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Pennsylvania Folklife Magazine Pennsylvania Folklife Society Collection

Winter 1966 Pennsylvania Folklife Vol. 15, No. 2 Earl F. Robacker

Henry Glassie

Berton E. Beck

Don Yoder

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Recommended Citation Robacker, Earl F.; Glassie, Henry; Beck, Berton E.; and Yoder, Don, "Pennsylvania Folklife Vol. 15, No. 2" (1966). Pennsylvania Folklife Magazine. 23. https://digitalcommons.ursinus.edu/pafolklifemag/23

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Covel' !Jie /u re: A DEViL rl PPEA R ANCE, Th e cover picture is all illustration by the early Pel1nsylval1 ia ('ngravel' G i lber/ f01 ' a11 almanac " lIni/lel'" of 1821, It appem'ed in thf Philadelphia publisher Conrad l ent/er's " A 17l el-ieall ­ iseher Stadt und Land Calender," For ti, e D evil ill Pe11nsy lvan ia, see the al,ti cle " 0 lJi.eia l R eligion vers1/S Folh R eligion," EDITOR : Dr. Don Yoder

D E PART M ENTA L E DITORS: WINTER 1965-66, Vol. 15, No. 2 Dr. Earl F. R obacker, Antiques Ed na Eby H eller, Cookery Olive G. Zehner, Crafts LeR oy Gensler, Design D r. J. William Frey, M usic

E DITOR E\fERITes : Dr. Alfred L . Shuemaker Contents

S I3SCRI PTION RATES: $4. 00 a year in the United States and Canada. Elsewhere fifty ce nts a dditio n a l fo r pos tage. Single copies $1.00.

MSS A ND PHOTOGRAPHS: The Editor will be glad to consider 2 Dutch Country Burls and Bowls M S and photographs se nt with a view to publica ti on. 'Vhen unsuit­ EARL F. ROBACKE R able, and if accompanied by return pos tage, every care will be exer­ 8 The Pennsylvania Barn in the South cised toward their return, although H ENRY G L ASS IE no res ponsibility for their sa fety is ass umed. 20 Tales of the Block House

PE SYLVANIA FOLKLIFE, B E RTON E . B ECK Winter 1965-G6 , Vo1.l 5, No.2, pub­ lished quarterl y by the Pennsyl­ 36 Official Religion Versus Folk Religion Yania Folklife ociety, Inc., Lan­ cas ter, Pennsy h 'ania. Subscriptions D ON YODE R and busin ess corres pondence : Box 1053, L ancaster, Pennsyh ania. Edi­ to ria l corres po nde n ce: Dr. D o n Yoder, Bennett H all Box 19, U ni­ \'er ity o f Pennsy h 'a nia, Philadel­ phia -1, P ennsy h ·a nia . Co nte nts w p yrightecl .

E nlered a, second tlass malleI' a l Lancasler, I'ennsy " ·ania . Turned soap-dish believed to have come from the EjJhrata Clois­ ters, and an 8-inch treen IJlate. These pieces m-e of tulip poplar.

chop it. And an elm bw-/! Probably the best reason that burl serving as a guide. From there on, the burl was gouged, ca n be g iv en [or taking on the forbidding job o[ hacking carved, whittled, and eventuall y smoothed until it became away a t an elm burl is the one adduced by the inveterate not only useful but also ornamental. Fancy woods have al­ climber of mountains: One does it because the mountain wa ys been popular in fin e cabinet-makin g, and walnut and is there. other burls, largely des troyed in the process of creating the It is generall y assumed that early colonists learned the art bowl, might have lent beauty to many a commode or lowboy, of making burl bowls [rom the Indians. Such Indian bowls after being converted to veneer. \"'hether or not the as have survived, differ from those made by the white se ttlers colonists found their bowls attractive we shall probably not principa ll y in the matter of h anell s; the Indians fini shed the know- but LOday, refinished and retired [rom heavy se rvice, bowl so th at the fingers could be slipped through the bowl many of these vesse ls are th ings o[ beauty. on either side. The colonists did not. No one knows exactl y M achine-turned bowls-and most were machine- turned by wh y, but a reasonabl e surmise is that the extra ex penditure the beginning of the 19th Century-are attractive or not, of time ca lled [or in creating handle did not seem war­ according LO what additional process ing took place after they ranted, in view of the fact that the bowls were often thought were releaseel [rom the lathe. Some of the earlier bowls were of merely as interim pieces, an yway. sanded and smoothed until all , or a lmost a ll , the tell-talc Determining the age of a wooden bowl is, in large mea - circular markings were destroyed . Except for the fact that ure, guesswork. Bowls took shape in a variety of ways, but they arc perfectly round, one might suppose that the be t of the fini hed product does not necessa ril y reveal beginning or them had actuall y been made by hanel. Real hand-mades, o[ intermediate or final stages in the task. Indian bowls were course, tend to be a little lopsided or off-center, and the walls reduced (rom solid chunks of wood to finished bowls by vary in thickness. There is little i[ any variation in thickness burning- red hot stones patiently appli ed until all unwanted in a machined product. surfaces and thicknesses had been purged away. As might \Vooden chopping bowls were still being lLIrned out a be expected, the wa ll s a nd bottoms of Indian bowls vary mere generati on or two ago, but these m ade no pretension somewhat in thickn ess. They are, of course, completely free to an y quality other than utility. They were turned [rom of any sign of shav ing, chipping, gouging, chiseling, or turn­ a ny hare! wood [ree o f knots, and no attempt was made to in g. Indian bowls now in existence were probably made elimina te the rhythmic, in cised lines created by th e lathe. during the 17th Century. j\ ccording LO how they were u ed or abused , ome of these There arc crude bowls which aClU all y might appropriately bowl, may still be fo und in actual service, while others split be termed troughs. Formed of straight-gra in ed wood, they long ago and were disca rded. Those which were used for arc mere wooden blocks which have been gouged out with butter making were particularl y vulnerable beca use of the mallet and chise l. They undo ubtedly served their purpose deleterious e ffects o f .the sa lt. Today, o[ course, the market in the domestic economy of the 1600's and poss ibly the places arc full o l brand-new wooden bowls, lovely to look at, 1700's, but they were so heavy, cumbersome, and- in most trea ted so that they will resist sa lt or acid or even alcohol, cases- so ugly that any innovation was likely to be an im­ and ranging in price from pence LO pounds, according to provemen t. wh eth er they are to be regarded as objects of utility or ob­ The early colonists had no need to use red-hot SLO nes in jects of art. the creation o( a wooden bowl, but reducing a block of Rims and ears sometimes, but not always, giv clues as to wood to a useable shell before a turning lathe was avai labl e the age o f o ld bowls. Seemingl y, most lathe- turned bowls ca ll ed for enormous patience. T he chunk of wood would had rims prominent enough that they could be gras ped and first be hacked or chopped in to a rough a ppro x imation o[ carried easily. Some o f the hand-made bowls o[ earlier times the des ired round or oval shape, th e natura l form of the a lso had rim s, but more did not. On some of those which

4 Oval bowls were prefened by housewives who sold tll eir butler by TOlls mthel than in stone cTOcks. No flapja ck-bakeT ("Quld outdo the housewife who adroitly tossed Tolls, including the en ds, in to shape in these maple containen! Th ey were usually pierced at one end to take a leal heT thong-or a heavy st1-ing- f01" hanging them up.

Mortal' of majJle, with pestle tipped with fin e white stol1eWa1·e. The mug is of quassia wood, imported fTOm SW'inam and used widely along the eastem, seaboard. Watel' which stood in quassia containers became bittel- and was believed to have medicinal qualities.

5 T urned and decora ted bowls. The seven-in ch sugar- bowl at the left has a spatte1' decom tion in red and green. The two tobacco-jaTS, foun d n ear York, Pennsy lvania, at different times and places, are chip-carved in an old technique known in Ger­ many as " kerb -schn itzen." InC£se d lin es and gouges are fill ed in with rich, dm'lI coloring in which red predominates. did not, till Y ears of wood were a ll owed to remain, to se rve burl a nd slowl y disintegrate. The refini sher can render as handles, but one i compelled to recognize the fact tha t cracks in visible, smooth rough edges, minimize knife marks the red man was way ahead of the white man when it came -but the discoloration of wood brought a bout by the d is­ to making bowls which could be ca rried conveni ently and integra ti on of the na ils and the subsequent absorption o f sa fely. the iron is pro babl y there to stay. R arely is the coll ector lucky enough to discover a reall y While an y householder, anyw here, may once have pos­ old bowl " in the rough"- untouched by the refini sher. Per­ sessed a lathe- turned bowl , it' is in the thinly populated , haps "lucky" is not the right term to use, because res toring " remote" parts of the country that the rea ll y good , hand­ and refinishing call for patience, know-how, a nd sometimes a made article is likely to be found The most attractive elm touch of the psychic. A wooden bowl surviving from days bowl the writer has seen was found in the ce ll ar- o f a farm· gone by would have been scrubbed so o ften tha t either water house in the Poconos, only a year ago. More than mos t alone or water and a cleansing agent would have bl eached it mold y, a bandoned odds and ends in country ce ll ars and a good man y tones li ghter than its natural color- in some outhouses, burl bowls are likely to repay the person who will cases almos t white. The chances are that this same scrubbing spend time in cl ea ning them up-and now and then a really would h ave produced a number of cracks in the vessel, par­ astonishing m etamorphosis occurs. ti cularl y if it were placed in the sun to dry. After yea rs of Not a ll bowls ran the full gamut of household use, of disuse, a bowl left in a damp place, such as a cellar, would course. Indeed , the service expected of some of them was develop success ive layers of mold or mildew, es peciall y if it dependent on the sha pe o f the article that could be produced had ever been used to hold anything sa lty. from the burl itse lf. Thus, we find an occa ional dipper with Still another h azard might be mentioned. In an endeavor a short handle, and now and then a small scoop o f a size suit· to patch up a d efective bowl a t some time' in the past, an able fo r sugar. Some suga r bowls were o f wood, either with owner would occasionall y put a piece of leather or a sheet o f or without covers. Individual eating bowls are now seldom thin metal over a crack, fas tening it with na il s set so tightly come u pon, but now and then an in-between vessel appears together that mo isture co uld hardly work its way through. - a receptacl e LOO shall ow LO be considered a real bowl, but As years passed, the leather would wear Out and the metal too d eep and large to qua lify as a trencher. Articles o f this would rust or loosen- but the nails wo uld rema in in the hard kind were o ften used for drying fruit.

Burls of a shape which did n ot lend themselves to bowl-m aking. The butte1'-pa ddle is light in weight and velvety in texture. The ro lling-pin, also of birdseye m aple, is extremely heavy and nearly as smooth as glass-and is 21 in ches in length!

6 One-piece handled mortar, seven inches tall, with pestle. Both pieces are of maple but th e mortar, in the desiccating j)rQ cess which sometimes occurs in old wood, has become nearly as light as cork.

l\Cortars for crushing or grinding anything from herb for a large stew to corn for the domestic animals are a kind of boll' l. Large ones tended to be no more than hollowed-out sections of tree trunks, but sma ll ones frequently were of superior workmanship. A favorite wood for mortar-a nd­ pe,tl e operati ons was the non-native lignum vitae, a very hea \'y wood brought back, ordinarily to ew England, on sa iling vessels returning from the tropics. There seems to be no thing peculiarl y Pennsylva nia Dutch about , uch treen wares as hollowed-out spoons, plates, and trenchers- quite the contrary, in fact. Pieces we know to be of Pen nsy lvan ia origin seem usuall y to have been mere off­ hand specimens, perhaps created to meet a spec ifi c need, but just as proba bly turned out by casual wh ittlers experiment­ ing to sec what could be done with a knife and a block of Whittled {lour-scoop of tulip poplar: four­ 1I'00d. By contrast, in ew England and in areas of the Mid­ teen inches long, with its rawhide thong still ""'est se ttled by the Norwegians, there was a real tradition of intact. Wooden implements used in milling treenll'are. The Scandinavian carved wooden spoon a a often became almost as light in color as th e love token had no para ll el in Pennsy lvan ia, though it might {lOU1- or m eal they were designed to move. be argued that the bentwood bride's box served the same This is not a burled piece. purpose. A common contemporary practice is to achieve distinction or uniqueness in household decor or accessories by assigning I . Daniel Baud-Bovy, Peasant Art in Switzerland (Lon­ to old·time objects functions once considered foreign to don, 1924). them. Thus an iron coffee grinder and the wooden hub of a 2. Erwin O. Christenson, Eal"ly American Wood Carving wheel become bases for lamps; a cranberry picker may be­ (New York: World Publi shing Co., 1952). (O lll e a pl anter or hold magazine . In such company the 3. nn Kilborn Cole, Antiques (New York: David Mc- hollowed·out wooden meal scoop- or even the full-s ize grain Kay, 1957). ,coop 1I,ed at threshing time-may find it elf doing duty as a 4. Mary Earle Gould, Em'ly Amel'ican Wooden Ware lruit b01l'1 ... not inconceivably while the shades of our (Springfi eld, Massachusetts: Pond-Ekberg, 1948). ancestor, slllother a laugh ! 5. Life Magazine editors, America's Arts and Skills (New Comparati\'Cly little has been written on wooden lI'are of York: E. P. Dutton and Co., 1957). the kind Iloted here. but the reader might be interested in G. Edward H . Pinto, Treen, or Small Woodware (London : the \'ollllll es I) eloll', all 0 1 which at least touch on the subject: B. T. Batsford, 1949).

7 The Pennsylvania Barn In• the SOUTH

By HENRY GLASSIE

Southeastern Pennsylvania was one of the major source areas ot American hlk culture: beginning early in the 18th Century material initially introduced by Germans, English, and Scotch-lt:ish was ca rried in every direction from this dynamic area both by direct migration and diffusion. Of this material the most obvious to the fi eld worker and m ost useful in indicating patterns of Pennsy lvania influence is the barn. In many sections of the United States are to be found barn types introduced into and evolved within south­ eastern Pennsylvania, which, because they were German introductions, appear in no other coastal areas. In con­ trast, the Pennsylvania house types which achieved wide B

distribution were of English origin and were also introduced I I I in the 17th and 18th Centuries into the two other m ajor I source areas of American ma terial fo lk culture: the tide­ I I water South and ew England. When these houses appear ~ ------~ in areas, such as central Ohio or the Valley of Virginia, c where Pennsylvanians met and mixed with people from one of these other areas, they cannot necessarily be es tablished as indicative of Pennsylvania influence. Other elements which spread from Pennsylva n ia- most of the rail fences, for ex­ ample-are, while important, less use ful than barns in estab­ b JJ lish ing patterns of influence because they have been wiped off the landscape in so many areas that their distribution D represents patterns of diffusion less than patterns of survival. There were three major routes which cultural elements, the barn among them, fo llowed out of Pennsylvania; each has its own distinctive characteristics. Barns precisely of 1 the types found in so utheastern P ennsylvania were carried northward, but in northeastern Pennsylvania the Penn yl­ I vania German architectural complex-including, of course, many elements not of German origin-met and was abso rbed by that of New England. A few Pennsylvania hams are found in southeastern ew York but Pennsylvania influence E in the northeastern United States is reflected not ill the ap­ pearance of Pennsylvania barns but in certa in Pennsylvania FIG. 1 -Bam type A , C. A) Located between NIt. Fair characteristics which were added to the New England barn and B rown's Cove, Albemarle County, Virginia; this tradition. The barns mo t commonly found through parts has a narrow cenlml walkway like Fig. 1 D and three of western New England and in New York have two levels doors on the fmnt like Fig. 1E (Decembe1', 1962). B) which function like those of the large Pennsylvania barns, Located northeast of Goshen, Rockbridge County, Vil'­ b ut have no forebay and employ the same framing t,echni­ ginia; it is built of half-dovetailed log and is divided in ques, systems of enlargement, and interior arrangement of half by a tmugh (July, 1964). C) Located south of Pin­ bays found in the early New England barns built fiat on the nacle, Stokes County, North Carolina; it is buill of V­ ground.! notched log and has a shed ove1' the fmnt like Fig. 1A As the Pennsylvania barn moved westward it was evolved (August, 1965). D ) Located n ear Rock Oak, Hamp­ into a new type which had become predominant by ''''est- shire County, TV es t Virginia; Fig. 2 pictures this bam (June,1964). E) L ocated near Burtonsville, Montgom­ 1 Compare Eric Sloane, A merican Barns and Covered Bridges ery County, Maryland; this bam is pictured in Fig. 3 ( r Y. , 1954), pp. 68-70. (July, 1964).

8 FiG. 2-Type A, C Barn of Half-Dove­ tailed Log. This is lo­ cated neal' Rock Oak, Hamj)shire C ounty, Wes t Virginia. FOl the flool"j)lan see Fig. 1D (June, 1964).

