a bank of circulation, discount, and deposit in nearly every county of the State, which furnished more needed currency. This latter measure (creating also our Bank of Montgomery County) was carried over the veto of Governor Snyder, but those State institutions did not get into efficient operation for some time. In the meanwhile, nearly all the currency in use was of distant, State banks, private bankers, and Spanish silver, of denominations from the dollar to sixteenths of that coin, the last called, "fips." As the commerce of the Union was rising to its feet again, the want of intercommunication with the Far West began to be felt most urgently. The three great cities of the Atlantic coast, New York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore, turned their eyes to the rapidly-settling West, and demanded access to it by water communication of some kind. The only idea at that time was "internal improvement" by State means in constructing canals. Governor Clinton, of New York, had gotten his State to open the Hudson and Erie Canal, which Pennsylvania and Maryland hastened to follow by like works. This introduces us to the PART III. - LABOR-SAVING OR IMPROVEMENT ERA. In pursuance of the great object, water communication with the great West, our State as early as 1815 had revived the abandoned enterprise of 1792, to con- 111 nect the Schuylkill with the Susquehanna, and an act was passed that year chartering the Schuylkill Navigation Company, but the corporation was not effectually organized for several years. The failing supply of timber, however, and the recently ascertained value of anthracite coal as a substitute fuel soon after put the navigation scheme forward without more delay. And it was so far under way that a few boats descended with coal in 1818; but the canal and navigation proper was not completed till 1826. This great work extended from Philadelphia to Port Carbon, in Schuylkill County, one hundred and eight miles, and cost two million nine hundred and sixty-six thousand four hundred and eighty dollars, or about twenty-seven thousand dollars per mile. It consisted of sixty-three miles of canal proper, and forty-five of slack-water navigation, made so by thirty-four dams. The original one hundred and nine locks, eighty feet long and seventeen broad, were enlarged in 1846, and so increased in capacity as to pass boats of one hundred and eighty tons, instead of sixty as before. And the shipping of coal, which began the first year at sixteen thousand seven hundred and seventy-six tons, increased steadily until by 1857 it had reached one million two hundred and seventy-five thousand nine hundred and eighty-eight tons, notwithstanding a railroad competition had been fully established. But the most important result of this great achievement to our county was the creation of waterpower, taken up and utilized, at Norristown and Conshohocken. Previous to this time there had been no manufactory of cotton or other textile fabrics in our county on the line of the Schuylkill, driven by its waterpower. In 1826, McCredy's cotton-factory, a white-lead and stone-sawing mill were erected and soon went into operation, and not long after a rolling- and nail-mill, all driven by water-power drawn from the Navigation dam at Norristown. At Conshohocken, also, another stone-mill, a gristmill, sheet iron works and spade-factory of James Wood & Sons were put into operation by the surplus water of Plymouth dam. Within the limits of Montgomery County, and between it, Philadelphia, and Chester, the Navigation erected six dams, the lowest of them at Manayunk, hardly inferior as a source of power to that on the Merrimac at Lowell, Mass. The next great public work crossing a corner of our county was the State undertaking to build a railroad from Philadelphia to Columbia, to connect by canal navigation with the Ohio at Pittsburgh. This was one of the first attempted railroads in the United States, and was finished soon after 1834. The next work in date and importance to us was the Philadelphia, Germantown and Norristown Railroad; the company was chartered in 1831, and the road finished to Norristown in 1834. This important line of rapid communication with the great metropolis started improvement into still greater activity at Norristown, Conshohocken, and other places by the way. Our county town, from being a mere hamlet of one thousand and eighty-five inhabitants in 1830, sprang forward, nearly doubling its population each decade for many years. Conshohocken, unmarked on maps and unknown by name till then, -hardly a village, consisting of a mill, tavern, and half a dozen houses, grew also within a few years into a borough of three or four thousand people. And all this notwithstanding a lack of energy and gross mismanagement of the railroad; for almost within a decade, through corrupt dealing of one of its early officers, the capital stock was considered sunk, and for a short time it went into other hands. At first the road scarcely made an effort to handle freight, but still its influence in promoting business, concentrating population and enterprise throughout the southeastern border of our county was prodigious. Contemporaneously with the opening of railroad communication to Philadelphia, the State Legislature enacted a public, or, as it was then called, a free school law, to provide for common-school instruction