Maps, Drawings and Photography by H enry Glassie

morela nd County, Pennsy lva nia; it has twO levels, but lacks whcre, genera ll y, thc farther the barn is fro m thc Pennsy l­ th c fo rebay and has thc main doors of the basement o n the va nia so urce area, thc less likely it is to be a n early Penn­ end ril thcr tha n o n thc rear. T his typc, reinforced by thc ., ylva nia type. forebay-lc s two- level barn from ell' York, is commo n through Ohio a nd] ndia na; howevcr, as there was consider­ 2 For the Pennsylva nia barn in Ohio see: Willia m 1. Schreiber, Our A m ish N eigh bors (Chicago, 1962), pp. 47-5 1. Notable pockets ablc dircct migra ti o n from eastern Pcnnsy lva nia in to th c of Pennsylva ni a barns in Ohio may be found in Franklin and no rthcrn Midwcst th crc a re numero us pockets o f barns likc Greene Counties (August, 1963). Dates in parenthes is indicate thosc found in thc G crma n a reas of Pennsy lva nia, no t onl y the tim ~ of the fi eld co ll ection of the data wh ich prec;edes the parenthesis. in Ohio ~ a nd Indiana, but in Michiga n, \Visconsin,3 Iowa, 3 M. W alter Dundore, "The Saga of the P ennsylva nia Germans Ncbraska,4 a nd Ont a ri o~' as well. in Wisconsin," The Pennsylvania German Folklore Society, XIX Exc.e pting o nl y thc E nglish coastal a reas, the barns of the (1954) , Allentown, 1955, pp. 83-86; Richard W . E. Perrin, H istoric W isconsin J3 u ildings, Milwaukee Public Museum Publications in so utheastern U ni ted Sta tes predomina ntly a re Pennsy lva nia History, o . 4, pp. 22, 25, 39, 43-44. typcs o r arc d f' rivcd from Pcnnsy lv a nia typcs. Individual 4 G. M. Ludwig, "The Influence of the Pennsy lvania Dutch in the Mi ddle Wes t ," T he Pennsylvania German Folklore Society, ty pes rc prcse ll t a , W

FIG . 3 - Stant T yj}(' ,-I. C B am. Th is is located nem' B 1l1"to71sv ille, JU Ollt­ gomel")' County; M ary­ land. Th t door to Ih e ha), loft is located all th e opposite side. The fram(' elld ({ d dition w({s buill ill mid-19th Century, jJrobably about olie hun­ {h'ed )'ears after the stone barl1. Th e st011t bani measures 28' x -/0' . For the {loorpla11 set Fif!, . 1 E.

9 An examination o f the Pennsy lvan ia barns in the South of this type are not built into a bank as both of Dornbusch's leads not onl y to a knowledge o[ so uthern barns, a nd Penn­ exam ples a rc. The type A. C in the South is composed oE a ~y lvani a influe nce in the outh, but also to a deeper knowl­ rectangle, which, in the simples t examples, is divided in half. edge of the barns o[ Pennsy lvania, particularly because some Each of these halves is used for sta bling a nd has a small door of the types which are now rare in Pennsylvania are com­ o pening to the exteri or; these doors may be on each end, ili on in some sections of the South. ,\11 of the area south of both 0 11 th e front, or one on the end a nd one on the front the i\Iaso n-Dixon-Ohio River border is not included in this (Figs. IB, l C). The more usual variant oE this barn type is pa per, as part · of extreme northern ''''est Virginia and divid ed into three: two sta bling areas se parated by a narrow Kentucky seem, as regards the distribution patterns of the wa lkway. Each of these three sections has a door of equal Pennsy lvania barn types, to fit in with the Midwest, rather size opening o ut from it; there may be two doors on the tha n with that part of the South which was settled, a t least frollt a nd one 011 the end, but, much more usually, all three partiall y, as a result ol movement through the Vall ey of doors a rc sy mmetrica ll y placed 0 11 the front wall (Figs. I A, Virginia into th e orth Carolina piedmont. The barn types IE 3). Above the whole ba rn is a low hayloEt which may be II'hi ch wi ll be considered are those types whi ch have been ente red from the walkway by a ladder or steep stair so that recognized as extalll in Pennsylva nia; types which evolved hay might ue brought down a nd placed in the mangers in the South from Pennsy lva nia originals will not be dis· which a re usuall y located on each side of the walkway, or it cussed because, although they illustrate Pennsy lva nia in­ may be en tered thro ugh a small exterior door which is flu ence, they arc not a part of the sa me distributional pat­ usua ll y placed above the central door in the front wall , or, terns as the Pennsy lva ni a types: they move great distances less commonly, in one e nd or on the opposite side of the aga inst the normal northeast to o uthwes t stream o f migra­ barn. Very ofte n there is a ladder up to this exterior hay. ti on which the Pennsy lvania types do not.G These types are loft door. A shed is occasionall y built onto the front of the based upon Charles H . Dornbusch's Pennsylvania German ba rn which functions in the sa me manner that the forebay BaniS,' and the letters II'hich Dornbusch ass igned to his types on the great Pennsy lva nia barns does (Figs. lA, lC). This lI' ill be employed. H owever, several cha nges will be made ba rn may be utilize d as a stable for cows and horses or only in his sys tem . Most importa ntly, where he used construction horses and built near the other outbuildings of the farm, but technique as a definitive characteristic for a type this will be often, as is frequently the case in the eastern Alleghenies, it disregarded because there is no necessary correlati on be· tween co nstruction technique a nd building fOl"l11 . If the fi eld worker accepted his restrictions as to construction, Dornbusc h's cl ass ifi ca tion would become use less not only in the South but also in Pennsy lvania with buildings which Dornbusc h a pparently did not observe. T his does no t, of co urse, mean that constructi on is unimporta nt, or will not be discussed here. but only that it is not of use in es tablishing types . Further, sub-divisions of one of Dornbusch's types will be es ta blished as a result of southern field work; two of hi s types will be omitted because they do not appear in the South ; three will be giv en minimal treatment because they were known to the E ngli sh, appear in the tidewater South and so do not necessarily reflect Pennsy lvani a influence; and one type, which cloes ex ist in Pennsy lva nia, although not re ported by Dornbusch or in Alfred L. Shoemaker, ed ., The Pennsy lvania Bam,S will be added. Each type will be dis­ cussed as regards (I) form , (2) con tructi on , a nd (3) distribu­ tion. The informati on in this paper is based almost e n­ tirely!l on fi eld work ca rried on in the pas t four years a nd so, although not complete, it does give an idea of the extant patterns of Pennsy lvania influence in the South. T ype A , C (Figs. 1-3) Dornbusch recognized that his types A a nd C h ad com· parable forms, altho ugh he se parated them by construction - A being of log, C of stone. The so uthern variants are more ,. closely related to his lone example o f type A, than they a re '-_~' .B to his type C, beca use they do not have large doors which would permit a wagon to enter. Generall y southern barns

G For a brief description of th e so uthern barn types which de­ ve loped from Pennsy lva ni a originals ee: Henry Classic, "The Old Barns of Appalachia," M ountain Life and W ork, XL:2 (Sum· FIG. -/- C orTle1"- Timb eTing. A ) V-7Iot ch'ing f?"Om a mer, 1965) , pp. 21·30. The most important of th ese, the trans­ velse·crib barn, ori gi nated in so utheastern Tennessee and sprea d dOl/ble-crib ban? subtype II, located between Ca vetow71 northw ard into northern Virginia and so uthern Indiana. and H agerstown, Washington County, Mm-y land (A u­ 7 The Pennsylvania German Folklore Society. XXI (1956), gust, 1965). B ) H alf-dovetail corner- timbering fmm a .-\ li en town , 1958. double-crib bm'n subtype II, located southwest of Greg­ S Pennsylva nia Folklife Society (Kutztown, 1959). ory, Muna), County, G eorgia (May, 1964). C) Saddle­ ~ i\fan y of the id eas in this paper are the resu lt of co nversations with Professor Fred Kniffen, who has bee n a co nstant guide in notching from a double-crib barn subtype III, north of my folk arch itectural studies. Coker Crf'P/(, i\lJonroe COllnly, T ennessee (May, 1964).

10 FIG_ 5-Type D. The English 01- Connecti­ cut Bal-n. L ocated betwee n GTot to es and D ooms, Augusta Count y, Vil-ginia. Th is ban) has th e same lotl vel-s, red jJainted clapboaTds, and white tTim as the two-level (ty /Je P-]) Pennsylvania baTns in the same m-ea (July, 1964 )_

funClions as a " meadow barn," that is, it is built a con ider­ Type D a ble distance from the dwelling a nd other outbuildings and The English aT Connecticut Bam is used only for the storage of hay and the temporary sta bling (Fig. 5) of draft animals. This barn is composed of two areas separated by a thresh­ The only stone examples ot this type have been ob erved ing fl oor; both o f these areas may be employed for stabling in central Maryland. In the Southern Appalachian region, or one for stabling a nd the other as a h ay mow or [or the particularly the sma ll er variants of this type which lack the storage of corn, grain, or machinery. There are large double central wa lkway are often found built of log in the Penn­ doors on each end of the threshing floor a nd small er doors sylvania German manner: the logs are hewn inside and out o pening in to the stabling a reas. Usually there is a h ayloft a nd are joined at the corner with V-notch or half-dove tail above the stabling area(s). In eastern Virginia a nd Ma ry­ corner-timbering, or, less usuall y, the logs are left in the land this type function as a tObacco barn.l2 round a nd saddle- notched (Fig. 4 ) .10 Examples of frame Altho ugh it appears more commonly in Pennsy lvania of covered with vertical board or occasionally clapboard are frame covered with vertical board than it does of stone, considera bl y more common than log_ Dornbusch establi shed stone construction as a characteristic This small stable is characteristically a mountain type; it of th is type. Southern examples are almost all o f frame,I3 is not found with any regularity in central Maryla nd but is more o ft en covered with vertical board than with clapboards. common in the Alleghenies from western l\Jaryla nd along This type is widely known in Europe and was introduced the Virginia-W est Virginia line, becoming less common in into the New 'World by farmers of several different national- southern W est Virginia and so utheastern Kentucky. It is 12 John Fraser Hart and Eugene Cotton Mather, "The Char­ also found with frequ ency in the Valley a nd Blue Ridge of acter of Tobacco Barns and Their Role in the Tobacco Econ­ Virginia; again, it becomes less usual the farther south it omy of th e nited States," Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 51:3 (September, 196 1), pp. 283-284. This same appears,so that it is only occasionally encountered along the barn type, co nstructed of half- timber rather than vertica l boarded orth Carolina-Tennessee Blue Ridge. A very similar barn frame, has been differentiated for use as a tobacco barn in Ger­ many; see: Barbara Seidel, "Wort und Brauch im Arbeitsjahr is known in England 11 and the Virginia tidewa ter from des Tabakbauern im Oder-Randow-Gebiet," Deutsches Jahrbuch where it was ca rried west in to the Piedmont. It is poss ible fiir Volkskunde (Berlin, 1964) , plates 14, 15. that this Tidewater type reinforced the strength of the stable 13 There is a log V-notch ed English barn so uthwes t of Pulaski, Pula ki Co unty, Virgi ni a (July, 1964). In Frederi ck County, Mary­ in the upland sections of Virginia; its great strength in the land, two miles so uth of Frederi ck, th ere is a Slone barn of this All eghenies, however, is more likely attributable to Penn­ lype (March, 1963) , wh ich bears a remarkably close rese mblance sy lva nia tha n to the Tidewa ter, so tha t, while this type is not lO one pi ctured in Samuel Chamberl ain, Six New England Vil­ lages (New York, 1948), p. 48 . Although Frederick Co unty was a clear guide to Pennsy lvania influen ce, it, with all of its largely se ttled by Pennsy lva ni a Germans, the farm on which this va riants, should be .recognized as a Pennsylva nia type. barn is located was es tablished by French and this barn is prob­ ably of French origin . This type was known in France (see: Wil­ 10 For A merican log co nstruction see th e forthcoming articl e li am D. Foster, Cottages, Manoirs and other Minor Buildings of by Professor Fred Kniffen and Henry Glass ie in The Geographical Normandy and Brittany [New York, 1926], plate 1 [lower)) and R eview. was brought to th e New ''''orld by the French (see : John Fraser 11 Oli ve Cook and Edwin Smilh, English Cottages and Farm­ Hart, "Barns of Quebec," The Geographical Review, LV :3 [1965], houses (New York, 1955), plate 137 . pp. 424-426).

11 0\-1\0

KE ~ T uCI<.,(

No R..Tt1 TENN ESSEE CAROLINA

5 0u -rH C AROLINA

M IS S I.SSI PPI AL A BAMA GEORGIA

FIG . 16-D istributiOll Of the D ouble-Crib B arn in the South. The double-CYib bam may af) peal' a / most anywh ere in the South} but it is faun d with Tegulm'ity In the ({rea with in Ihe double lines and is very common in the shaded areas.

ities. It was brought by the English to N ew England 14 gll1l a. This barn is of little use as a guide to Pennsy lvania where it is very common and from where it spread into the influence in the South, as it was also introduced from the Midwest. It was known in Germany l~ and Scotland as well Tidewater. The facts that in va rious areas its external as England, so it is likely that it was built in southeastern shea thing co nforms to that found on types definitely intro­ Pennsy lvan ia by many of the earl y se ttlers,lG It was intro­ duced (rom Pennsy lvani a-vertical board except in the cen­ duced into the tidewater areas of North Carolina and Vir­ tral Valley o f Virginia where clapboarding was employed­ ginia 17 and was carried with the Engli h se ttlers into the and that it is found with frequency in central Maryland and Virginia piedmont. It is found o nl y rarely a long the Vir­ the Valley, where German influence is comparatively great, ginia Blue Ridge but is frequently enco untered in ce ntral co uld indica te that many of the southern examples are of Maryland, the northern Alleghenies a nd the Va lley o f Vir- Pennsy lvan ia provenance; however, the Tidewater-English influence on the architecture of the Valley of Virginia was great and most I)f the barns of thi type appear in the north­ UfoI' lhc English barn: Gcorgc Ewart Evans, Ask Ih e Fellows IVho Cut Ihe Hay (London, 1956) , pp. 92- 94; Amhony N. B. ern Valley where the E nglish influence was strongest. Gan'an, A,chilecillre (/lid TaWil Planning in Colonial Connecti­ T ype B cut (Ncw Havcn, 1951) . pp. 91, 111 - 11 2, lacing p . 117. The D ouble-Crib Bam 1~) fOI Gcrman cxamplcs: Hein rich Gotzger and H clmul I'rcchlcr, Dos liallCl'llhalis ill J3a y Cl n, Balld i : R egiel'llll gsbezirh (Figs. 6-16) Schwabell (J\Iunich, 1960) , pp. ·17 , Ill. Tn Gcrmany a nd wilzer­ Although no lo nger commonly found in Pennsy lvania, the land Ihls I)PC IS [lcquc11lly incorporaled inlo a largcr building. It; For a I' cnns)l\'ania cxamplc in add ilion lO lhosc givcn by double-crib barn is generall y recognized as an earl y Penn­ DOl nbullc h scc: .\ Ifrcd L. Shocmakcr, H r:;., No' (Lanca leI', 1953), sy lvania type.1S It is composed of two separate construction p. 21. (Thc lIamc p lclure and lCXI appcar a lso in Shoemaker's units- traditionally referred to as " pens" or "cribs" or Till eI' 1\[\,11" . l holll !III' Pl'1l11s \' lvallia Dllieh COIIIIII'V and PenH ­ sylv.,allia Dllieh flcx JI/ (lIhs.), Hc ca ll s lhis an " English-lypc barn." "mows"-separa tecl by an open runway and connected by a 1, \ V. Edw1l1 H cmphdl , '\Vh ) l3alns?-Thcn and ;-.Jow ," Vir­ common gable roof, the ridge line- "comb"-of which runs gillia Capalcade, VJI :3 (Winlcr, (957) , p. 18. A lhalchcd, mid- 19lh Cenllll )' cxamplc rl0111 call1CI n Vilginia. Comparc lhis with 1 Charles I\[ orsc SlOlZ. The Early Architecture of lVestel'll .\I rrcd L. Shocmakcr: cd .. Til l' Pellllsylvania /lam , p . 17 , for an Pellllsylvallia (New York, 1936), p. 144; Henry J. Ka uffman, "The CX:lmple or lhc amazIng slIndallly o[ nOllhCI nand sO lllhern cx­ Log Barn," in Ifred L. hoemaker, ed., The Pennsylvania Bam, amplcs 01 the sa mc barn lypC. pp. 33-34.

12 FIG. 7-D ouble-Crib Bam, Subtype I. This V­ notched log barn is located 1wrtheast of Bristol, Washington County, Virginia. For the floorplqn see Fig. 6D (1uly, 1964).

transversely to the runway. As a result of southern field work three subtypes of the double-crib barn have been recogn ized. B The Double-Crib Barn Subty1Je I (Figs. 6-7): This type is distinguished by havi ng its two rectangular cribs aligned with the comb of the roof. Most usually there is one door opening into the runway from the lower level of each crib. In rare instances one of the doors may not open into the runway (Fig. 6C), or there may be two doors into one or both of the cribs. The lower level is usuall y used for stabling in the upland South and corn storage in the Deep South; generall y the farther south this barn is found the small er are the cribs and the more likely they are to be used for corn storage. Above each crib is a loft almost always reached from a door into the runway, although a very few with doors opening in to the loft from the front of the FIG. 6 - Double-Crib Barn Subtype 1. A) L ocated near barn have been observed. This loft is usually a hay mow, but Entel'prise, Clarke County, MississijJjJi; one crib is of in the Deep South it may be used for the storage of root saddle-notched log, the other, which is oldeT, is of fmme crops, broken furniture and outmoded machinery. The C) (November, 1962). B ) Fl oOJ-plan of Fig. 6A. Lo­ great majority of obse rved examples, particularly in the cated between Nashville and Ozan, H emjJstead County, Arkansas; it is of saddle-notched log (March, 1964). D) Deep South, h ave shed for sheltering stock added onto two Loca ted northeast of Bristol, TVash ington County, VLr­ or all four sides (Fig. 6A, 6B). Only very rarely are large ginia; see Fig. 7 fOT a photogmph of this barn (1uly, doors placed on the ends of the runway which usually has a 1964). hard-packed dirt or clay floor.

13 The Double-Crib Bam 'ubtype II (Figs. 8-12) : The rec­ tangular cribs o f the double-crib barn subtype II are ar­ ranged transverse ly to the ridge line. T h ere is most usuall y one door opening out from the front of each crib, but oc­ A casionall y there are two doors o pening to the front, in which case the crib mayor may not be divided in half by a manger or trough (Fig. 8C). Only very rarely are there doors open­ ing from the lower level into the runway (Fig. 8G). Oc­ casionally the cribs are square instead of rectangular (Fig. 8F, 10). There is frequently a pent roof over the front doors supported by the cantilevered extension o f logs in the end wall s of each crib. Particularl y in southwestern Virginia a forebay- like shed, used as a hay mow or straw room, may be built over these front doors; this may easily be distinguished from the true forebay by the fact that it is not formed by the ca ntilevered exten ion of fl oor joists but rather by light beams framed in between the logs of each crib. The lower leve l o l each crib is almost a lways used for stabling and there are often rear shed appendages (Figs. 8A, 8B, 8F) or ga ble end <1 dditions (Fig. 8E) for stabling. A corn crib may it n ------o be co nstructed as part o f a shed built onto one gable end of this barn. Occasionall y one o f the cribs is differentiated for use <1S a corn crib, in which case it is usuall y more nar­ U ______row than the crib used for stabling (Figs. 8D, 11 ). In one, G poss ibl y unique, }Vlaryland example (Figs. 8e, 12) one crib is built o f log for sta bling and the other of frame for use as FIG. 8-Flo01-plans of the Double-Crib Barn Subtype II. f, a hay mow; as these two cribs were framed together the barn L ocated south of Faith, R owan County, North Carolina; Sf is not the res ult of a series of additions. The upper level Fig. 9 f01 ' a photografJh of this barn (August, 1965). B) Lj of each crib, as in the other subtypes of the double-crib cated southwest of W ytheville, Smyth County, Virginia; th barn, is used as a hay mow and is entered through a door cribs are V-notched and a fore bay-like shed is framed in OV I opening into the runway, but unlike the other subtypes the the fTOnt (.July, 1964). C) Located north of Williamspor Washington County, Marylland; see Fig. 12 for a fJhotograp loft of the subtype II is often very large. Frequently there of this barn (August, 1965). D) Located near Philomon are large double doors at each end of the runway which is Loudoun County, Virginia; see Fig_ 11 for this barn (Augus covered with heavy planks to se rve as a threshing floor 1964). E) Located south of Sevierville, Sevier County, T el (com pare Figs. 11 , 12). The double- crib barn subtype II nessee; this bam has half-dovetailed cribs-measuring 12' seems close ly related in (orm to the English barn (Dornbusch 20'- with frame end additions (.July, 1964)_ F) Located soutl type D) and it is poss ib le that they share a common origin . west of Crandon, Bland County, Virginia; see Fig. 10 for photograph of this barn (.July, 1964 ). G) Located betwee Boonesville and Brown's Cove; the left crib is used for st. bling, the right for corn storage, both are V-notched an m easure II' x 20' (August, 19_64)-

FIG. 9~ Doubl e- Crib Barn Subty fJ e II. This half-dovetail log barn is located south of Faith, R owan County, Nmth Carolina. The cribs m-e employed for stabling, have a lm-ge hay mow, and m easw'e 12' x 20'. The sheds on the side (11-e fo r the storage of farm machine1}, thai in the Teal' is divided into stalls with on,n section set as ide for chickens_ F01- the {i o01,/J/an see Fig. 8A (August, 1965)_

14 FIG. lO- Double-Crib Bam ubtyjJe n. This bam is located southwest of Cmn­ don , Bland County, Virginia .. The 1"Ough ly V-notched crib a1"(' used fOJ· stabling and are 11 feet sqU(l1·e. See Ftg. 8F for the floorplan (July, 1964).

FIG. ii- Double-Crib Barn SubtyjJe n. This V-notched barn is lo­ cated near Philomont, Loudoun County, Vir­ ginia. The crib on the right-measuring 17' x 14'-was used for stabling, that on the left -measuring 7' x 17'-was used as a corn crib . FOT the floo1" ­ jJlan see Fig. 8D (A u­ gust, 1964).

FIG. 12- Double-Crib Barn Subtype n . This barn is located north of TVilliams­ port, Washington County, Maryland. One of the cribs is of V-notched log and serves as stabling, the otl!er is fmme and serves as a hay mow. The sheds flankin g the large doors are unusual on one-level barns, although f1·equently found on the large two-level Pennsylvania barns. For the floorplan see Fig. 8C (A ugust, 1965).

15 The Doubl.:-Crib Barn Subtype III (Figs. 13- 15): The rec­ tangular cribs o[ the double-crib barn subtype III are, like those o[ subtype II, arranged transversely to the ridge line. Each crib is divided into two or, very rarely, three stabling sections, each o[ which has a door opening into the runway. Occasiona ll y one o[ the cribs is differentiated [or corn stor­ age; it is built co nsiderably more narrow than the other crib and has a sma ll door opening to the front. Like the other double-crib barns this type h as a small door opening into the runway [rom the hayloft of each crib, a nc! [re­ quently has sheds added to the sides [or additional stabling or the ~ torage o [ farm vehicles and implements. This type only ra rel y has the thres hing Ooor or doors on the ends o[ the runway which are frequently found on the do uble-crib ,0 -W-- "V' barn subtype II. , ' The double-crib barn is characteristi ca lly built o f log. In ce lllral Maryland a nd the outhern Appalachian region the l og~ are usuall y hewn inside a nd out a nd are joined with V-notch or half-dovetail co rner-timbering (Fig. 4). The interstices lelt between the logs are rarely chinked: the logs, l- ---- B ::::- a: ::~ however, are frequently covered with vertica l boards. In ,. , I I the Deep South the logs may be hewn but more commonly il __ ___.... JL __ Jt are left in the round and addle- notched or are split and B used in a half round shape. Very often, particularly in the North Carolina Blue Ridge and piedmont, the double-crib barn is translated into frame. The frame is covered with r------v-----a - - ~-1 clapboards, vertica l board or occasionall y wide horizontal I : boards between which there are interstices in precisely the I proportions of log construction. The double-crib barn was widely known in Torthern In ancl Centra l 20 Europe a nd was undoubtedly known to many of the gro ups which were to form the Pennsylvan ia German folk culture. From southeastern Pennsylvania it was carried into we tern Pennsylvan ia 21 a nd Ohio where it m ay still be rarely found. The double-crib bam, particularly sub­ , type II, is found with increasing regularity from Washington i c I County, Maryland, through the northeastern neck o[ W est I I !!p ______0 ______Q ______g Virginia into the Valley and Blue Ridge of Virginia. The double-crib ba rn subtype II is extremely common in the .\lleghenies along the W est Virginia-Virginia border and into so uthwes tern Virginia a nd southea tern Kentucky, FIG. 13- D ouble-Cn:b Bam SubtYiJe III. A) Located where a few examples o[ subtype I may also be found. The southwes t of Cullman, Cullman County, Alabama; the double-crib barn u btype II is also common along the North cribs (l1'e of V-notch ed log and meaSUTe 9' x 20' (May, Carolina-T ennessee Blue Ridge a nd in the so uthern To nh 1964). B ) FI001·planofFig.13A. C) Located southwest Carolina piedmont, an area se ttled in the middle of the 18th of Walnut G1'Ove, Blount County, Alabama; for a CenlUry by Pennsylv ania Germans.22 The double-crib barn photoamph of this bam see Fig. 14 (May, 1964). subtype III is found at the so uthern end of the Blue Ridge in orth Carolina, T ennessee, South Carolina and Georgia, ancl particularly in north-central Alabama, wh ere there is a it wa carried northward so that the examples found in considerable German population. The double-crib barn is southern Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois were probably brought occasiona ll y found in the Tennessee Valley 23 from where from Pennsylvania by way of the South rather than due west. The double-c rib barn is one of the major character­ J!) For cxa mpl cs: Vail eI' \ V. Forsblom , "S),doslerbollniska allmogeb)ggnader." Folhlol lstislw oclt etnoglafiska sludier I istics of the Southern Appalachian region, but- usuall y (Helsinki , 1916), p. 11 9, ]\fanin WlIghl. "The .\ J1lcccdents of in the form of the ubtype I , occasionally as subtype III, lhe DOllbl c- Pen House T)pe." Anllals of tile A ssocialion of 11 mer­ a nd ra rely as subtype II- it did spread into the Deep South ieall (; ('oglaj)iIcrs, ·18:2 (jllne, 1958) , fi g. 5D. 20 ~or cxa Ill)) les : Jose[, Vareka , " Hospodil';ske slavby v Brvnisli , so that a few example may be found in central Georgia, Dolnl a Hornl '\carfkove, Papradnu a vc SlI av l1lku " (Farmsteads r\labama and Mississippi; in eastern Missouri; the R eel in lhc Villagcs or illunisli , Lower and Upper i\ [arikova, Popradno River Valley o[ Louisia na and Arkansas; and in eastern and Sl ia\ nik). SIOVt!llSh)' N fll odoPis, X:3 (Bralislava, 1962), pp. 157. 1,,9; Ciilzger and i'reciner, op cit., p. 210. Texas. In rare instances it has reached to coastal outh ~I Therc i ~ an exccll enl examplc of dOllblc-crib barn sublype I Carolina, northern Florida, and the northern limits of the localcd wcs t 01 Bed rord , Bedrord COU 11l y, Pennsy lva ni a (August, 1963). French sections of Louisia na. The double-crib barn was ~~ Joseph R. ;-.!i xo n, "The Ccrman SCll lers in Linco ln Counl)' certa inly a Pcnnsy lvania German introduction and its deep :I nd " 'cs lcrn North Ca rolin a." lames SjJr ll1!t H istorical Publica­ southern penetration is indicative of the great, yet often liolls (Chapel Hill. 191 6). ~;t For an examplc sec th c co vcr of lhc T ennessee Folklore So­ unrecognized, inAue nce of German Pennsylvania upon the riel\' lIu//elill, XXX: I (Dcccmbcr. 1964). fo lk cullUre of the South (see Fig. 16).

16 FIG. J4-Double-CTib Bm'n Subtype III. This bam is lo ca ted southwest of Wal­ nut GTOve, Blount County, Alabama. Its V-notched cribs meaSUTe 10' x 25' See Fig.13C fin the flooTplan of this barn (May, 1964).

~::-~ -- ,' . _ ....IJ • FIG. 15- Runway of a Double- Crib Subtype III. This photograph illustrates the stretcher wall dividing each crib in half, the doors opening into each hatf of the crib, and the dom- into the hay loft. This bam, which is very similar to that pic­ tured in Figs. 13A and 13B, is located northeast of Dobson, Sun'y County, Nm·th Carolina (August, 1964).

17 pe N NS"I'LVANIA

oHIO

INDIANA

KENTUCKY VIRG-INIA

TE.NNESSEE NO~TH CAROL-INA

MISS/SS 1 PP I ALA BAMA SOUTH CAROLINA

FIG. 20-Distribution of the Double- Crib Barn with Cantilevered, Overhanging Loft in the South. This bam type appears in the areas bordered by double lines and is common only in the shaded areas.

The Double-Crib Barn with Cantilevered, Overhanging LOft ,- ,, (Figs. 17-20) This is a double-crib barn subtype II with a large loft which overhangs the first level by mea ns of the cantilever principle. The first level usuall y has one or two doors open­ ing to the front from each rectangular crib, a lthough rarely the doors may open into the runway. Each of these cribs functi ons as stabling. The runway may be left open but is frequen tl y closed off by large doors or is framed in to pro­ vid e an additional stabling area. The loft may overhang on the front and the rear, in which case it is supported by the 1)" - - - - - '0------0------6( I I cantil evered extension of the top logs in the end walls of o 0 I each cri b (Figs. 17 A, 17B, 19), or, less commonly, on all four sides, in which case it is supported by the ca ntilevered ex­ o Ir=J! . tension of the top logs in the front and rear wa lls of each crib and the ca ntilevered extension of floor joists which run D [rom the front to the rear and are placed over these ex­ J- lIillTIL ! tended logs (Figs. 17C, 18). The loft functions as a hay mow. I ! I I Frequently the area under the loft in the rear is framed in g ______Q ______.5' ______9~ and covered with vertica l boards to be used for corn storage, :B slielter for cattle, or pens for hogs. In this case the area under the front of the loft is left open, but occasionally this r------I I I area, too, is framed in giving the barn the appearance only I I of a large, gabled, board rectangle. In rare instances there may be a ramp built up to the overhanging loft on the end or the rear so that a wagon may be driven onto the fl oor of the loft. The cribs of the first level of this barn type are usuall y of hewn log join ed by V-notch or half-doveta il corner-timber­ ing (F ig. 4) . One eastern T ennessee example (Figs. 17C, 18) = in which the Jogs are mortised into corner posts, as was oc­ :______- ____ - ______J casionall y done in southeastern Pennsylvania,24 has been. G obse rved. The loft is usually of cl apboarded frame; how-

24 Fo r hori zo ntal log constr uction with co rner posts in Penns),l ­ vama see: ..\ Ifred L. Shoemaker, ed .. The Pennsylvania Barn, FIG. 17- The Double-Crib Barn with Cantilevered, p . 33;. Thomas Tiles.ton W atcrman , T he Dwellings or Co lonial Ovahanging Loft. A) Located n ear Villas, Watauga AIII(, l'Iw (Chapel HilI , 1950). p . 159; G . EcIwin Br umba ugh , C01ln t)', North Carolina; the cribs are V-notched (A u­ " Colonia l .\ rchiteclure o [ the Pennsy lva nia Germans, " Pennsy l­ tlal/ i ll C erlllall Society P rocee d i ll g~, XLI. part II, pp. 25-26, plates gust, 1964). B ) Flom-plan of Fig. 17A. C) Located IO- II ; R o bert C. Buch er , "The Continental Log H o use." Pennsyl­ n ortli of Maryville, Blount County, Tennessee,' see Fig. pal/ia Follilire, X lI: I (Sullllllcr, 1962), pp. 17- 18. 18 for a photograjJ h of this bam (May, 1964).

18 FIG. 18- Double-C1'ib Barn with Cantilevered, OVe?"­ hanging Loft. This barn is located n01,th of Maryville, Blount County, Tennessee. The frame loft of this barn overhangs on all four sides. The log cribs, which. have ever, th ere are examples entirely of log in Kentucky (Fig. 19) the logs tenoned into corner posts in the fTOnt and V­ and entirely of frame in West Virginia and Tennessee. notched in th e 1'ear, measure 23' x 16'. For the fioor­ There exists a peasant house type, the umgebindehaus, in plan see Fig. I7C (May, 1964). some of the European areas from which the Pennsylvania Germans came, particularly in Bohemia, which has a frame upper level which overhangs the log lower level by means of the ca ntilever principle,2;; and it is likely that the Ameri­ ca n double-crib barn with overhanging loft descended from this type. It has not been reported in any of the published writings dealing with the Pennsylvania barn; 2G however, examples of this type have been observed in York and Adams Counties, and its appearance in the South is certa inly the resul t of Pennsylvania influence. It is fo und occasionally in the All eghenies of Virginia and W est Virginia and in the northern Valley of Virginia. From the extant survivals it seems li kely lhat, berore General Sheridan in the Vall ey and coa l mining in the Alleghenies, many more barns of this ly pe ex isted in weS lern Virginia and southern W est Virginia. It appea rs with some frequency in southeastern Kentucky bUl is common only along the Blue Ridge of T ennessee and in the general area of the Great Smokies in North Carolina and T ennessee (see Fig. 20). The second half of this paper will deal with the fully developed Pennsy lvania barns (Dornbusch types F-J ), their forms, co nslruction, and distribution in the South. FIG. J9-Double- C1'ib Barn w ith Cantileve1'e d, Ove1'­ 2., For the umgebinclehaus: H erbert KOrth , Auf Wanclerfahrt naeit alt er Hanclwerkslw ll st (Leipzig. 1957), pp. 132-143 ; Klaus hanging Loft. This V-notched barn is located east of Thiede. Aile den/sehe Ilau emhiiu ser (Slullgart. 1963), p . 96. S ~ lbiana , Pihe.County, Kentucky. Th e fi oorlJlan is like 2GIt is probably tha t lype referred lO as the log and frame barn FIg. J7B , excelJt that the doors of each crib open into in the Pennsylvania lax reports for 1798; see: Alfred L. Shoe­ th e T1 l17.Way (June, 1964 ). maker . cd ., The Pellll sl'ivall ia Ba rn, pp. 29 . 91 - 96 .