at public expense. This wise policy, although old in New England, was strange to the people of Pennsylvania, and especially our upper townships, which did not put it into full practical operation for some years, but as it gained way and favor with the people the enlarging influence of education spread rapidly, and improvement, material and social, took wing in every direction. This abrupt allusion to the public-school system in this connection is justified by the fact that we shall never know the mighty power of common schools as a factor in industrial and material progress. Almost simultaneous with the events last recorded, Norristown started on her third career of advance and improvement. John Markley, the second improver, died July 1834, and soon after his detached property, lying between Main Street and the river, on the line of Stony Creek, was put to sale by his executor, seeming for a time to hang on the auctioneer's tongue, but finally started with considerable spirit, until all was sold at what was thought good prices. Very soon after the Pawling farm, covering much of the northeastern part of the unimproved land of the borough, came into the hands of the "Land Company," consisting of John Boyer, Mordecai R. Moore, Jacob Adle, Jr., Lewis Ramsay, and W. H. Slingluff. About the same time, Feb. 24, 1834, an act of Assembly was passed appointing a commission, consisting of Alan W. Corson, Henry Scheetz, George Richards, and Evan Jones, to "widen, extend, lay out, and grade the streets of Norristown," which up to that time had no uniform grade or ascertained sidewalks, or when 112 paved at all were covered with rude flag-stones without curbing or proper crossings, besides many of the houses on one side of Main Street were stilted up above the street, and on the other even below the roadway. The commission, with their surveyor, Mr. Gay, proceeded to widen all the "alleys" of the original survey and plot of twenty-eight feet into streets about fifty feet wide. Thus Lafayette, called "Brick Alley," Penn, "Court-House Alley," and Cherry were ordered to be widened, curbed, and paved, and the fences and stables set back to the line. As may be supposed, this created ferment among the nonimprovement class, which required several years to allay. The commission also ordered Swede, below Airy, excavated, and Penn, between its terminus at east side of public square, also opened through those grounds, and excavated eight or ten feet; they also ordered Airy Street, between De Kalb and Swede, opened and lowered nearly as much, and Swede Street straightened, which used to deflect to the right at Airy. Chestnut and Marshall, two new streets parallel with Airy, were laid out from Swede, graded and excavated nearly to the line of Green Street. It was on the north side of Airy near Swede, and on both sides of the latter, as well as on the two new streets, that the "Land Company" made their sales during the few following years. The same act of Assembly gave the Town Council enlarged powers, and ordinances were enacted July 27 and Aug. 13, 1836, enforcing the recommendations of the commission and carrying them into, effect. The leading improvement men of the town, John B. Sterigere, Adam Slemmer, Levi Roberts, William H. Slingluff, and others, with the first named always on the lead, pushed these reforms until they were accomplished, while constables and board fences "fell back" to the new line, and the flag sidewalks had to give place to those of curbed brick. We now proceed to briefly describe the third enlargement of Norristown, which took place in pursuance of a new act of Legislature and a new commission, dating from April 7, 1845. The work of the first commission chiefly related to alterations on the original draft, widening alleys into streets, fixing sidewalks, and adding Marshall and Chestnut Streets to the old plot. This second commission consisted of Jacob S. Cost, George Richards, Isaac Linderman, and William T. Morrison, who at once proceeded to carry out the express commands of the act. First they were required to widen Swede Street nearly to the borough line; to lay out Elm, Jacoby, and Oak Streets from Swede eastward to the true line of Green Street, thus adding six new blocks exactly in the rear and northwardly from what had been laid out previously, as also to open De Kalb from Elm to Airy, and to lay out Green from Airy to Elm. A supplementary act, 1846, authorized the same commissioners to change the bed of Penn and Ford Streets, widen and straighten Main Street southeasterly from Ford, widen the bridge over Saw-Mill Run so as to bear the regulation sidewalks, and lay out Sandy Street (Sandy Hill road) eastward to David Cook's house, not less than forty feet wide. Thus street extensions, lot sales, and building improvements had gone forward a few years longer at the county seat, when much dissatisfaction was felt and expressed at the inconvenient and dilapidated state of the county buildings. Grand juries took the frequent recommendations of court in charge, and ordered that new ones be erected. Accordingly the commissioners purchased a large open lot east of the Episcopal Church, extending from Airy to Marshall Street. Le Brun, the architect, submitted a plan and front similar to the Eastern Penitentiary, castellated in style, which was adopted. It was erected of durable sandstone, sixty feet front by