19 Tales of the

By BERTON E. BECK

I cannot tell how the tTuth may be, I say the tale as 'twas said to me. - Sir W alter co tt Block House as a place name never appeared on any ma p of Pennsylvania, but in the ea rly part o( the 19th Century the present borough of Liberty, T ioga County, and the sur­ rounding co untrys ide of LilD erty Valley within a radius of fiv e miles-part of which is in L ycoming County- was known as the Block H ouse. The first building in the area was erected in the center of Liberty by Charl es Williamson and his workmen while building a road from Williamsport, Pennsy lvania, to Pa inted Post, ew York, in 1792. The b'lilding, twenty feet by forty feet square, was made of round logs a nd to the German work­ men in Williamson's crew an y house made of logs was a "Blockhaus." In English it became two words, "Block House," ancl the name was popular in the community for the hotel, the village, and surrounding countrys ide. Over the years, in the community o f the Block Hou e and nearby areas, there were often amusing incidents that befell various perso ns and a lways someone with a se nse of humor saw the (unny side of those events. These ancl other " twice told tales" were h anded cl own as tradition mainly by word o f mouth and they may have grown some according to the imag­ in ation of the narrators so that this version of them may nor be the exact truth. Philip Anthonyson and his Hotel 'iJVhil e parts of this story are traditional hearsay, ce rta in other parts are recorded history. H enry W . Shoemaker in his T ales of the B ald Eagle Mountains d evotes a chapter to Philip Anthonyson and his two hotel , one o( which was lo­ ca ted on Big Run in Clinton County, where that stream empties into th e W est Branch of the Susquehanna, and the other was the "Block H ouse," a hotel located within the presen t borough of Liberty and operated (rom 1793 to 1813. Th e map locates t Il e Block House COlll1tT'Y ill Noveli sts are apt to "gild the lily" by pa inting in somber Pennsylvania's T ioga and L ycoming Counties _ black the character of their vill ain. In this story there was no heroine so apparently Shoemaker gave his villa in an extra coat of b lack " paint_" John]. Meginnis in his H istory of L ycoming County, and land , but this was too close lO Fra nce as there were French Sherman Day in his H istory of Pennsylvania, both pa int a sy mpathi7ers searching for him in order to collect the offered very dark word picture of Anthonyso n. reward. From these three sources and an account by Judge Charl es Anthon yso n boarded a hip sa iling to PhiladelphIa wnere G. Webb, p lus a b it o[ tradition, I have constructed the fo l­ soon after his arriva l he was engaged by hip capta ins to go lowi ng story o( Philip Anthonyso n and his hotel, the Block to German y as a "n ewlander" to induce people to immigrate I-louse. lO Pennsy lvan ia, receiving a commission for each passenger Anthonyson, a native of Alsace-Lorra ine, was a soldier o( he secured. H e painted a very rosy word picture to his fortune who drifted to Paris prior to the great revolution pro pecls, telling them of the many natural resources of of 1793. H ere he joined various groups who were fi ghting Pennsy lva nia, lhe high wages, a nd large acreages of land the Monarchy and sought to enhance his fortunes by murder lhal could be bought (or a song. and p illage o ( the aristocracy. H e soon became a leader to rf the immigrant la cked money for his passage, he could be (eared and with a price on his head he escaped to Eng- sign a cO lllract whereby the ca ptain would transport him to

20 T o ?'e present the m'iginal Blockhaus bu ilt in 1i92, a log bam was torn dow1I and erected here fm' the centennial celebration of 1896. amuel Seclnist 1Joses here as Philip Anlhol1 )'son. Photograph CQu rtes)' of l'I[1'S. Cha?'[es A . M iller.

Philadelphia for the right to se ll his services for a period of all directions. There had not been a tree cut except the few onl y a fell' yea rs to the highest bidder, thus making the im· cut in building the road and the log house. Also, there were migrant a n indentured se rvant. very few travelers over the road for several years. H owever, 'Wh ether the immigrant came as a free perso n or an in­ soon people began moving to northern Pennsylvania and dentured servant, he was a pt to find the beautiful picture west central ew York, They came as single families or two painted by j\nthonyson to be a myth. There were no high or three families traveling as a group for company. At wa gcs and ethnic discrimination was generall y apparent be­ times there might be a regular caravan consisting of a large twccn the Engli sh townspeople and the German immigran ts. group of people with two teams of oxen pulling large wagons ,\rrivil1 g at Philadelphia after his third trip as a " new­ loaded with goods, Often persons would be seen walking lander" ,\ntho l1 yso n found so man y disappointed people behind the wagons while the others scoured the countryside looking for his "scalp" that he fl ed to the interior part o f the looking for game to feed the people. st;J te and bought a hotel in Clin ton County where Big Run Anthonyso n reaped a rich h arvest from all this travel for cmpties il1to the \Ves t Branch o f the Susquehanna River. his was the only hotel for many miles in either direction. Herc he often entert;J ined his guests with the stories of his His little hotel did not have sleeping accommodations for a hair-ra ising ex peri ences so that man y a patron did not sleep large crowd but then people generally carried camping LOO well a ft er hearing such tales. equipmen t and for a price a ca mp site was avail able. Also, Rumors spread about him, one being that a lone traveler they could use his stone bake-oven for a price. H e seldom SLO pped at the hotel one evening and that was the last seen had an y feed in his barn for the livestock but if the travelers of him. Business fell off and r\nthonyso n was looking for had their own feed, he rented the use of the feed troughs. a new loca ti on when h e received " 'ord of a hotel being b uil t U ndoubtedly there we re travelers who were not averse to tak­ on the \Villiamson R oad a t a place called Block H ouse. T his ing adva ntage o f a hotel man if they could, but in Anthony­ was the round-log building at the present site of Liberty son they met their m atch. which was converted into a hotel and Anthonyso n bought One of the specia l treats at his tabl e reserved for his best it in 17 93. H e operated the hotel for twe n ty years then sold pay ing gue ts was "smoked elk steaks," There were some it to J o nathan Sebring from Berks County in 1813. elk in Pennsy lvania but his elk steaks were more likely The Bl ock H ouse hotel was in a most desolate spot in ordinary beef. H e was accused, but the accusation never 17 93, situated in the d ense forest that stretched for miles in proven, of being a first rate. cattle rustler. Travelers often

21 drove cows and yo ung cattle along to their new homes and Mush and Mjlk when stopping to camp at the hotel the cattle were placed in We generall y think of corn as food for the farm animals a fenced field. Very often in the morning some of those cat­ but in colonial days whole CO nt or cornmeal or flour, in tle were missing. He was careful to take only one or two variously prepared dishes, was the main staple of the peo· from a mall herd, but a drover with a lot of cattle might pie's diet. The cornmeal baked into bread or a cake was lose quite a few. Anthonyson, however, was always most often carried in the saddle-bag when on a journey and be­ sympathetic with any of his guests who lost cattle and always ca me known as "journey cake," which was contracted to insisted on leading the search making sure the owners did "jonny cake," and in this form is often used today. Served not get near the place where the " lost" cattle were hidden. hot with maple sy rup or strawberry preserves, instead of from Tradition is often most cruel to one who is not popular th e saddle- bag, it is deli cious. with the common man, and Anthonyso n's reputation may Cornmeal mush is made today in a doubleboiler but in have suffered more than it should have. Human nature is the olden days it was made in an iron pot or kettle. The most fickle and Anthonyson could have aided any number pot was filled half full with water, sa lted to taste, and when of people in distress without the populace knowing anything the water was boiling the meal was sifted slowly into the about it. H e was quite popular with people who could pay wa ter. It took an hour of steady boiling to cook the mix­ for their accommodations and his hotel became famous with ture to a stiff consistency. Served with a little sweetening such travelers over the William on Road. and milk it was the famous " mush 'n milk." Any mush left Travel over the road was not all one way traffic for there over would be placed in a pan to cool; when hard it was were people in New York who wanted to go to Ohio and sli ced thin, fri ed, and served with syrup or jam. points west and their way led south to Harrisburg where the In the very earl y pioneer days cornmeal mush was called road turned west. It is reported that Aaron Burr once "Indian pudding" or "hasty pudding." As the Indians in­ stopped over night at the Block House possibly when h e was troduced corn to the whites, no doubt the Indians originated traveling west to Ohio as he followed his dream of e tablish­ the making of cornmeal mush. ing an empire in the Southwest; but there is no tradition One of the country folklore sayings was, " If your company that " George W ashington once slept h ere." has worn out the ir welcome, feed them 'mush 'n milk.' " The Han. Charles G. W ebb, President Judge, Tioga A story was told of a yo ung man who was hired by a neigh­ County, writing in the magazine of the Muncy Historical bor to hel p mow hay. The young fellow h ad had a good Society, Now and Then, Vol. X, No.7, 1953, cites an account breakfast at home, which consisted of more than cornmeal of a trip over the Williamson Road in October, 17 97, by mush, and presented himse lf for the day's work. With J acob Lindley. The following paragra ph is taken from this sharpened scythes the two men mowed hay until noontime account. when they sat down to the table to a hearty meal of mush " vVe rejoiced to take our leave of the waters of the Tioga and milk. After working an hour that afternoon the young having asce nded them upwards of thirty miles, a nd crossed man was hungry and going to the house asked if he could it twelve times in twenty miles. Then encountered the rug­ have a bowl of tha! good mush. The lady gave him the ged Allegheny Mountains, to the famed Block House . Fed snack but in an hour he was hungry again and came asking our horses, and called for supper, which was served up; for some more mush. At his third appearance the lady sug­ coffee, without cream; buckwheat cakes, without butter; and ge ted he might like something other than mush and milk . venison broiled, without gravy." " TO," he replied, "I like mush 'n milk, but when I work When Lindley speaks of crossing the Tioga, they had to hard I need it every hour." ford the river, for we can be sure that no bridges existed . The Man With Too JVlany Children When they encountered the Allegheny Mountains, they were In the Block House in the 1860's there lived a man with crossing Bloss burg Mountain. a big family of ch ildren. The fanner was building a new After se lling the hotel, nthonyso n lived near Trout Run barn and the boss carpenter with a couple of helpers arrived where a few yea rs later he was killed by a fa lling tree. to put up the building. These men were given their dinners and suppers at the fann, and as there was not room at the Jew Hill table for all the men and children, the hired m en with the Tradition has it th at Moses Ulman came from Germany farmer and the older boys had their meals and the wife and and became a "pack peddler," carrying on his back a pack small er children ate at a second table. of small items that he sold at the various homes he ca me to ' i\fhi le the ca rpenters were framing the timbers for the H e is sa id LO have arri ved at the Block Hou e about 1820 barn, one of the men remarked to his companion that he and I ik ecl those German-speaking people so well h e d ecided had never seen a family where there was so much quarreling to establi sh a home and store. H e located on level ground as in this famiiy. If it wasn't the younger children quarrel­ on top of the hill just east of the present Liberty borough in ing with themse lves or their mother, it was the bi g boys and what later was known as Shenktown. Another J ewish mer­ their fa ther. chant had a SLOre there but when Shenktown was abandoned One of the pastimes of vVillie and Joe, two of the smaller as a townsite the place became known loca ll y as J ew Hill boys, was for each to take a corner of the new barn wall and and the name remains to this day. throw stone at each other. The ca rpenters all agreed it everal o lder perso ns have told me they remember a was a dangerous sport but as it was none of their business hewed log building beside the road that was the home and the activity continued . One day while the men were h aving SLO re of one of those earl y merchants, but at the time they th e noonday mea l, Joe came to his mother and told her that indica ted the building was used as a warehouse by one of Willie's h ead was bleeding. the Illerchants o l Liberty. " What makes Willie's head bleed?" Moses Ulman later es tabli shed a men's clothing store in "I hit him with a stone." Williamsport which is still doing business under the name " Where is Willie now?" of Ulman Brothers. "Out by the horse trough."

22 The borough of Liberty as it was about 1896. We are indebted to MH. Charles A. Miller of Liberty, Tioga County, for this piGture.

Everyone jumped up from the table and looked out to being stepped on so he walked away. Dan soon had the the trough where Willie was standing, dipping his hand into colt under con trol and was leading it back to the stable. the water and putting it on his head . The bloody water The boss ca rpenter remarked to the father, " You seem from the open wound was a gory sight. to have an awful lot of trouble with your boys." The father and mother went to look after Willie, who was "Yes, if they only were little, or if some of them weren't not badly hurt, but he did get his head bandaged. The rest at all, I would be better off," was the father's reply of the men finished their meal. Burning of a Covered Bridge The oldest boy, Dan, warned J oe, "You are in for a ca ning In the early 1820's George Wheeland was living in Vir­ s'o why don't you hike over the hill to the neighbors?" ginia and there he helped to build a covered briage over J oe would not take his big brother's advice but instead one of the rivers. Some yea rs later he migrated to the Block went into the pantry and went to work churning butter, a H ouse and during the Civil War one of his sons was in the task he had been told to do an hour before. cavalry of the Union Army. He was with a small group that About this time the father arrived on the porch with his crossed this bridge but they were attacked by a much larger cane and wanted to know where the rascal Joe was hiding. group of R ebel cavalry and h ad to make a hasty retreat across Dan sa id, "You are too la te, Dad, Joe has gone over the the river. Here they stopped long enough for young hill to the neighbors." Wheeland and a couple of his companions to set fire to the "Yes, and I bet yo u told him to go." bridge his father had helped to build forty years before. "No, I told him not to, but h e went anyway." The father took Dan's word for it and we nt off about his The Wounded Soldier work. During the war between the states there were a great many A few days later Dan got in trouble with his Dad. They yo ung men from the Block House and vicinity who answered had a suck ling colt which was kept in a stable of the old barn the ca ll to service and wore the blue uniform. To preserve when they were working the mare. They were using the the U nion some paid with their lives and many more su f­ team this day to drag some heavy timbers around that the fered wounds. We will call one of the latter soldiers J ohn, ca rpenters needed. who had the misfortune to be castrated by a musket ball. In the midd le of the afternoon it was time for the colt to After spending some time in the hospital he returned to his have his lunch so one of the boys opened the stable door and unit and finished out the war. the colt came trotting to his mother. After the colt had orne yea rs later a friend of his, we will call her J ane, wa mi lked the mare dry, Dan got his arm around the colt's neck curious and wanted to hear his version of his war experience. to lead it back to the stable but the colt was not yet ready She asked him if he had been wounded while in the army to be shut up in his stall. Dan was wrestling with it and and he admitted he h ad been. Then she wanted to know his father sa id he should unhitch the mare and lead her where he h ac! been wounded and he replied in the battle of down to the barn but Dan did not want to go to all that the \,yilderness. But that wa not what she wan ted to know bother. so she asked in what part of his body he was wounded. The father grabbed his ca ne a nd started for Dan who kept H e is reported to have aid, "I was right in the line of the colt going in a circle between him elf and his father. battle, Jane. but if yo u had been standing in my place, that The father was lame and he was having trouble to keep from bullet would not have touched you."

23 The Block House Centennial o f things were sold. There was home made ice cream, and a The Block I-louse Community ce lebrated its first centen­ nickel would buy a generous portion; there were all sizes of nial at Liberty, Tioga County, Pennsy lvania, on July 4, 1896. fire-crackers, Roman candles, torpedoes, sky rockets, cap I doubt if there is in existence any wrilten record of this guns with the ammunition, and all sorts of things. eve nt but it still lives in the minds of all who were present Another new structure a ttracted our attention. It stood on that memorable day. Block House as a place-name orig­ in the center oE the wide main street and was made of poles inated a fter Charles Williamson in 1793 had completed the and old boards to represent a shack or temporary shelter an road from Williamsport, Pennsylvania, to Painted Post, New early pioneer might have built as a home for his family. York. ' !\Te wanted to know the why and wherefore, but were told Many changes had taken place during that first hundred to wait and see. As part of the entertainment, the planners years: the wilderness h ad given way to a thriving country had arranged to have a n Indian raid on the little hut in the town, which had just been organized in 1893 as the Borough ce nter of the town. This was reminisce nt ot the very early of Liberty, and the countryside was dotted with farmsteads. pioneer days in other parts of our country, but here in the The heavy industry of lumbering was past its peak, and the Block House there had been no Indians when the first set­ population of the area was a t its highest. It was the end of tl ers came. They had been gone from this part oE the state one era and the beginning of another and that called for a long before 1793. ce lebration. At a prearranged signal in the a fternoon, a band of simu­ In 1896 there were living in the borough and the com­ lated Indians in war paint and fe athers came skulking from munity a great many veterans of the Civil '!\Tar and they with between houses and other places of concealment and did a the business men of the borough organized and put on the war dance outside and around the little hut. A group of centennia l celebration. vi ll agers with muzzle- loading rifles appeared, fired several What was this big event like? To an eleven-year-old boy shots, and the Indians made a hasty retreat but not before it was people, people, and more p eople. I h ad never before th ey had et fire to the little building. seen so many people at one time and in one place. From far From the balcony of the Sem psey ho tel came tile peals of and near they ca me, but not in automobil es or air planes, the big bell that hung there a ncl which was rung only in case for at that time those conveyances h ad only existed in the of nre or some other calam ity. The fire company, dressed minds of a few dreamers. Horse-drawn vehicles were the in mo t fanta tic garb, arrived with their hand pumper and usual mode o f travel but a wa lk of ten or more miles was no hose ca rt. A I ine of hose was stretched from the creek to great feat for many people of that day. Occas ionally a young the fire and the pump was started but only a trickle of water man with his girl friend might come along with a buggy came from the hose. The pumper was abandoned and a drawn by a horse, and then the boys delighted in lighting bucket brigade orga nized. I well remember one fat fellow some fire-crackers to see what effect it would have on the whose clothing may have been padded, carrying a pail of horse. water in his two hands, when he fell on his face and bent his Stable room for the horses a t the barns of the hotels was pa il fl at. H e gO t up, looked at his pa il , then threw it into at a premium, and often a farm famil y driving to the town the fire. might stop at a friend's place a mile or so away a nd there The fire soon burned out, the rubble was cl eared away, stable the horses, the family walking the rest of the way to and that part of the enterta inment was over. town. One such team of horses met a tragic death that day, Another incident I well remember, for I was impressed as but more about this a little l:ol ter. one of the actors in a pie-eating contest. A big wooden box We lived about ten miles from Liberty, a nd my fa ther, was brought out into the street. The box must have been who had been reared in the Block House Country, could not fiye or ix feet each way and men were nailing to each corner miss this opportunity to meet and visit with his many friends a small er box tha t apparently had come from Miller's drug he knew would be there. It was to be a great "homecom­ store for printed on each small box were the words Eskay's ing" for many who lived a considerable distance away from Baby Food. William Merrithew, the druggist, seemed to the community. Early tha t morning my father, m y brother, be in charge here a nd this activity attracted us boys like a and I drove with a horse and buggy to my gra ndfather's magnet. Two of our number, Clarence Beck and Irvin place on J ew Hill where we placed our horse in his barn. Antes, had their hands tied behind their backs, an apron At grandfather's we met m y two uncles who had come from ti ed about their necks, and were stood up on the big box. E lmira by train and stage the day before. My father wanted Someone a id, " H ere are two more," and soon Charles Mye rs to visit with his parents and brothers a while, but fin all y we and I with our hands ti ed and wearing big aprons were on got started for the town a halE mile away. The men were the box with our chums. always meeting old fri ends they h ad not seen for a long time A blueberry pie was cut in four pieces and each of us had and stopped to visit. My brother and I were most impati ent a plate with a quarter of the pie placed before us on the to get on to where the eve nts oE the day were taking place small boxes. At a given signal we were to start eating. and with our father's co nse nt we left the men and were off \ Vhat a way for a boy to eat a piece of pie! I was working to see the sights. My brother met some boys his own age and away as fas t as I could but not making much headway when I was left on my own. I had a few dimes and nickels to spend I heard omeone say, "That is all." I looked around and but knew I would need to budget them very carefully. I saw that Charle had his plate cl ean. The rest of us were soon met my cousin, Charles Myers, and with some of his stopped as the contes t arrange r probably did not want us to fri ends we were on the town. drown in berry juice. \ !\T e were lifted down, our hands un­ Every building on the main streets was gayly decora ted tied, and the a prons removed. Someone ca me with a bas in with fl ags and bunting and at the end of the bridge over of water, a wash cloth and towel to wash our faces. Charles Block House Creek a round-log building h ad been erected received a silver doll ar, another fellow received seventy- fiv e to represent the original Block House that was built in 1792. cents, another fift y cents, and as I had leEt a large portion of Only instead of being a hotel, it was a place where all kinds my pie I was given a quarter. To the best of my knowledge