one hundred and thirty feet deep, provided with an airy corridor leading to forty cells in tipper and lower tiers, designed with sufficient light and ventilation for the separate and solitary confinement of convicts at hard labor. It was built in 1851 at a cost of sixty-eight thousand dollars. Being finished late that year, the prisoners were removed, and the site of the old one cleared of the ancient material preparatory to the erection of a new courthouse on the ground. The same architect prepared a plan fronting the building westwardly, instead of southwardly, according to popular wish as expressed through a town and afterwards a county public meeting called to consider the matter. The architect and commissioners alleged in defense of their purpose that the size and shape of the lot forbade a change. It was therefore built during 1852-54, fronting one hundred and ninety-six feet on Swede by sixty-four on Airy and Penn, of brick, faced with Montgomery County marble, and finished with a tall spire, clock, and bell, at a cost of one hundred and fifty thousand dollars. It is probably the most magnificent building of the kind in the State. The steeple (which ought never to have been placed upon such a plain, oblong structure in preference to a dome) was soon found to leak, and a few years after was reduced in height to a handsome cupola, containing a new clock made by Custer, Norristown, with also a bell of three thousand two hundred and thirty-two pounds weight. As railroads, rapid transportation, and travel by steam-power lie at the base of our amazing progress in material improvement during the past two decades, we shall proceed to record in tabulated form the corporations and the tracks they have laid across our territory, as near as may be in the order of time as established. Pennsylvania Railroad; original line built by the State, commenced about 1830, and finished between Philadelphia and Columbia about 1834; sold to the present corporation, with other State works, 1849; estimated capital now invested in all its roads, owned, leased, or controlled, according to Poor's Manual (1882), $175,547,876.18. Philadelphia and Reading proper, 98-1/4 miles; chartered, 1833; opened, 1838-42; estimated capital of lines owned, leased, and controlled by the corporation (same authority), $130,519,917.94. Philadelphia, Germantown and Norristown; chartered, 1831; opened, 1834; 17 miles; cost, $2,246,900; leased, 1870, to the Philadelphia and Reading corporation for 999 years. North Pennsylvania and branches, from Philadelphia to Bethlehem, 86-1/4 miles; chartered, 1852; opened, 1857; cost, or associated capital, $11,444,107.32. Chester Valley; chartered, 1836, and part graded from Downingtown to West Conshohocken; work suspended about 1839; new company formed, 1851, including the original stockholders; terminus changed to Bridgeport; road opened, 1853; estimated cost, $1,765,900. Perkiomen Railroad, from Reading Railroad junction to Emaus. Lehigh Co. 38-1/2 miles; chartered, 1865; opened, 1875; cost, $2,887,374.68. Philadelphia and Newtown Railroad, 20 miles; opened, 1878; cost, $1,900,000. Colebrookdale Railroad, Pottstown to Barts, 121 miles; chartered, 1865; opened, 1869; cost, $668,210.50. Northeast Pennsylvania Railroad, 91 miles, Abington to Hartsville; opened, 1875; cost, $292,056.26; leased, with the Stony Creek Railroad, to Reading Company, May, 1879, for 999 years. Delaware and Bound Brook, from Jenkinstown toward New York, 20-1/2 miles; opened, 1876; also leased to the Reading at the same time as above, and for the same term. Plymouth Railroad, chartered 1836; completed to Oreland (North Pennsylvania Railroad), 1868, about 8 miles. Stony Creek, from Norristown to Lansdale, 10-1/4 miles; chartered, 1870; opened, 1874; cost, $497,138.23. Norristown Junction Railroad, 1/4 mile; opened, 1880-81. Pennsylvania and Schuylkill, Valley Railroad, from Philadelphia to the coal regions, including the line from West Chester to Phoenixville, now building. On the opening pages of this article we presented a list of the first churches and grist-mills of our infant county, as also the few early turnpikes, bridges, and the like. Completeness in such an undertaking is, of course, out of the question. Nevertheless, to compare the past with the present, we shall now add lists, from available sources, of what the children have done in imitation of the fathers. To avoid duplicating some elsewhere recorded, numerous improvements of our day are omitted. CHURCHES KNOWN TO HAVE BEEN BUILT OR REBUILT SINCE 1830. -Friends (Orthodox), Plymouth, erected 1830. First Baptist, Norristown, erected 1833. Rebuilt 1876. First Methodist Episcopal, Norristown, erected 1834. Rebuilt 1857. St. Patrick, Norristown, erected 1836. Rebuilt 1859. Lutheran and Reformed, Kulpsville, erected 1833. Methodist Episcopal, Upper Dublin, erected 1888. Baptist, Lower Providence, erected 1836. Rebuilt 1880. Presbyterian, Jeffersonville erected 1841. Rebuilt 1876. Baptist, Bridgeport, erected 1843. Presbyterian, Port Kennedy, erected 1845. Providence Presbyterian, rebuilt about 1845, and again 1878 Boehm's Reformed rebuilt 1868. Church of the Ascension, Norristown erected 1847. Trinity Lutheran, Norristown, erected 1849. Rebuilt 1863. Friends, Norristown, erected 1851. German Baptist (Green Tree) erected 1846. St. Peter's Lutheran, Barrels Hill. Rebuilt 1847. Church