24 -- - ====-- ~

ArteT the barn on the faTm of L evi B Ct1" tsock, Liba ty, Tioga County, burned 0 17 July fow'tlt, pTepamtions wel'e made at once to build a new one. I t was aected eluTing the late summeT and the date 1896 plainly shows 011 the pictl/Te that was taken the day of the mis111g. To th e neighbors it was a " lab aT of love," and to many of the m en a holiday, faT it was only at special times th ey weTe TequiTed to exel·t themselves and do some heavy lifting, The common lab01'ers had a lot of time faT theil' social activities and " hone play." But to th e half dozen or so of men skilled in helping the cG1'jJ ellters, it was a day's w01"k. NITs. HaTtsock and heT helpers saw to it that the m en were well fed at the noonday meal, and to the childTell it was a festive. occasion. At the left and holding a square is NIT. H aTtsock and beside him is the " boss" caTpentel', William Landon. VeTn e BTio11, the ownel' of the pictw-e-.al the time a llUltuTe man aged fift een­ is seen standing at the extl'eme right on the fl oor of tlt e bam, his left ann "akimbo" and weaTing dark clothes and hat.

lhat was the only time I ever left any pie on my plate. standing near the site and watd1ing the smoke still rising Some time in the a fternoon Tature put on a spectacle that from some of the embers of the fire. The wreckage of the was not on the program. Dark clouds were gathering and farm machinery and wagons lay tw isted and bent partly soon the air was rent by sharp Rashes of lightning, while coveri ng the remains of fiv e horse and a number of cattle. great peals of thunder reverberated through the valley. Fortunately, the herd of milk cows were not in the barn at Rain came in torrents and everyone hastened to cover. In the time of the fire, or they too would have been des troyed. the midst of the storm someone shouted, "A big fire on J ew One can only imagine the terror of those fiv e horses in Hill." R egardless of the rain, many men made their way that inferno. T he body of one horse, instead of being in tip the steep hill road to see what might be on fire and give the sa me position as the others, was lying in what had been any aid that m ight be needed to save any other buildings in lhe passage way in front of the mangers indicating it h ad danger. Everyone was 3ure it must be a big barn that was jumped over the manger in its fright, only to die as did the burning so fi ercely. others. Lighlning had started a fire in the barn on L ev i H art­ Of the fiv e horses that died in the fire, three of them be­ sock's farm and had gained such headway there was no hope longed to h . H artsock and the other two to his brother-in­ of saving either the barn or an y of its contents. There were law, George Yaudes. The Yaudes family lived a few m iles no other buildings in danger, so all the men could do was away, and that morn ing the fami ly drove to the Hartsock to watch th e fire burn itself out. farm to stable the horses, then walk with the family to town As this barn had Slood near my grandfather's house, the for th e ce lebration. Mr. Yaudes had only recently bought next morning I joined a group of men and boys who were one of the new li ght wagons, sometimes ca ll ed a spring-

25 wagon or "carry-all." This wagon was for the pleasu re driv­ to try and find the perso n who had entered the house. ing of the family, having three comfortable seats, with a top i,\Ihenever he mentioned anyo ne he m ight suspect, Charles decorated with fringe around the edge. There were side cur­ was sure th at perso n was not th e gui lty one. After letting ta ins to put on in event of rain, and it truly was a pride and El li s worry for about an hour, Charles said, "Here is your joy to the whole family. But alas, it too was a victim of money. Ike and I \\" ere in your house and we were going the fire. to lUI n yo ur clock with its fa ce to the wall, but took the That thunder SlO rm put an end to the festivities of the money instead. N ext time either take your money with day. I know that often at such a celebration a speaker was yo u or find a better hiding place." u uall y there to make a speech eulogizing the hardy pioneers Charles was turning over in his mind some way to get who first se ttled here in the woods a lmost a ce n tury be(ore. even with Isaac for the load of wood he had sold. H e did 'Whether or not such a speaker had been secured, or whether not want 'to do anything to cause an y injury but hoped at there had been such a peech at some time during the day, least lo ca use some in convenience. i'Vh ether it was this year 1 cannot say. I only know that for years afterward the cele­ or next, he wou ld bide his time. The opportunity came one bration was the main lOpic of conversation among all who evening in late (all when h e called a t his brother's home. had attended it. As for myse lf, because of the pie-ea ting H e ti ed his team at one of the two posts that supported a co ntes t, I had a whole quarter more to spend. pole on which the two big iron kettles were hanging and The Pmctical Jokers a lwa ys used at butchering time. i!\Thile visiting in the house Isaac, E llis and Charles were three brothers who lived he learned they were doing the butchering the next day and quite close to each other on their separate farms, often h elp­ generously offered his h elp. I saac told him h e would not ing one another with difficult tasks. T hey were (un lov ing need him this year as Ellis and his son were coming as well and delighted in playing practical joke, each giving as he as another neighbor who owed him a day's work. received. Charles had a large maple tree near the publi c When Charles said good n ight, he added, if a nything hap­ road which he (elled a nd cut in lO firewood, piling it beside pens that yo u need help, let me know. He went out to his the road lo season (or winter use. Isaac came along as the team and quickl y p laced the two kettles in his wagon, then work was about completed and slO pped (or a moment to proceeded home. chat. A s h e was about to drive away he said, "You should The next morning beCore dayli ght, Isaac went out to light haul that wood up to the house, (or anyone could come along a fire a nd fil l the kettles lo have the water hot (or scalding and steal some of it." the hogs. ,\ t once he saw the kettles were gone and knew " Oh, no one around here would think of stealing wood." where to go looking (or them. Calling his son they hurriedly A few month later Charles saw where some wood had hitched the team to a wagon and started down the road. been taken (rom the woodpile. He knew it had been taken Isaac wa telling his so n the things he would say to his that afternoon, for he had gon e by there at noontime and brother, but as they neared their destination, his mood no wood was mi sing then. H e went to his neighbor who changed. Finall y, he sa id to his so n," ow my conscience lived up the road a short distance and asked him, "Did you is clear. This will pay me for stealing U ncle Chari ie's load see anyone go by this afternoon with a load of wood?" of wood." "No one but your brother I saac." The Lost L ead Mine "Do yo u know where he went with it?" Peter Sechrist is sa id to have been the first permanent "No, but later I saw his team and wagon at ' !\Ta lt Guern­ -se ttler on a farm or homestead in the Block H ouse, ome sey's black mith shop, but there was no wood .on the wagon saying he came in 1811 from Germany. Whether this date then." is correct we do not know, but we do know h e bought from Charles went on to Liberty and stopped at the blacksmith the Academy a tract of land situated a mile or so from shop, asking W alter, "Did you by an y chance bu y a load of Anthon yso n 's hotel along Block H ouse Creek a t a spot where wood from Isaac today?" there is a natural waterfall. H ere by the stream he cleared "Yes, it was nice clean wood and I shod his horses for it." a patch o( grou nd and built his log hou e and other build­ "That was m y wood," said Charles. ings, eventually erecting both a sawmill and a grist mill. "Now what do I do, pay you?" The latent power of the fa lling water turned his mill s. " 0, Isaac will pay me." In later yea rs he o ften recounted stories of his fir t years E llis was a school d irector and as treasurer of the school here in the woods, and the following was one of his favorites. board he frequently had considerable money in the house 1 will let him tell it in his own words. with which to pay the teachers. One Sunday the family "\ !\Th en I first came here we had a pretty hard time to ge t went away for the day and instead of E llis taking the money enough food lo keep us goin g, and h ad it not been for the with him, he placed it under the kitchen clock. T h at after­ plentiful supply of game in the woods and the help of a noon his two brothers ca me to ca ll a nd as no one was at home (riendly Indian who lived n ear by, we might have b een th ey thought it might be (un to get in the house and turn starved out. The Indian, Old Tom, as I called him, often the kitchen clock with its face to the wa ll. That might giv e went hunting with me and he seemed to know just where to Ellis a slight shock to know someone had been in . look for a bear or deer. I had a good riRe and was a pretty They (ound a window they co uld open and oon were in good marksman so we were most always able in a short time the kitchen. Charles picked up the clock and discovered to get a supply of meat. Of course, I always gave him a gen­ the money. They counted it and Charles thought he hould erous portion of the kill, and he was always ready to go take the money along home (or sa fe keeping. The clock hunting. was left in its right position and the window closed when " One clay he wanted me to go hunting with him, but my the two brothers left. supply of bullets was very )ow, and I told him I would have ' Vhen Ellis returned home and picked up the clock, he got to get some lead to make more bullets before we could do quite a ~hock when he saw the money was gone. He went a ny hunting. H e asked me (or' my axe and started off to see Charles lo tell him o( his loss and map some strategy through the woods. In a co uple of hours he was back with a big chunk of pure lead . I asked him where he had gotten the ghost. They thought, however, it mIght be pos ible to out­ I ad, but he would not tell me, saying the Great pirit would wit the ghost in the valley a nd locate the lead up on the be very angry if he told me. l1Iountain. "Some year later we were hunting one day and I killed ,\rrangements were made to buy thirty acre o f la nd from a deer ncar the junction of Pack H orse Run and Block Kai er but his wi[e had an inkling of why they wanted it House Creek. ' '\Fe dressed out the deer and were carryi ng and refu cd to sign the deed unless her hu band was taken it home when we stO pped to rest in the shade of a big pine in as an equal partner. 0 the five men went up on the tree on the bank o f the stream where Buttonwood is now mountain and dug and dug. Down in the va ll ey Old Tom's situated. Old Tom seemed very tired but was in a talking ghost likel) sat on hi grave and la ughed and laughed, for mood. He told me he had hunted many ummer, but was by some means known on ly to the pirit wOlld, the lead was afraid this might be his last hunting trip. I tried to cheer changed to a very low g-rade of iron ore. him up, but to no avail. H e looked around a bit, a Ad sa id The Rat ill the Meal Chest we were ncar where the lead was located. 1\ Iaking me swear In J\ pril of I 73 the R everend ,\ . B. liller came to the by my own God and the Great Spirit, he led me into a laurel Block I lou e as pastor of the Friedens Evangelical Lutheran thicket, where there was a nat rock sloping down into the Church. l\fr. i\liller could speak, read, and write German, water of the creek. Th is he sa id was the lead and h e showed and therefore was right at home in this community where me the pl ace he had cut out the piece he had given me. many of the o lder people were more accu tomed to u ing "1 never saw him a fter that, a nd wa told he had gone to German than English. Very few of them spoke pure German the ha ppy hunting grounds. By then I had built my mill but often u ed Engli h words or misused the German tenses, a nd was too busy to go looking for the lead. I thought I singu lar, and plura l . could afford to buy m y lead thereafter." 1\Ir. 1\liller had no trouble conversing with these people 'Ia n y years la ter Peter's son, Daniel, a nd his friend, Dan iel but ;'.Irs. 1\liller could not speak an y German a nd frequently Krotzer, recal led the story of the India n's lead and decided mislIndersLOod what the con versations were about. to go looking for it. They knew about the sacred oath that Once the ladies of the church were having a ocial gather­ had been sworn, but they reasoned that as both Old Tom ing and an elderly woman was telling of t~e big rat in the and P eter Sechrist had been d ead a lo ng time, the oath was mea l che t or fl our bin. She said h er husband had come no lo nger in effect. But a las, they h ad nOt reckoned with home and had shot three times in the meal /chest, but the the denizens of the spirit world. ... rat had escaped. Daniel Krotzer was a "dowser" of no mean ability, a nd peaking in German thi lad y sa id, "Eine grosse Ratte with a forked witch haze l branch he soon located what h e war ill den lU ehlkasten, und me in JVlann Jacob kam von wa sure was the hidden lead. Conditions had changed in Libert), n{tc/z H CllI e und hat dreimal in den !lIehlkasten fift y years; there was no big pine tree, and n o rock sloping gescheissen, abel' die R.atte ist veg komen." down into the water. So they decided to do some d igging. i\Irs. i\Iiller was horrified a t what sh e understood h ad Krotzer selected a I ikel Y spo t and soon they had a small hole happened, for when she arrived home sh e told h er husband in the ground, when they were stOpp ed by a voice that that J acob ... was the lI1 ean es t man sh e h ad ever h eard of, startled them. They looked around but could sec no o ne, for he came h ome a nd must have been drunk for h e had so they res umed their work. J\ gain came the voice, a nd done something terrible three ti'Tles in the meal chest. seemingly from the ho le they were digging, and thi time they were rather sca red. The voice continued , sayi ng, "Thi I'll-. M iller and Maggie is sacred ground, the pl ace where Old T o m is buried, a nd 1\lr. Miller se rved as pa tor [or seventeen years, until 1890, I am his Spirit, and I wi ll guard forever the secret I told my and was well liked by all the people of the community, ex­ fr iend Peter Sechrist. lo ng ago. The lead is up the moun· cept [or o ne of his pa rishioners, whom we will call Maggie. tain. so go up there to do yo ur digging." One time M aggie's husband a nd 1\1r. Miller met at Liberty Picking up his forked sti ck Krotzer followed what he was and were h avi ng a friendly conversa tion, when the husband sure was the vein of lead a lmost to the top of the mountain, remarked, "1\ [r. Mil ler I, wo uld be very glad i[ you called to where he sa id the vibrations in the sti ck were just as stro ng sec us sometime, but m aybe you had better not. You see, as they were down in the valley. Again they began to dig my wife l\Iaggie does not like you very well." and were not molested by an y India n Spirits, but were "Oh, it makes no difference whether or not she likes m e, stopped b y a b ig rock. The rock would h ave to be blasted on I y so you like h er." " Oh, sh e is an awful good woman to work." out, a nd for this they thought they h ad better get permIs­ "J\ nd so are a lot of old oxen," replied Mr. Miller. sion from the owner, whom they knew was David Kaiser. But they did not want Kaise r to know what they were a fter, The Cow H e Didn't Buy and decided they would n eed to buy the la nd. T his would Soon after h e took up his residence in the community, Mr. require money, something tha t neither of them had. 0 they Miller Jet it be known h e wanted to buy a cow. One of his refill ed the ho le they h ad dug a nd sat d own to d o some parishioners offered to sell him one so Mr. 'Liiler came to thinking. " Yah , let us set and think out loud," sa id echrist. the [arm on e day to see about the cow. The two m en soon They agreed they sho uld get twO me n LO buy the la nel and came to a n agreemen t when the farmer said p erha ps h e had help thelll with the d igging . 1. h ey ta lked o[ the va rious better speak to his wi [e before they do ed the d eal. people they knell', and thought that George Beck (m y grand­ The men wen t to the house a nd the fanner speaking in father) a nd hi;, wu;,in J ohn Beck were the twO most like ly German told his wife tha t the preacher wa nted to buy the to collle LO the ir aid. First, they called on John Beck a nd o ld b lack cow; should h e sell her to him? after telling their sLO ry, suggested the three o [ them wa lk "Sure, sell h er to him. She isn't much good a n yway," re­ across the fi elds LO see George Beck. The two Becks sa id p li ed the wife in German. they well rem mbered hearing the sto ry o[ P eter Sechrist's, The couple were not able to put a nything over on Mr. but they were not toO anxious to get mixed up with any Miller [o r he understood th e ~r conversation. He simply told