of the Redeemer, Lower Merion, 1848. Friends Norristown. Erected 1851. Central Presbyterian, Norristown, erected 1856. Mount Zion African Methodist Episcopal, Norristown, erected 1845. Rebuilt 1853. Oak Street Methodist Episcopal, Norristown, erected 1854. Ebenezer Methodist Protestant (colored) erected 1850. Presbyterian, Springfield erected 1857. Mennonist, Kulpsville. Rebuilt 1854. Methodist Episcopal, Evansburg, erected 1844. German Baptist, Norristown, erected 1859. Lutheran and Reformed, White Marsh, erected 1818. Lutheran and Reformed, Sumneytown, erected 1859. St. James' Episcopal, Evansburg. Rebuilt 1850. Plymouth Friends. Partially rebuilt 1860. Destroyed by fire and rebuilt 1866-67. St. Augustus, Lutheran, Trappe. Rebuilt. St. Paul's Lutheran, Lower Merion. Rebuilt 1873. Presbyterian, Huntingdon Valley erected 1861. Evangelical Association. Norristown, 1859. St. Luke's Reformed Trappe. Rebuilt about 1874. Methodist Episcopal, Jarrettown, erected 1866. Evangelical Association, Plymouth, 1870. Baptist, White Marsh. Methodist Episcopal, North Wales. Baptist, North Wales. Presbyterian, Bridgeport erected 1875. Haws Avenue Methodist Episcopal, Norristown. Erected 1875. 114 St. Paul's German Lutheran, Norristown, erected, 1872. Baptist, Shannonville, erected 1881. Puff's Reformed Upper Dublin. Rebuilt. Trinity Christian, Freeland, erected 1853. Trinity Christian, Skippackville, erected 1858. Methodist Episcopal, Upper Hanover. Methodist Episcopal, Cheltenham. Schwenkfelder, Worcester. Methodist Episcopal, Montgomery. Besides the above, there are several churches erected in the period which are recorded among the specialties noticed in the review of the larger boroughs. COLLEGES AND HIGHER SEMINARIES: St. Charles Borromeo, Catholic, Lower Merion, buildings erected 1866-71; Pennsylvania Female College, Collegeville, 1851; Ursinus College (formerly Freeland Seminary), Collegeville, buildings erected 1848; Oakland Female Seminary, 1846-48; Cottage Seminary, Pottstown, 1850; Hill School, Pottstown, 1852; Washington Hall, Trappe; Frederick Institute; Tremont, Norristown, 1844; North Wales Academy; Centre Square Seminary; High School, Norristown. RECENT TURNPIKES: The following are some of the turnpikes constructed since 1830: Perkiomen and Sumneytown, built 1840; Conshohocken and Three Tuns, 1847; Bridgeport and King of Prussia, 1853; Spring House and Sumneytown, 1848; Norristown and Centre Square; Willow Grove and Doylestown; Goshenhoppen and Green Lane, 1851; Limekiln Road pike, Middle Road, Willow Grove. Bridges: The following are the most important bridge structures erected during the period under consideration. Great stone bridge, erected 1838, over Schuylkill, by the Reading Railroad, at Black Rock tunnel; Perkiomen, near Shannonville; 1834; Pawling's, rebuilt 1840. Swedes' Ford, over Schuylkill, Norristown, 1848; Phoenixville and Mont Clare, 1845; Limerick Bridge, 1849; Royer's Ford, 1840, swept away and rebuilt 1850. Black Rock, over Schuylkill, 1860; Port Kennedy, 1849; Madison, Pottstown, 1868; Mattson's Ford, Conshohocken, about 1840, swept away and rebuilt 1850. De Kalb Street Bridge, Norristown, rebuilt about 1860. Schwenksville, over Perkiomen; Hunsberger's, over Perkiomen, at Arcola and Yerkes Stations. Stone bridge over Stony Creek, Norristown. Also one over same stream at Marshall and Elm Streets; over SawMill Run at Marshall; also Penn and Oak Streets, Norristown. Before describing the prodigious improvements of the county at large, we turn aside to present in contrast the now twelve boroughs which have grown out of the two existing, 1830, at the close of the second era, bringing a brief and imperfect notice of them up to the present time. NORRISTOWN: (Continued). -Notwithstanding the three previously distinct enlargements, 1801, 1834, 1845, the people were not satisfied with its boundaries. Land dealers and speculators had sold into the hands of builders or third owners most of the lots offered at former public sales, and many enterprising men were anxious to have town limits extended again. Accordingly, another act of Assembly was passed 1852, appointing a third commission, consisting of Philip Super, Charles F. Jenkins, and John Thompson, who proceeded to carry the western boundary across Stony Creek, and up the river to the western line of Montgomery Cemetery, nearly half a mile, but leaving that institution in Norriton; thence northward to the Plymouth road, about two miles from Schuylkill; thence by that road eastward nearly as far, and thence southwestwardly to the river again near Magee's lime-works. This fourth extension took another large slice from Plymouth, and several hundred acres from Norriton, making the borough nearly two miles square, and adding all the First and much of the Fifth and Sixth Wards. The commissioners, before surrendering their trust, laid out all the added new territory into streets, naming them after land-holders and the distinguished public men of the town and county, thus leaving no unsettled lines for future improvers or builders to alter or dispute. They also ordered Main Street raised several feet at Stony Creek, and that stream spanned with a Dew stone bridge of a width to bear the usual sidewalks. This new structure, much higher than the old, with the cutting down and widening of the street up Chain's Hill, makes the entrance to and exit from the town by that great avenue both easy and convenient. This changed width, with straightened course, and cutting down also of Knox's Hill and filling of a hollow, extended the improvement to the borough line on the west. The year following this enlargement, L. E. Corson and Gabriel Kohn purchased the Chain farm, west of Stony Creek, sold the lots, and now that ground contains probably as much population as the whole borough in 1820. This last resort to the Legislature, thirty years ago, will certainly serve the county town for at least fifty years to come. Almost within the period just named Norristown has erected six spacious school buildings, the last for a high school, which is an edifice of rare taste and classic proportions. The chief public or corporate buildings of the borough built during the era are the following: Norristown Insurance and Water Company's works, erected 1847, and greatly enlarged, with new basin, 1879; Montgomery Cemetery, 1848; Norristown Gas Company's works, constructed 1853; market-house, covering the square from Airy to Marshall, built about 1855; Norris City Cemetery, founded 1858; Montgomery National Banking-House, erected 1854, and First National building, 1869; Farmers' Market (formerly Reiff's), established about 1868; Norristown Library building, erected 1859; Odd-Fellows' Hall, erected 1850; Soldiers' Monument, nineteen feet high, erected in the public square 1870; Music Hall, with 115 accommodations for Masonic lodge and post-office; Western Market-House and Hall, at Kohn and Marshall Streets. Conspicuous among Norristown's latest public improvements is the great State Hospital for the Insane. The fire department of the borough consists of the Norris, Humane, and Montgomery Hose and Steam Fire Engines, and the Fairmont Hose or Hook and Ladder Company All of these associations have erected large three-story brick engine houses with capacious halls. The first especially is one of the stateliest edifices in the town, and it is not an over-estimate to value the apparatus and real estate of all the firemen of Norristown at near a hundred thousand dollars. POTTSTOWN: Very soon after the completion of the Norristown Railroad, which started the villages of the lower Schuylkill, the great Philadelphia and Reading was opened to the public along and through the whole southwestern border of the county, furnishing another rapid way to Philadelphia market. The opening of this road started Pottstown from its sleep of nearly a century, a place which enjoys the rare distinction of being the first laid-out town in the county, having been surveyed and designed for a city by John Potts in 1753, thus antedating Norristown over thirty years. Like his great exemplar, William Penn, he placed the streets at right angles and in line with the cardinal points, and High or Main Street, like Market Street, Philadelphia, was laid out near a hundred feet wide. But notwithstanding its site, almost level as a floor, seemed formed for a city far above the line of overflow from the river, and in the midst of rich bottom land, above and below, it improved little until the railroad broke in upon its rural slumber, about 1842. It was, however, incorporated as a borough in 1815, and for many years from that period justly sought to become a county-seat of adjoining parts of Chester, Berks, and Montgomery Counties, under various names, but finally "Madison." That enterprise failed through purely selfish and political motives among the people of the opposing county towns; but Pottstown advanced, nevertheless, through the newborn energy already described. Since 1845 its three churches have increased to ten, including the following: Episcopal, 1833; Methodist Episcopal, 1839; St. Aloysius (Catholic), 1850; Presbyterian, 1853; First Baptist, 1859; Salem Church (Evangelical Association), 1870; African Methodist Episcopal Church, same year. During this period also Friends' Meeting was rebuilt (1875), and the Reformed and Lutheran Churches erected separate edifices, which were finished 1870 and 1872. The manufacturing industry of the borough has rested on a solid basis for many years, there being several corporations combining very heavy capital, and in matters of town improvements, such as gas, hydrant-water, markets, and the like; the first was secured by a company, which erected works in 1858; the second by another corporation, 1869; and the last by another, still earlier, which also furnishes a public hall, with additional lodge-rooms above. The fire department of Pottstown is now well organized, having two steam fire-engines, the companies being named "Good-Will" and "Philadelphia"; they have hose-carriages annexed, and all their apparatus is of the most efficient description. The school department has two or three large houses, including the former academy building. Like Norristown, the borough has passed its original barriers two or three times, there being extensive additions of laid-out and improved streets on the north, and especially eastward, now being rapidly covered with buildings. The large blast-furnace just over the Manatawny, added to the immense iron-works and other manufactures of iron in the borough proper, gives Pottstown a fair claim to contest with Conshohocken the title of "iron-clad." Pottstown has founded two public cemeteries, a little out of town, "Pottstown" and "Edgewood." The town maintains