27 lhem he had changed his mind about the cow, and as h e him. H e was worried as lO how he could get his load home departed he bid them goodby by saying "Auf TV icderseJm." and had anOlh er drink [rom his bottle hoping that m ight help him so lv e hi s problem. Soon he was again fas t as leep. The Rancid Butter Another lraveler ca me up th e road and had to SLO p. H e In the horse and buggy days of long ago, the making o( got au t o( h is sled and woke up the sleepi ng rna n, and butter was strictl y a' home process. During the early summer wanled to know why he was silting there as leep anel block­ when pasture was good, lhere was an over supply, and lhe ing the road. I'Vilh lears in his voice the sleeper replied, price being subject to supply and demand, was accordingly "IU einc Pfercie sind fort gelaufen, und haven mich hieT very 1m ,'. During this period the butter was orten sa lted a gelasse/1; unci wie wade ich nun mit mein Ladung nach bil heavier and packed in wooden LUbs or earthen crocks meine Hause k01l1men?" (M y horses have gone away and and kepl until (all to be sold when the price was higher. left me here and how wil l I gel h ome with my load ?) The tubs or crocks were kepl in the cellar, the coolest pia e, unless lhere was a lrong Oowing spring with a spring house. The JU an lVho Stammaed One resourceful "Hausfrau," who had no spring house John was an unfortunate person in that he slammered and sa n any refrigeralion had to keep her packed bUlter in ve ry badly; it was hard for him to carryon a conversa tion so lhe ce ll ar. Unfortunately one o( her crocks of butter becam e man y o[ his remarks were short but to the point. H e never rancid. he look it lO several merchanls hoping for a sale, married but lived a lone on his [arm, anel as he grew older but on lasling th e buller no one would buy it. he finally he (armed less each year, leaving his fi elds to li e idle. His decided to make one more attempt LO get rid of th e spoiled neighbor, J oe, wa s a progressive (armer and needed more bUler. he hilched a horse LO the buggy and with a bushel land. The lWO men were ta lking one day and J oe as ked, o( potaLOes, ;everal daten of eggs, a basket of onion , and " H ave yo u ever thoughl of se lling your fann?" the crock o( butter, drove to the village o( Liberty. " N-n-n-n ot to yo u. " Selecling a merchant to whom she had not as ye t shown J oe was startled by the repl y, but managed lO say that if her butler, she inquired if he could use some potatoe a nd lhe farm was ever (or sa le he wou ld make a good offer for it. some eggs. The merchant agreed to take the potatoe and *' ,. *" $: >If: '*' eggs so she brought tilem JJ1 to the store. She then went back Once J oe lost his pockelbook and could not remember to the buggy and brought in the onions. The merchant where he last had it. didn'l think he neededlhe onions and was not interested in A few days laler th e lWO met and J ohn sa id, "I [-[-f-fo und them. She being a pretty good trader bega n lelling what yo ur p-p-p-pockelbook," and handed it to J oe. wonderful onions the e were, and with a knife deftl y sli ced "Thanks, John. Where did yo u find it?" off a piece o( an onion and insisted on his at least having a " R -r-r-right where you l-I-I-left it." laSle. H e admitted it was a good onion but h e did not need *' '*' '*' '*' '* a n y more at the time. So she carried the onions back to her One lime John was sick and the doctor wanted him to go buggy and brought in the butter. H e could use the butter, to the hospital, but that did not suit John. H e was not aod gave it the' laste lest. With the onion taste still in his se riously ill but needed someone to look after him, so a mouth the butter seemed to be all right, so h e bought it. 'neighbor agreed to have him stay with them [or a while. The next day he discovered the crock of butter was good only One cl ay J ohn had a sulky spell and re(usedto take his medi­ for soap grease. cine. The neighbor coaxed him a little, then sa id, "John, i[ yo u don't take your medicine you might die and then Joe The Long Road Home would get yo ur farm ." For many years the 'i"lilliamson Road was the one most J ohn replied , "'iV-w-lI'-where is tbat medicine?" generally used in traveling between the Block House and I"'illiamsport. It was not until about 1850 the road from A Mannon Maid Liberty to Trout Run was built, corresponding closely to Early in tbe 19th Century Joseph Smith founded the Mor­ lhe present route IS. Between Trout Run and Liberty the mon Church in upper New York State. His teachings were Williamso n Road kept to the right of that section of IS, so different from what his neighbors were accustomed to, pass ing over Laurel Hill Mountain. The story is told of and there wa s so much opposition to him and his follower the man who had gone to 'i"'i IJi amsport on busin ess, travel­ th at Smith decided to lead his peopl e to Ohio where they ing over the 'Williamso n Road. It was in the winter and would found a Mormon community. They would travel by with horses and big sled he was on his way home with a wagon tra ins and the onl y road led south to H arrisburg, and rather heavy load. ,\ fter sto pping at the inn at Trout Run lhen ",est to Ohio. From Pa inted Post to 'i"lilliamsport they for some warming refreshments, plus a bottle for the road , had th e choice of eilher the tate Road or the Williamson he slarted for home and had lO make the long climb LO the R oad. Both routes were used in making the pilgrimage. LOp o[ Laurel Hill. H e h ad stayed longer at the inn than One of tbe stories handed down by tradition, and it may he knew he should have, for it was then almost dark. o nl y be fi Cli on, was that a wagon train traveling over the 'i Vhile going up a Sleep part of the road he began to feel ta te R oad SLO pped at the pre enl site o( Nauvoo, Tioga so rry for his horses, having to pull the h eavy sled while h e County. H ere a rest ca mp [or the weary travelers had been sat there making the load just that much heavier. H e got prepared by pUlling up se vera l log ho uses, and a large stone off and wa lked behind the sled to make the load li ghter. bake-oven . Several persons have told me lhey remember I-Ie found the wa lking harder than he had thought it would h;lI'ing seen the remains of the bake-oven. be, so he climbed on the back o[ the load and sat facing down Once while it pan y was at the rest camp, a young woman lhe road. A warming sip from his bottle and soon he was who ",as a recent conven , began to question in her mind if fas t as leep. The horses plodded along un til they got tired she was doing the right lhing in going to Ohio, and decided and stopped to res t. H e wakened and realized the sled wa LO relUrn home. To the ]\Iormons this was h eresy, and she not movin g, but he could not see his horses. H e was sure ",as put under ,guard. lhey had gotten loose from the sled and.gone home without As the wagon train was going down Texas Creek she wa

28 hoping lor a (hance to get away but it was not ul1lil they o[ his boys on a horse to go by the shoner route to give the were lording Block H ou~e Creek, when one of the wagon; warning. had a mi~hap , that ~he wa s able in the confusion to make her E"enwally the agel1l came 0 often that the o perators of escape. ,\ trail along Block House Creek led eastward to the still decided it might be better to quit the business tha n the \villialll;on Road. he followed this trai l about fiv e to run the risk of a jail sentence. miles, w ming to the road at the foot of Laurel Hill. H ere ~ h e met a man with his tea m and a wagonload o[ goods he The Making of Apf)le ide}' wa s taking to a relative wh o had recen tly moved to Painted ,\t one time every [arm had an a pple orchard a nd m any Post. She went with him to his destination where they were bushels of fruit were harvested each fall. In the different married, then [or a honeymoon, they traveled so utli to his localities cider pres es were built and unco unted barrels of home in so uthern P e nn ~y lv an i a . cider were made a nd all owed to ferment into a plea antly potent beverage. Sometimes the fermenting process wa in­ A Slim'l) Business Deal creased by the addition of sugar and rai ins, or the balTels t\ so n ot one of the very earl y se ttlers in the Block H o use were left out of doors ul1lil cold weather had frozen the was engaged in lumbering a nd dealing in real estate; a t both water in the cider to ice, giving the cider a much higher he was quite successful. One of his so ns wanted to buy a conte nt of alcoho l. .A hole was made in the ice within the larm, ;0 the [ather so ld him one for a small down-payment barrel a nd the concentrated cid er drawn off. and accepted a note lor the balance. The yo ung man wrote H av ing this potent cider or "apple jack" for home con­ the note, making it paya ble when convenient. H is father sumption was perfectly legal, but it was not supposed to be accepted the note but the yo ung man never found it con­ sold at retail or by the gall on jug. H owever, no one knows venient to make an y payments. how ma ny farm mortgages were paid off yea rs ago by elling ,\ nother yo ung man borro\l'ed some money from his father, the prod uct at reta il. It was only a few years a50, however, signing a note for the loan. Then the question arose as to that a fa rmer learned the ha rd way that "crime does not pay." who sho uld keep the note. The yo ung man sa id he hould, Another cider story concerns the making of cider at Lib­ so he would know when it was to be paid. It is sad to relate erty a bout the turn of the ce ntury. Mr. Mott had bought the note was destroyed, a nd the father becoming destitute the Green foundry and added some other lines of business, had to a pply to the Overseer of the Poor [or relief. hav ing a printing p);ess for job printing a nd also a cider press. Fooling the R evenue Agents Iott's cider press was working full time during the cider­ ,-\t one time in the Block H o use there were some peopl e making season, a nd someone built a nother press in ·the bor­ who were such rugged individualists that they rese nted o ugh. I do not know what the usual price was for making a having the Federal Government interfering with their pri­ gall on of cid er, but soon a price war developed. Each press vate business. The business was the distilling of whiskey owner was determined to have the lowest price. Finall y without having a lice nse or paying a tax on the finished Mott ca me o ut \I'ith the adve rtising " broadsides" of "cider product. made for V2 cents a gallon." It wa s common knowledge to man y in the community a nd As the cider-making season was short, so was the price :llso to the revenue agents that frequently there was a small wa r. I do not know what happened a fter tha t. Did the , till operating in one of the wooded hollows adjacent to two owners agree on a fix ed price, thus setting the precedent Sugar Hill. o f hxed prices for a monopoly in many other lines 6f ma nu­ The Jackson House or hotel, was located on Pack Horse facturing througho ut the country? Run a half mile [rom where that stream empties into Block House Creek. To the north acros Block House Creek rises H ow to T ortw'e Yom' l¥ife the steep southern slope of Sugar Hill. There is a depres­ Once upon a time a narrow dirt road led up a mountain sion or hollow on this slope separating two peaks of the vall ey fin all y ending in two wagon tracks that led off into range of mountains; here a foot path or trail led up the the da rk woods. The road was first used by I umbermen, but mountain side, which was used by hunters a nd lumber jacks la ter a few hardy settlers cleared some la nd a nd built homes going to and from the hunting grounds a nd lumber camp in the va ll ey and the road became a public highway. At on the northern sid e of Sugar Hill. the end, where the road was just the two tracks, was a clear­ Once two strangers who were recogni zed as revenue agents ing a nd the farm home of John ---, where he lived with ca me to the hotel a nd asked how they could get to Sugar his wife a nd se veral small children. Hill a nd the home of M artin Fable. They were shown the It was a pleasant place in summer, but when the d eep hollow where the tra il was located, but as they had a team snows of winter came the wife a nd children were often and buckboard, they wanted to drive to their destination. "snowbound" until spring. During the winter months John They were told to follow the road to the waterfall s, there was busy with his team ha uling logs to the sawmill or bark turn left a nd the road would lead to the se ttled area on to the tan ner y, so he was a ble to see and enjoy the com pa n y Sugar Hill. But they were not told of a shorter route, and of other men. But for the wife, it was a lonely time a nd as soon as the agel1ls were o ut of sight a man took the tra il o ften she wished " that just once" she could get away [rom up the mountain to inform the men at the still that the the house (or a couple of hours. revenue agents were coming. The agents finall y found the One day J ohn did not go on the road with his team but place where the still was loca ted, but all incriminating evi­ spent several hours do ing odd jobs around the barn. It was dence had been removed. a beautiful winter day, not cold and blustery but the air ''\Ie would not expect a justice of the peace to lie to a was quiet and cl ea r and the sun seemed never to have shone couple of revenue agents, a nd he didn't. ''\Ihen the agents so brightl y before. It should have been a day for rejoicing. appeared at the h ome of Squire Sawyer a nd asked the di­ for doing something special for the famil y as he was not rections to ivIanin Fable's place, he told them the road to ha uling on the road that day. But, somewhere within his take, but did not mention that there was a shorter route. make- up the devil h ad hidden a mean streak and on this As soon as the agents were out or sight the Squire put one marveloll s day it ca me to the sllrface.

29 Going to the house he told his wife, "All those who are The B ig Boy ready , when I have the horse hilched to the sled ca n go Like all other farm communities of that day it required along," a greal amount of man power lO provide a li ving for a grow­ " Where are yo u going?" asked th e wife. ing fami ly and of len the boys were required to stay at home "It doesn't matler where 1 am going, jusl be ready if you to help wilh the farm work until they were lwenty-o ne. In walll to go along." one of the families were three big boys, husky and strong, J ohn wenl to the barn and when he broughl the horses age 17 , 19, and 20, They were doing most of the heavy from the stable the wife and children wrapped in blankels work while the father busied himself at so me of the lighter were se ttled in the box of the sled. tasks, One morning the father was looking over the fann T he horses were hitched and away lhey sped midsl the a ncl fo und some work that was not being done to his satis­ gleeful shouts of the chil dren. Out acro s the farm fields faclion. At the noonday meal the father took the older boy and down the road to the first neighbor's house where the to lask about til e larm work, and as one word led to another, hor es were turned as lhough this was where lhey were the falh er to emphas ize his point banged his fi st on the table stoppin g, But John had other id eas. He had only driven and sa id , " felt bill del' Mann da." 'Vhen he hit the table in here so he could turn around. They were headed back he upse t his cup of coffe e a nd this aroused the ire of his home, and the ride was over. wife who put a stop to the argument. Block H ouse, Woodhouse and Cogan H ouse ''''hen the mea l was over the men folks went outside the· A man from the township of Cogan H ou e married a house and oon the argument was resumed. The father woman named vVoodhou e who lived at the Block H ouse. wa nting to show his so n lh at he rea ll y was the man there, A practica l joker sa id to his fri end, "There is going to be a took ho ld o f the young fellow but soon found himself fl at moving on aturday. Can you help us with it?" o n his back in the wife's flow er bed. Aga in the wife had to "Who is moving?" se ttle the fu ss and show them that even though she was not "A fellow wants to move a Woodhouse from the Block the " 1'£a11n da," she was the boss of thi',:gs about the house House to Cogan House." and ya rd, "I ca n't be bothered with such a trivial thing. Why The School House that Bumed does n't the fellow build a wood shed?" In the late 1870's so me of the residents near the Brick The Dreamer Church in J ackson Township were dissatisfied with the long William and the fi ctitious Darius Green had a number of distance their children had to walk to either the Mountain things in common. Both were born a number of genera­ School at the foot o f Laurel Hill or to the R ettie School on tions too soon, both hoped to fl y like the birds, and neither th e R ettie farm in the eastern eild o f the township. was able to overcome the force of gravity. Perhaps Wil­ These people petitioned the school directors to establish li am's reading the poem, Darius Green and his Fl ying Ma­ a new school distri ct and erect a school near the site of the chine, was where he got his inspiration, for both slid off a ori ginal Squire Beck sc hool which had been es tablished in barn roof wrecking their machines. 1820. The school board pleaded poverty, as the Rettie William tried to overcome the force of gravity by lifting sc hool was housed in a log building and there was agitation himself by his bootstraps but the loops were only large to replace it with a new one ce ntrally located, Several yea rs enough for one finger in a loop so next he tried the big passed and there was no united opinion as to the loca tion co pper kettle that was used for making applebutter. H e of the new building. Finally a fire of "unknown origin" stood in the kettle, and se izing the handle he gave a mighty destroyed the old log building. It was imperative that a tug, pulling the ears from the kettle. new building be erected at once, and it was placed at the Will had the plans for his flying machine stored in his .site of the burned one. Apparently no one in the area was fertile mind and often talked of them with his friends. sa ti sfi ed and another " mysterious" fire destroyed the new Though they were sure his idea was not practical, they en­ building. co uraged him with their ludicrous suggestions. One day the Perhaps the school directors were superstitious and did hays were having a talk-fest around the pot-bellied stove in not want to risk a tll ird fire at the same spot so they placed one of the loca l stores and the proprietor joined in the fun . the new building on the Kehler farm on Roaring Branch H e had a peculiarity in his speech in that when asking a Run and gave it the name, Kehler School. This new school question he often repeated himself with the first few words site gave no relief to those living near the Brick Church as though he had not quite made up his mind how to phrase and again the people of that area petitioned the school di­ the question. rectors for a new school district and building, but their H e started by saying, "I say Will- I sav Will- I say Will, request was not granted. if we wanted to go to Chicago, how long would it take us?" The parents, remembering how their forefathers had built Will replied, "Charley, if we had started right away, we the first school house in the Liberty Valley in 1820, pro­ would be there by now." ceeded to erect their own building not very far from the Will had the idea there was gold in the hills of the Block site of the original Squire Beck School. The work progressed House and often we nt prospecting, digging deep holes in to a stage where the roof and floor were finished when the the farmers' fi elds and woods. He once dug a big hole in school board relented and sa id they would grant the loca lity one of the pasture fi elds on Squire Sawyer's farm. One of a sc hool district ancl building. For some rea on the partly the cows on the farm died and the carcass was placed in the co nslructed building was not finished by the school board hole. Will was asked to come with his pick and shovel and but an entirely new school house was erected very near the when he arrived he was shown the cow at the bottom of the o ne that was ha lf finished. Mrs. May Miller, now deceased, hole. o nce told me that she went to school in the new building The Squire said, "See here, Will, you dug this big hole and of how the children often played in the half-finished in my field a nd this cow fell into it and died . ow you bury building at the noonday recess, the cow by filling up the hole." Perhaps the school directors were irked by the persistence