two or three well-conducted newspapers, and from its grand site, and public-spirited, wealthy inhabitants also, we infer that at no distant day it will become a considerable city. Population (by census 1880), 5305. CONSHOHOCKEN: The manufacturing town of Montgomery County is Conshohocken, which at the opening of the era under consideration hardly had a place on any printed map; its population now cannot be less than five thousand souls. When Plymouth dam and the aqueduct over the creek of that name were being built by the Navigation Company, a few acres of land adjoining were purchased by it for convenience in prosecuting its work at that place, which, after the canal was finished, were sold to John Fridley and James Wells, of Norristown. The latter built a hotel and store on the line of the railroad (site of present station), and the former erected below the canal on the river bank a mill for sawing marble, which was run by water-power for some years by Freedley & Heebner, the senior partner supplying much of the stone from quarries worked or owned by him in Massachusetts. A few years later they sold the residue of their purchase in lots to improvers, which was the beginning of the town. David Harry erected also a flouring-mill on the bank of the river (site of the present print-works), and just above it, driven also by water-power of the canal company, James Wood erected, 1832, a mill to manufacture spades, saws, and other tools, as also sheet-iron. 116 These mills were the nucleus from which the present immense manufactures of the place have sprung. It is needless to add more, as these will be treated of elsewhere. The further extension of streets and building improvements was promoted by sales of land eastward of the town by Isaac Jones, along Hector Street, and later by Benjamin Harry, who sold nineteen acres along Fayette Street, on the rear centre of the town. That main avenue, turnpiked in 1847 (which was the township line between Plymouth and White Marsh), is already adorned by numerous palatial mansions, and by a handsome Episcopal Church, chapel, and adjacent rectory, which last property in completeness, would do credit to any city. The borough has also a Presbyterian, Catholic, Baptist, Methodist, and an African Methodist Church, as also a handsome public ball, with market and lodge-rooms combined, the last three stories and a Mansard roof, built by a company, 1872. Two other corporations, chartered a few years ago, have erected water and gasworks. The Washington Hose and Steam Fire-Engine Company erected in 1878 a handsome and substantial building for their steamer and hose-carriage, which, with the superior apparatus, is valued at twelve thousand dollars. In addition to a substantial open iron bridge over the river, Conshohocken has two large public school buildings, and another owned by the Catholics. Considerable attention has been given recently to grading, curbing, and paving the sidewalks, and the population is increasing quite as rapidly as any town of the county. It was chartered May 1850. WEST CONSHOHOCKEN. -This new borough, formerly called by an Indian name, Baligomingo, now just entering its second decade as a corporate town (chartered 1874), owes its chief importance to the valuable water-power of Gulf Creek and to the extensive woolen manufactures of George Bullock and others near by, as also the extensive blast-furnace of Moorehead & Co. The latter works are established on territory taken from Lower Merion, and the former belonged to Upper Merion, the borough limits as in the case of East Conshohocken being taken from two adjoining townships population (1880) 1462. Most of the manufactories of the borough line the ravine of Gulf Creek, and being so situated the town offers little opportunity for street improvements, and yet its one or two avenues, as also the upper ones, are kept in superior condition. Here, in this mountain-like glen, fifty years ago, Bethel Moore successfully carried on the manufacture of woolen cloths, the first in our county. The borough contains a number of mills, a church, and some school buildings, as also a reservoir on the hillside to provide water for extinguishing fires. BRIDGEPORT. This is the fourth borough of the county in order of incorporation, being one year younger than Conshohocken, its charter dating Feb. 27, 1851. It was in its early history called Evansville, after its then owner, Elisha Evans. It possesses a number of manufactories of textile fabrics, a papermill, market-house and hall combined, a Baptist and a Presbyterian Church, and the extensive depots of the Reading and Chester Valley Railroads. It also has a number of stores, and just below its corporate limits perhaps the largest manufactory of mixed woolens on the line of the Schuylkill, owned by the Lees Brothers. The population of Bridgeport is 1802. HATBOROUGH: The name of this lower end borough comes down to us from colonial times. It said to have been named from a manufactory of hats established there before the Revolution, though the village was as often called "The Billet," or "Crooked Billet," from a tavern sign which bore that name or symbol, no doubt of English importation. The place is one of the oldest settled districts of the county, and is full of historical and legendary remains. It was the residence of Col. Robert Lollar, of Revolutionary fame, and Hon. Nathaniel