30 of the parents for they gave the name "Independent chool" along wooded roacl> b) a talking panther that would fre­ to the new di strict and building. By the arne token, the quently emit one of tho e loud creams. ome di credit the patrons accepted the name for it ymbolized "their inalien­ idea that a panth r following it prey would betray it pres­ able right to petition the government (the school board) for ence with a loud cr), but said rather it \\'a a lone panther a redress of their grievance." seeking a mate. T wo Proi)osals It would be intere ting to learn ,,·hen the tate paid the Love was no more a stranger in those early days than it la t bounty for either a wolf or panther. but it mu t have is now if we are to believe the two following torie. been in the late eighteen hundreds, for around the middle 1\ you ng man asked the lady of his choice to marry him, of the century the animal were frequently een and their but she was not quite sure she wanted to accept hi offer cries more often heard. so he gave her a ales talk. I-Ie told her of the many good The Missing D eer things in li fe they would share if they were to marry, and Thi episode happened in Cogan H ou e Township not one of the things he told her was that she would never need too many yea r ago, but it produced a number of chuckles to put her hands in co ld water, unle she wanted to. ow in the community. It \\'a during the depression yea rs when th at was quite a promise to make when the only running money was just as hard to come by for the farmer a it wa wa ter to be found was the water running from the spring. for a great many other people. Foods were cheap including he fin all y accepted, and they we re married. Some years a ll cu ts of meat, but the money with which to bu it was later they we re hav ing a fr i ndly argument, when she a ked scarce so "mountain lamb" was often found on the tables of him what had become of a ll the hot water he had promis d. va rial!; co untrymen who under normal circumstances would "Did I ever make yo u such a promise?" never think of killing a deer out of season. " You certa inl y did, for yo u said I would never need to Once i\Iax and Jim killed a deer and took it to fax's put my hands in cold water." cellar to dres it. They d idn't think the game warden was "' '''ell, there is the teakettle, yo u can warm th e water." around, but till one never knew, so i\Iax's son was posted The other swain was a man of few words but he wanted as a lookout. The warden was in the vicinity that summer a quick answer. day, and had heard one rifle shot wh ich was the only clue "Ieh liebe dieh, he had. But, he decided to investigate the premises of Max L iebest du aueh mieh? whom he suspected of be ing a poacher. ·When his car turned Ueberlege es gesehwinde into the lane the son informed his father he could expect a Wiihrend ieh meine Peife amiinde." ca ll er. Plans had been made for such an emergency so while Translated it is, i\ Iax went to visit with the warden, Jim took the deer up­ "I love you, stairs to a previously selected hiding place, then removed Do you love m e? wha t evidence from the ceUar that h e could and went home. Think it over (o r make up your mind) From the affable way i\Iax greeted him, the warden be­ While I light m y pipe. " came qu ite SUSp ICIOUS. H e noti ced a blood spot on fax's Stories of Wild A1U11111s pants and inquired about it. Max ex plained he had dressed During the earl y 1800's in the pioneering days of northern a chicken for dinner and must have gotten the blood on his Pennsy lva nia th ere were fiv e species o f large wild animals clothes at that time. The warden asked permiss ion tp sea rch that roamed through the virgin forest; they were the elk, the premises, which was freely give n. They first went into deer, bear, wolf and panther. E lk were rather scarce and the ce ll ar where the warden looked around but could find soon became extin ct. The deer survived the attacks of th eir no concl usive ev idence though he thought a deer might have natura l enem ies and man but now due to protecting laws, been lhere not lOa long ago. Going through the res t of the are more numerous than in those earl y days; the black bea r house the various rooms and closet doors were opened but too has survived due to protective laws. The wolves and one door Max did not offer to open. The warden inquired panthers eem to have di appeared soon after the middle about this room and i\Iax sa id it was his wife's room and as of the nineteenth ce ntury, when lumbering in the mountain she was pregnant and not fee ling well she had gone to bed. regions destroyed their natural habitat. i\ fax rapped on the door and was told to enter. H e o pened To the earl y ettlers the elk and deer were no threat, but the door showing the warden hi wife resting in bed and the bears, wolves and panthers were a menace to the farm an i­ wa rden bei ng a gentleman did not enter the room. But ma ls. Many sheep, pigs, and yo ung cattle fell prey to these hacl he not been a " perfect gentleman" he would h ave searched lhe room and found the big hump beside the wife marauders. A number of sto ri ('~ of these depredations h~vl' under the covers to be the deer for wh ich he was searching. been recounted as tradition, and others have been recorded in the writings of Sherman Day in his H istory of Pennsyl­ To Kill a B ear vania, and by Tomb in his book Thirty Years a Hunter. The following tory was told of how Matthias Litzleman The tate earl y recognized the dangers from wolves and who had seltled in the woods in Cogan H ouse Township panthers and pa id a bounty of eigh t dollars for the death about 1850 got rid of a bear that was laking his sheep. of each one of these two specie. No bounty was paid for H e saw the bear going from the field where the sheep were the death of bears for they were considered as game animal pasturing carrying a half-grown lamb into the adjoining and were useful as food; also under normal conditions they woods. Getting his gun he followed hoping to surprise the were of very little danger to perso ns. bear at its meal. but after a long search he found only the fany years ago a great number of stories were told of half-eaten ca rca s. H e reasoned the bear would return peopl e being frightened by the blood chilling and terrifying aga in when hungry so he securely fastened his gun so it was howls of wolves a nd the screams of panthers. The latter aimed directl y over the heep. "\lith one end of a string were sa id to resemble the high pitched hysterical screams of tied lO the trigger of the gun and the other end tied to the a badly frightened woman. There were persons who were sheep, the trap was set. ' '''hen the bear came LO finish his wi lling to swear a sacred oath that they had been followed meal, pu ll ing at the sheep fired the gun, killing the bear.

31 The CalJtive B ean were having some fun with it, being careful not to ge t too About the turn of the ce nLUry H enry Drill lived a lone in a rough, and getting away [rom the bear if it became angry. sm;tli house at the foot of Green Mountain, 'working in the ' Vhi le I was there H enry came from the mountain and lumber woods to earn his li ving, but enjoying his hobby of ,a id th ere was another cub in th e trap. H e as ked who would hunting as often as he could. One of his ambitions was to like to help to bring it down from the mountain and soon c:1p ture a bear. H e wanted his :1n im a l without a blem ish had pl enty of vo lun teers. After obtaining a few pieces of so he discilrded the use of a stee l-spring bear-trap ilnd used h;df-in ch rope the men were ready to go but they went by instead a box trap. His trap was made of poles about fi ve a roundabout way so they could stop at a farmhouse and ge t inches in d iameter making a rectangular box about fiv e or a jug o f hard cicl er to take a long. six (eet long, three feet wid e and three feet high, with the ,\ mong the crowd that Sunday were fi ve or six boys of my sides fastened securel y to the poles making the fl oor. The age. " ' e decided to go up to the trap and see how the men lid was also made o f poles, hinged at one end and held open wo uld take th e cub out. A couple of the boy knew the lo­ by a spring to which th e ba it was fastened. '''' hen an animal ca tion of the trap, so \I'e tarted off taking a shorter route worked at the ba it th e spring released the li d all owing it to thall the men took. '''' e arrived at the trap and surrounding fall into pl ace where it autom:1tica ll y locked. I doubt if it we peered between the cracb at the little bear. H e ap­ H enry origin il ted the use of a box trap to ca tch a bear, [or parently did not li ke so many eyes staring at him for he most li kely this method had been used by men in other rushed mad ly about seeking some aven ue of escape. One of loca 1i ties. the boys pushed a sti ck through a crack a nd the bear began The trap was built on the mountain beside an old lumber­ ;narling a nd biting at it. Someone with a little more sense ing road about iI mile from H enry's home. The trapping ;a id , "Cut it out. The little bear does not know what it is was done in the late summer when the cubs were quite well a ll about, so stop teasing him." grown so it made no great difference if a cub or a [ull g ro~vn The cub settled down and as " time was hanging heavy bear was ca ught. Taking a li\'e bear from the trap, whether on our hands," we all sat on top of the trap with our feet iI cub 0 1- a full grown bear, was qu ite a task but Drill always dangling down, talking and waiting for the men to come. had the help of h alf a dozen kindred spirits. l\I y heel was just below a crack between two poles, and all Over the yea rs Drill had quite a number of bears wearing at once I felt a tug at my shoe. The cub had put his mouth a coll ar and faste ned by a long chain to a post. I never knew through a crack a nd ca ught my shoe just above the counter, him to ha\'e on the premi ses more than one adult bear in any tearing out a small piece o f leather. Needless to say, no one olle yea r, but once or twice he had a mother and h er two sat on the tra p after that. It was not until man y years later cubs. eve ral perso ns recently told me they had as boys I realized tha t had tha t crack been an inch wider I might played with two small cubs as th ey would with a co uple of have suffered the sa me fate as did Achilles of old. small puppies. Two cu bs tha t I saw one year were quite With the arriva l of the m en, a noose was passed between large and J am sure they might have played rough. the poles of the lid and placed over the bear's head so that T he old bear was in a fenced enclosure with a heavy strap the bear cou ld be pulled up aga inst the lid and choked into as ,;1 c0 11 ar about her neck and a chain about sixteen feet submiss ion. The lid was then opened, a collar was placed long fastened to a post. T he fence was not to confine the around the neck and a muzzle tied over the mouth. The bear but to keep d ogs, children, and thoughtless adults from fe et were ti ed , the noose loosened and the bear lifted out of getting too cl ose to the bear and poss ibl y getting hurt. Mr. the trap. BUe something went wrong. A foot became loose Foster Garrison of Brewster, New York, recently told me h e and a claw was raked over the top of a haml. The fellow had been reared on a farm at Green Mountain and as a yo uth had a nasty gash on the top of his wrist, but when the bear passed Mr. Drill's home going to and from school. One was fin all y subdued and tied, the men took turns in carrying morning with some of his schoolmates they stopped to watch it down the mountain. the bea r. They were leaning over the fen ce and Foster h ad You may ask, "What did Drill do with the bears that he his lunch pail in his hand in front of him when the bear caught?" smelled the food and ca me begging. I t sa t up on its They were well fed with grain, vegetables and fruit, be­ haunches but as no food was offered it took a mighty sw ing coming fat and docile. In the late fall during the hunting with its paw anc; sent the lunch pail rolling, spilling the season there was a read y market for them, as often ci ty hunt­ sandwiches out on the ground where they were quickly ers were not successfu l in shooting a deer or bear but were eaten. ,-\11 that remained of the day's lunch was the h andle willing to pay a good price for a fat bear, taking it to the of the pail tightl y clasped in Foster's h and. city with a good story of the big bear they had bagged on One year an o ld bear and a ha l[ grown cub were chained theil- hunting trip. At that time there may have been no to their posts, and usuall y on Sundays there was a crowd legal restrictions on keeping live game animals, or, if there of me ll , boys and a few of the fair sex gathered to watch the were such laws, they were not enforced. bears. Instead of going to Sunday School as I was supposed One can imagine taking an adult bear from a trap might to do, one Sunday I rode m y bicycle over to Green Moun­ be a diffi cult task. All that I know about it is hearsay for tain to see the bears. At the end of her cha in the old bear the story of one such incident was told and retold and the was walking clockwise, a h al[ circle about her post, looking narrative may have grown some during the many times it was longingly to th e Idt at the nearby mountain . ' '''hen she repea ted. reached th e po in t where she could no longer see the moun­ One o f Drill 's neighbors was Benjam in Bitterman, who tain, she turned and went counter clockwise with her head was easy-going, of a jovial disposition, and often the butt of turned tow:1nls the mountain . She apparently walked this his companions' practical jokes. To one and all he was way for endless hours at a time. known as Benny. Once in bringing a bear from the moun­ T he h il lf grown cub, also fa stened by iI coll ar and cha in tain Benny was one of the helpers and, as it turned out, he to a post, didn't seem to mind its captivity as much as did the was a h ero. mother. The cub was quite playful and a couple o f boys T h e procedure for taking a large bear from a trap started

32 ').~ By holding the chain taut the bear was held away from the men.

th e sa me as for a cub. A noose was placed about the bear's he responded LO the urgent cries of the men, "Ben, grab your neck and it was choked until unconscious. Getting the chain," and tnus became the h ero of the day. H ad Benny noose over the head may have been easier sa id than done, not gotten hold of hi cha in H enry would have been forced but when it was accomplished and the bear was unconscious, to shoot the bear. the lid was opened and a coll ar with two long chains at­ 'Vhen Sally heard the news of how Benny' shoe was tached to it was placed around the neck. ' '''ith two men LOrn, she was angry at the men. She said, "All the time it is holding the end of each chain, the noose was loosened and Benny this and Benn y that, just to make a fool of him. But the bear allowed to recover. when it came to leading the bear, my Benny had to go lL wa a very enraged bear that awoke to find itself in a ahead." most se ri ous predica ment, for there it was midway between There were no further m ishaps in ge tting this particular its ca ptors. Snarling at the men, biting the chai n, or slap­ bear orE the mountain and chained to a post. Getting the ping the chai n with its paws, was of no avail. Threshing extra chain loose from the coll ar was another " ticklish" job. about in th e tra p, but given a little slack on one of the The bear again had to be choked before the chain could be cha in s, the bear climbed out of the tra p and started for the removed. men hold ing their cha in taut but was held away from them Mr. Garrison recently told me that though he was quite by the other chain. The bear fought the coll ar and cha ins you ng at the time, he remembered that his father had helped with a ll its strength. Snarling its defiance at the men, it to bring a big bear off the mountain. His father told' of their ro ll ed on the ground and turned somersaults, trying to work choking the bear, securely tieing it, and hauling the bear the co ll ar over its head, but it still remained a prisoner. Dur­ down the mountain on a stone boat. ing all th is time H enry had his riOe ready in case it became necessary to shoot the bear. A Young Girl's Flight Fmm a Wolf To get the bear to go forward, the men in the rear gave This sLOry is told by iilton Landis in the unpublished their cha in some slack, and with a couple of tugs on the for­ biography of Daniel Krise who was born in J ackson Town­ ward cha in th e bear would start for those men only to be sh ip, 1868, died 1962. Mr. Krise related that when a youth kept from getting close by the second cha in. In this manner attending high school he had li ved for two years with his they got the bear started down the mountain road. After a Aunt Christina Krise Messner who told him of this episode. number of fits of ro lling and threshing around the bear From a partial genealogy of the Krise family, Mr. L andis fin a ll y quieted down and gave some cooperation in being thought the incident had occurred in the early 1860's. led. After a while things were goi ng so well that only two As Aunt Christina told it, when she was twelve years old men were holding o n to the chains and Benn y was walking it was her duty each afternoon to go into the woods to search aheac!. They were on a smooth piece of road and the bear for the fami ly herd of cattle, including the milk cows, and wal1led to trot, so the men jogged along quite fast. They bring them to the home corral. Like all other pioneer fami­ came LO where the road was steeper and a bit rough. They lies, there were not enough cleared fields in which to pas ture should have slowed down but they had waited too long. the ca llie, so during the daytime in the summer they were The man in the back could not hold the bear and Benny had turned loose in the woods to seek their food. to run faster. H e stubbed his toe a nd fell to the ground. One afternoon Christina started as usual to look for h er The bear got close to Benny and got hold of his foot and charges. Searching all the likely places near the fann and lVas tearing at the shoe. Benny was frightened and began not finding them she went deeper into the woods following ye lling that the bear would kill him and he would never a path the cattle had made that led over the brow of a hill aga in see his Sally. The men told Benny to keep quiet as to a spring where they often went for water. Going down th e bear was not hurting him but Benny said, "Yes, but he the steep hillside she heard the cowbell that was worn fas­ is tearing my shoe." tened by a strap about the neck of the leader of the herd. Another man helped to pull the bear away .from Benny As the so und of the bell grew louder she k new the cows were and it turned on the men who were annoying it from the coming toward her. In a few moments the cattle came into rear. In the excitement Benny h ad let loose of his chain but view and traveling quite fast as though being chased . As