B. Boileau, both distinguished and active businessmen in the early days of our county. It contains a public library, the oldest and most extensive in our bounds, an academy, with many handsome residences and churches. Hatborough is no exception to the rule that our recent boroughs owe their corporate existence to the railroad, as the locality was densely settled for years past, but only erected into a municipality in 1871, when being opened to railroad travel. The borough contains also two or three schools, which occupy the academy; it has a weekly paper, and a handsome monument to commemorate the resting-place of soldiers killed by the British during the Revolution. Population (1880), 586. JENKINTOWN: This younger sister of Hatborough was chartered 1874, also made up mainly of old settled families in Abington township, and organized into a borough to provide local improvements. It has one of the oldest Presbyterian Church buildings and nearby one of the oldest Friend's in the county. It contains also an Episcopal, a Catholic, and a Methodist Church, and numerous fine buildings of the olden style, as also some of modern elegance. There have been recently built a bank, a large school building, and a Masonic Hall. Population, 810. LANSDALE. -This young thriving borough, which only dates its charter from 1872, owes its rare distinction as a manufacturing place to the North Pennsylvania, the Stony Creek and Doylestown Branches of that railroad, which intersect at that point. Heebner's agricultural machine-works are famous all over the Union, as also known in places abroad. It is taken from Gwynedd and Hatfield townships, is fully surveyed and carefully laid out, and for a town of its age is wonderfully improved. It lies over a plain on both sides of the North Pennsylvania Railroad; it has two or three public schools, a Reformed and a Methodist Church, a bank, and a weekly newspaper. 117 It is destined to be a place of great importance, and its population, at present 798, is growing rapidly. For the purpose of supplying pure water it has put down an artesian well. NORTH WALES: This is the elder sister of the borough just described, being distant from it about two miles, and chartered in 1869. It was taken from Gwynedd Township and is situated on the Sumneytown and SpringHouse turnpike, on elevated ground, and beside the North Pennsylvania Railroad. Like its neighbor, it has grown up within little over a decade. It contains a Reformed, Baptist, Lutheran, and Methodist Episcopal Church, two or three school buildings, and a fine seminary, a steam-flouring mill, bell foundry, and other manufactures, as also a weekly newspaper. The town has been carefully surveyed and laid out into streets, and active means have been employed to place its avenues and walks in good condition; population (1880), 673. GREEN LANE: This is one of the latest boroughs, chartered 1875, and has been surveyed and laid out into streets and building lots. It is situated on Perkiomen Creek, in Marlborough Township, on the Sumneytown and SpringHouse pike, and covers one hundred and fifty-four acres of ground. It is the old locality of Schall's Forge, which was famous in its day, and as it is adjacent to the Perkiomen Railroad, it will doubtless grow rapidly. Population, last census, 187. EAST GREENVILLE: This borough is taken out of Upper Hanover township, and is also situated near the Perkiomen Railroad; it was incorporated 1875, and contains considerable improvements, consisting of a seminary for both sexes, one or two churches, schools, cigar manufactories, and other industries. It is on Green Lane and Goshenhoppen turnpike. Population, 331. ROYER'S FORD: This youngest of the boroughs was chartered 1879. It is a thriving manufacturing town, taken out of the lower corner of Limerick Township and is situated on the Schuylkill, where the river was formerly crossed by a deep, dangerous ford. There is a substantial bridge here now, connecting it with the borough of Spring City, in Chester County. Some years ago an extensive stove foundry was established there, which, with other manufactures, have caused an influx of population. There have been recently erected two or three churches, and a fire company has been organized. The streets are being graded and rapidly improved. Population, 558. The foregoing hasty review of the boroughs was not undertaken or designed as a full exhibit of the material development of large centres of population, but only to show how corporate towns spring up as by magic in this labor-saving, railroad age. But to complete the picture we must name in order the other villages of the county, which are on a like career; such as Trappe, Freeland, Collegeville, Schwenksville, Iron Bridge, Gilbertsville, and Sumneytown; Valley Forge, Port Kennedy, Swedenburg, Spring Mill, Pencoyd, and West Manayunk, on the line of the Schuylkill; Barren Hill, Marble Hall, Plymouth Meeting, Flourtown, Edge Hill, Cheltenham, Ashborne, Kulpsville, and Centre Square, in the centre; Ardmore, Bryn Mawr, Merion Square, and the rural seats (almost rivaling the outlying villas which once stood around ancient Rome) now spreading over the plateau beside the Pennsylvania Railroad, in Lower Merion. But new ideas and methods of living are not confined to towns and villages; they extend to the remotest farmhouse. Free schools and improved land, with ready access to market, have excited all over the county a desire for more easy and efficient methods of farming and other production. Years ago farmers threw aside sickles, scythes, and hand rakes, resolving to keep abreast of the times by using horsepower implements to cultivate, gather, and prepare farm products for market. Thus by improved tillage upon limed land, with use of other fertilizers, crops have been nearly doubled; and now, instead of spending two months of exhaustive labor, as formerly, to gather and store a harvest, it is done in a fortnight. Thus, also, increased profit in agriculture excited a desire for more comfortable dwellings, capacious barns, more elegant equipages and attire, as also handsomer churches, and more roomy and convenient school-houses. Travelers on the continent of Europe inform us that in many parts, especially in rural departments of France, the people are seen using the rude implements of husbandry and wearing the same style of attire that their fathers and mothers wore almost centuries ago; while here, on the contrary, observant people of advanced years-express wonder and astonishment on visiting hardware stores and other depots of merchandise, at beholding new, handy, ingenious, and often almost unimaginable contrivances for farmers', householders', and mechanics' uses. And no well-filled grocery is without manufactured viands, syrups canned edibles without number, showing to what a prodigious stretch of activity the industrial mind of the country is brought in this labor-saving or rather labor-combination era. No sooner did the railroad get into operation across our territory than the telegraph wire followed it, thus putting us into instantaneous communication with the outside world. Now, poles and wires pass along many leading highways, as along all railroads; and still again the telephone, which enables us to converse with friends or correspondents in distant places, is also established in most of our chief towns; but, more wonderful than all, the electric light is coming, which will nearly actualize the Bible expression, "There shall be no night," for the sun or its reflex, electricity, almost turns night into pure daylight. But the two grandest elevators-we might say insti- 118 tutions of societies in this last quarter of the century are the reaping- or mowing-machine of the farmer and sewing machine of the household. By their use the man or woman who employs either has quadrupled his or her productive power, thus approximating the philosophic principle of the in machine itself, -"an instrument that produces, but consumes nothing." Our proximity to the great cities and large manufacturing towns has also nearly revolutionized agriculture in another particular. The farmers of Montgomery County, instead of raising beef, pork, and mutton for Philadelphia market, as formerly, have to some extent come to consuming meat grown and fattened on the great plains of the far West, and it is no unusual thing to see beef-cattle driven through our streets bearing the brands of herders of Texas or Arizona. Thus transformed, husbandry in our County largely takes the exclusive type of "the dairy," boys and men doing the milking, while the product is worked into marketable shape at "creameries," now recently built and furnished all over the county, the latter worked also by men and boys, while many of our mothers and sisters only ply the needle and sewing-machine, or perhaps finger the piano or harp. Another institution of the present, though not material in nature, must be mentioned in this connection as at the bottom of nearly half the town improvements which have sprung up during this era, we refer to building, savings, and loan associations. These enable mechanical and manufacturing employees in our towns to build themselves homes, with a reasonably sure opportunity of paying for them in installments, by help of loans which cannot be foreclosed until savings have, secured a dwelling free of debt. But in nothing has the progress of society been more marked and surprising than in the various social or voluntary associations to protect individual members against the ills of life, as beneficial and insurance companies, such as fire, life, health, and accident insurance companies, including farmers' institutes, fairs, and the like. The Montgomery Agricultural Society was formed, And buildings erected at Springtown, two miles northeast of Norristown, as early as 1848, which had a successful career for several years, its fairs being well Attended and salutary in their influence. A few years after it was removed to near Norristown, and merged into the "East Pennsylvania Agricultural and Mechanical Society," which continued a number of years; but dissensions arising, many members of the original society reorganized under the old Dame, and purchased and at Ambler, Upper Dublin, and erected new buildings, which after some years has somewhat declined again, in consequence of the predominance of the sporting over the strictly farming class of patrons. These county agricultural associations and fairs, when properly conducted cannot be too highly commended as educational institutions. After nearly thirty years experience the various fires, storm, and livestock insurance companies have come to be among our most valued corporations, furnishing as they do reliable insurance at cost. End Chapter VIII.