33 the ca ttle passed her, Christina counted them and found one was mlss ll1g. Going a shon distance down the hillside to where she could see into a ravine the cattle had crossed she sa w a young heifer lying on the ground and unable to arise because of a broken leg. Ju t then a she wolf with two h alf­ grown whelps appea red and Christina made a hasty retreat. The wolves attacked the injured heifer and though Christina co uld no longer see into the ravine she pl ainly heard the bellows of pain as the wolves bega n tearing at the helpless animal. Running a fter the res t of the cows, Christina caught one by the tail and was literally Cl raggeCl up the steep hillSide. It was d ark when she arrived home and after that her older brothet- a1-med with a gun we nt in search of the ca ttle. The D octor and a PantheT I have never heard of a person in this part of the State who had been attacked by a woJ[, but there is a true story of a man having been killed by a panther. T he panther was the most ruthless and savage of the wild animals here in the The m onllment ll eu( th e burial place of D r. Frederick R einwa ld at English Center, L ycom ing County, erected East and in these respects he resem bled the mountain lion by the L ycom ing M edical Society in 1946. During th e of the W est. summer of 1964, an elderly membeT of the R einwald Our story begins when Dr. Frederick R einwald was killed family now living on Oregon H ill in th e westem paTt by a panther December 22, 1846, in a densely wooded spot of L ibeTt y Valley, told the author that to the bes t of her in the "endless mounta in s" about three-fourths of the way knowledge D r. R einwald had studied m edicine in between Liberty, Tioga County, and English Center, Ly­ Germ any and emigrated to Pennsylvan ia, living at coming County. The Doctor lived at Liberty and had re­ Liberty and jJmcticing in the surmunding countrys ide. ceived a ca ll to visit a patient at English Center. It is r e­ A1JpaTently the DoctOT was not man-ied and left no ported the Doctor did not have a horse and made his calls on descendants. foot. The road from Liberty to English Center wound around over the hills and vales of the wes tern part of the Liberty Valley, fin all y following T exas Creek through a Interest in the tragedy was heightened about 1950 when mountain pass to where it joins Block House Creek to form the L ycoming County Medical Society erected a monument Little Pine Creek, thence for a bout three miles to English to the memory of Dr. R einwald. Of native stone, the monu­ Center. ment is placed along Route 287 about a half-mile north of the There was another route with a road from Liberty follow­ bridge over Little Pine Creek at English Center. On the ing along Block House Creek to just below the present site monument is a bronze plaque with the following inscrip­ of Buttonwood where the road may have ended in a path or tion: "Dr. Frederick R einwald was killed by a panther at tra il along the creek to join the road from T exas Creek to Black's Creek, four miles northeast of this point, December English Center. The trail led down the narrow V-s haped . 22, 1846, while on the way to visit a patient. An unusual valley between high mountains that were covered with a example of the fortitude of pioneer physicians and the haz­ rank growth of virgin timber. The giant trees grew tall and ards faced in the performance of their duties." close together and often it was dark and eery along the tra il. About 1950 the Trout Run Volunteer Fire Company held Where Black's Creek empties into Blo c ~ H ouse Creek a a " turkey shoot" and in the printed program were several panther lay hiding ready to spring on any living thing that stories o f local interest written by Milton Landis. One of that migh t come along. T oday, the virgin fores t is gone but the stori es was abou t the death of Dr. R einwald and for in­ the rugged mountains are covered with a lesser forest. It is formation in writing the tale Landis visited Mr. William unlikely that ever again will there be such a fo res t here as Schneider, now deceased, of Oregon Hill. Schneider re­ there was one hundred years ago. Instead of a tra il , a paved lated that he had heard a nd read a number of different ver­ roac!- now follows along Block H ouse Creek, known as R oute sions of the traged y but h e relied on what he had been told 284, co nnecting R outes 15 and 287. R oute 284 crosses by H enry English of English Center. Schneider said he wa Black's Creek on a bridge and it was near this spot the body a young man when Engli sh died at an advanced age but he o f Dr. R einwald was found. had often heard Mr. English repeat the story. Many storie have been told, and some written, with var y­ According to English's account, when the Doctor did not ing accounts of the traged y. In some of the stories the Doc­ come to English Center as expected, a number of men in­ tor was riding a horse and in others he was walking. In cluding E nglish walked up Little Pine Creek, stopping at some stories the attack was in d aylight and in others it was the different ca bins along the way, to inquire if anyone had at night. In one o f the tales the Doctor passed the ca bin of seen the Doctor. ' '''hen they reached Black's Creek they " Uncle" H enry Brion's fa ther a half mile north of the pres­ found the body of D r. R einwald. The trampled snow with ent covered bridge that spans Block House Creek near But­ the footprints of the Doctor and a panther 'Were mute evi­ tonwood. " Uncle" H enry was then a lad of ten or twelve dence of a terrific struggle. The body was so badly mutilated years old, and in later years he is reported to have sa id tha tit and mauled that English did not want to describe it. The was near dusk when the Doctor came by and his father had Doctor's satchel and double barrel gun were found nearby. asked him to stay for the night. The offer was refu sed as One barrel of the gun had been fired but on the other Dr. R einwald sa id h f' wanted to reach his patient as quickly barrel only the percussion cap had been exploded. The as h e could. Thus, the m ys tery grew! charge in that barrel had "misfired," omething that occa-

34 siona ll y happened with muzzle- loading guns. panther lI'a shattered. It would require everal minutes Mr. Schneider's account was that the body wa carried to to leloacl the gun but there wa no time. The gun \Va now English Center and buried in a small cemetery that was u ele s except as a club. It wa an unequal truggle and located near where the prese nt monument to the Doctor the panther soon won. razed by pain and in a great rage now stands. The only markers on the graves were ordinary the panther wreaked it vengeance on the unfortunate Doctor, fi eld ~to ne s with no insc riptions as to who was buried or mauling and clawing at the body long after the la t spark when. Over the yea rs the little cemetery was neglected. of life h ad fl ed. Some of the tones marking the graves disa ppeared and But the panther was under a entence of death b slow others were lying on the ground. starvation [or it co uld eat no food. It may at time have Possib ly it was forty years ago when the State built a new been abl e LO get a little water down its gullet but it gradu­ road along Little Pine Creek givi ng this section the route ally grew weaker and weaker, d ying a thousand deaths dur­ number 287. In grading for the road the little cemetery was ing those fiv e long ,,·inter months, paying a terrible price c.overed over and no doubt the engineers L It the paved road for the unwarranted attack on Dr. R ei nwald. would be a fitting memorial to the few pioneers who were T wo N eighborly eighbors. buried there. Farmers Clark and Blair li ved on adjoining farm and In 195 1, J ohn D. Allison, writing the history of the Texa ­ often helped each other with difficult tasks. 10 money wa Bl ockhouse Fi h and Game Club, cites a story in the Diary of involved [or it wa under LOod that a debt [or labor was to Ne s~ muk (George W . Sears) that Dr. R einwald was killed by be repaid with labor. a panther at Bl ack's Creek in December of 1846, and the In his dairy herd farmer Clark always kept a "sire" that foll owing May this same panther was killed in the vi ll age of wa frequently used by neighbor Blair, without any thought Texas, at the headwaters of Texas Creek, about ten miles of recompen e. Once, farmer Clark requested the loan of awa y. The little vill age of Texas is now only a memory but Bla ir's sire [or swine. vVhen the animal was returned home, at that time there were twO sawmills, a store and post office, Bl air very casua ll y remarked, "John, if you have luck with about twe nty- fi ve houses, and a schoolhouse. Today, the yo ur pigs, wi ll yo u give me a pair?" schoolh ouse has been converted into a home and a couple of I t is reported, summer cabins are all that remains of the village. aid farmer Clark to farmer B lair: On that sunny afternoon in early May of 1847, some " We have been neighbo1"S fOl- forty yal·e; children were playing in the street of the vi ll age when they You've used my bull to breed your cows, sa w a most frightening aspect. An animal, the likes of which This once I've had your boar to breed my sows. they had never seen before, was va inly trying to push its way Now you want pigs, and that ain't fair, through a fence. T hey ran home and excitedly tried to tell But you can have them for five a pair." of what they had seen. One little fellow sa id it was as big as a horse with firey red eyes. T wo Apprentices The children were so much in earnest and badly fright­ Two yo ung friends were talking of what they wanted from ened that severa l men went to investigate. They found a life and each wanted to learn a trade. One wanted to be a walking skeleton covered with skin that hung in great folds blacksmith, the other a shoemaker. Each one achieved his ancl va inly trying to push its way through the fence. It was goal. a panther in the last stage of starvation so weak and The first one agreed to serve his three years of apprentice­ emaciated it hardly had strength to move. In trying to walk ship to a local biacksmith, Alfred Sheffer, but after two years it fell over the lemt obstruction and was unable at once to of work the young fellow thought he knew all he needed to regain its feet. With its bloodshot eyes and debilitated body know about bl acksmithing and asked his employer to re­ it was more an object of pity than of fear. li eve him of working another year. The blacksmith was The men killed the panther and then saw that the lower agreeable and wanted LO know what the young fellow would jaw had been hopelessly shattered, pres umably by a gun do now. T he sm ith was not too surprised to learn the young shot. The animal was said to measure eleven feet from tip man was going to open hi ~ own shop-which he did. of nose to tip of its ta il. Without the use of its lower jaw, Someone asked Sheffer It the young fellow knew enough the panther had not been able to eat anything and had about blacksmithing to operate a shop? The smith thought reached the stage where it co uld no longer do h arm to any for a moment then said, " He knows enough about it to be a li ving thing. first class bungler." Sears was sure this was the sa me panther that had killed The other you ng man served his three years with a shoe­ Dr. R einwa ld for he states, "It is worth y to note that an old maker and was ready to se t up his own p lace of business. hunter of the (search) party gave it as his belief that the H e wanted to have his shop at L iberty where a ll the business panther's lower jaw had been broken by the shot. That it of the community was transacted !:l,,' his fath e. r objected to was the panther, no one who had seen the body or heard him going several mile from home. H e sa id, "It you go to the story ever doubted." Liberty, yo u will be of no help to me h ere on the fann. You From the foregoing, I wi ll attempt to rebuild the story had better have your shop here then wh en you are not busy of the dea th of Dr. R einwald. As he made his way along yo u can help me." the trail in the heavily wooded va ll ey between the moun­ 1 am afra id the young man did as his father wanted for in tains, it is possible that when he fir t saw the panther it was la ter yea r he lived on his father's farm, did some farming, about LO make its charge or spring from its place of con­ and some shoemakin g. H e never got rich but could count cea lm ent. The gun was aimed and fired but only the per­ his " ea lth in a large fami ly of so ns and daughters. cussion cap exploded and the gun had misfired. ' !\lith a I ca n vou h for some truth in some of these stories, and for rush, the panther closed in for the fatal blow. T here was the res t I can only say: no time for a careful aim and the second barrel was fired at I cannot say just what i the truth, close range with the result that only the lower jaw of the I have told the tales I heard as a youth.

35 Official Religion VERSUS • Folk Relig IOn

By DON YODER

T he Devil eems to have been a subject of popular d iscus­ th e book bears the elaborate title: T he Devil and Some of sion among America n Protes tants in th e 185 0's. H IS Doi7lgs; Or JVho H e was-I f/ here H e IVas- TV hat H e "Whatever the ca uses, the ,\ merica n churches in the decade Did- Who H e Is- IfIh ere H e Is-I f/ hat H e Does-IVhat H e of the 1850's explored, via the popular press, the subjects Is- rind What H e Is Not. H is TVork in Pm'cels-H is TV ork of the a fterlife and the whole fr in ge area of the occult­ With 'he Kingdoms of Israel and j udah, and Their Kings­ demonology, angelology, as trology, and spiritualism. T here and ]) uring the Ca j)tivity of th e j ews, W ith Some of H is were in that decade the "spirit ra ppings" o f the Fox Sisters. IVork From the Coming of Our Savior D own tn the Present T here was also th e a ttempt to legitimize astrology, and raise Time. By Rev. TV. B. R aber, Pennsylvania Conference, it from the level o f the country almanac to the city news­ United Bretln-en in CIl ,·isl. Day ton, Ohio, Printed for the paper. There was intense interest in dea th, the spirit land, Author, At the Printing Establishment of the United Bre th­ the "h eavenl y recognition," the "sainted dead," the glories ren in Christ . 1855. From it I quote Chapter X, "The of heaven and the horrors of hell. There were, fin all y, books Devil and Delusions," which forms the basis of this paper. on the "Christian" doctrines of the guardian angel, the hosts William B. R aber (1823-1875), U nited Brethren circuit- of heaven, and the d evil and his kingdom. These were, it seemed, national interests-national re­ ligious fads, so to speak-and this was one aspect of the Amer­ ica n P rotesta nt spir it at the time. There were other aspects as well. T h e 1850's were times of intense political hatreds, of nativism, and anti-slavery-all of which the P rotestan t conscience was debating. In the realm of rheology there were Bushnell and Nevin , Emerson and Ball ou and Parker, Brownso n and H ecker, bu t the interes ts which we hall look at in this pa per were not th e high theological interests of the church but the popular curren ts. SOME OF HIS DOINGS; ' '''hile these were national fads, Pennsy lva ni a's Protestan ts

were producing their hare of the popular books. The pro­ 0& lifi c H enry H arbaugh (1817- 1867) was writing T he H eavenly

w n o HE W4&-wnt:BJ; fn: WAB-WnAT m. OI~m:rO lIEIfi--WItEBE R ecognition; or, An Eamest an d ScrijJtural Discussion of the 11 .. tS--WilAT nr; DOtS-WIiAr 11 £ IS--.I.~D 'I\' II,\T Ii£ 18 :o>OT. 1118 \\'0111 I N PAJlCn.s--Ul& wonl> WITH TIlE XIXCDOlfS Qllestion-W illlVe Know our Friends in H eaven? (Ph il adel­ 0' IIJ8,AU. .A."'D .n."lMlI, ... XD TIIP-IB JtI$GS-A:-D DC- AllfO THE OAMIVITY OY TlIl: Jrt\"S, " ' 11'l.I 6OW& p hia, 185 1), and T he H eavenly H ome; or, The Employ­ or 1113 WOIll[ n:.OU THE CO)(I~G or 011& IUTtOn DOW, TO Tlf.r; l"JtQOT Tun: ments and Enjoyments of the Sain ts in H eaven (Philadel­ phia, 1853), both items in his then popular "FulUre Life"

series. At the same time the vitriolic Philadel phia nativist REV. W. D. RADER, J oseph F. Berg (1812-1871 ) produced his curio us volume, P E~IUY t .V A ::-t IA OO:s,.E&.r;NOE, Ul-rITED BRETHREN IN CHRIST. Abbadon an d Nlahanaim; or, Daem ons an d Guardian Angels (Philadelphia, 1856). There has recently turned up what may be the rares t of all the devil-books of 19th Century America. Certainly [or DAYTON. OHIO.

the student o f folk-c ulture it is one of the most revealing, JIIlJ'fnD I'oa THE AUTHOR, AT Tn,. P'lUSTL'lQ E:8TAD1.1SJUI~ 0,. from the fact that it does not limit its discus ion o f the dev il THK U~rTUI BR.J:TKIlElf Ilf Cltal8T, 1855. to his esca pades in the Old and N ew T estaments-although it does give p lenty of detai ls of those escapades. It presses on to the devi l's part in the "delusions" of the 19th Century. These seem to centel- in two areas- the "delusions" of the popular culture and the "delusions" oE the Pennsylva nia Raber's D evil-B ook of 1855 blames the D evil fm Dutch fo lk-culture. Penllsylvania's folk-religious practices of 'paw­ Before we go further, we shall introduce the book and its w awin g' and w itch craft . Coul·t esy Pl'il1 ceton author. The d ate is 1855, the author William B. Raber, and Theological Semi17a.1·Y.

36 TH E D Y I NG CHRI - TIA r. Th is engraving U)' Gilbert, fr01I1 a P(,ll1lsyl­ vania almanac of 1837, il­ lustrates the 19th Cel1tury Pl·otestanl ("011("('1"11 with death, heaven, and a11gel­ ology.

rider, wa s a na tive' of East Berlin, Adams County, Pennsy l­ prepa red, practi ca l, logica l. a nd earnestly deli vered, could va ni a. After a n a uthentic soul-sea rching revivalist conver­ sca rcel y ever fa il to make a deep and lasting impress ion. It , ion experi ence in 184 6- February 19th was what he call ed is do u btlul \\ hether he had a su peri or in this ch urch as a his "spiritual birthday" a nd he celebraled it every yea r a long pulpit orator.. ." From his fi rst a ppointment, Chambers­ with his " natural birthday"-he join ed the Pennsy lva nia burg Ci rcuit, in 1847, he continued in the itinera nt ministry Conference in 1847 and se rved the rest o f his life in the until his death in 1875, se rving ten yea rs in the pre iclin g acti\ e ministry in o uth Central Pennsy lvania. H e h as eldership a nd fo ur times as delegate to General Conference. wrillen lW O things whi ch are avail a ble to the scholar, both W h il e he was a good preacher, the account intrigues us with of which shed greal light on reviv ali st a ttitudes to life in the information th at " he was o ften imposed upon by the general- his manuscript 10umal (1847-1852), evide ntl y, like 1I'0 rthie s, a nd made the subject o f bitter censure by those o many o f the circuit-rider jo urna ls, wr itten for publication ; of his fri ends wh o did not carefully study his nature." This and his one book, The D evil and Some of H is D oings (1855). Victorian chronicle ends with February 7, 1875, when "Bro. The j Oll m a/ is the property o f the Histori ca l Society of the W. B. R aber entered hi s pulpit, a nd there a nd then pro­ Pennsy h·a nia Confere nce, at Quincy, Fra nklin County, cla im ed his las t God give n message of sa lv ation. Be fore the Pennsy lva ni a . ne ' l sa bbath ca me, his so ul had take n its last fli ght to the . \ ccording lO the f1 oll"e ry o bituary that his ministerial col­ spiril la nd ...." H e was su rv ived by a gri ev ing "compa nion leagues published in the j ournal of lit e Pennsylvania Confer­ a nd da ughter," a nd of co urse his book, stra ngely unknown ell ce for 1875, R aber "was a man of considera ble educa ti on, a nd loday practi ca ll y impossible to come by. a close student a nd a ra pid thinker. But few men were bet­ T he chapter which we reprint here is a curio us blend of ter po,ted in li terature a nd ;cience o f the day than h e. But li terary folklore and a uthentic Pennsy lva nia lore recorded at no pl ace was he more at home than in the pulpit, com­ ev id e ntl y frolll th e aUlhor's own memory. Certa in secti ons mand ing in per,ona l a ppearance, a vo ice well trained a nd rely heavil y upon C harles l\Iackay"s j\iemoirs of Exlmord i­ under perfec. t cO lllma nd. His sermons, a lways thoroughl y IIllI y Po/w /ar Deillsiolls {(lid lit e M adn ess of Crowds (1841),

37 one of the most popular of the rationalist exposes oE witch­ craft and related subjects which appeared in the 19th Cen­ tury. However, where R aber uses Mackay, he occasionally takes him only as a starting poi nt, drawing one or two ex­ SPffiIT RAPPING UNVEILED! amples from Mackay, which prompt him to add America n .A.lJ E X POS? OJ' THE examples of the sa me idea. R aber's most valuable sections are those which have little or no co nnection with Mackay­ the sections on witchcraft and "pawwawing," and that on ORIGIN, HISTORY, THEOLOGY AND PHILOSOPHY popular follies reflecting the ta tes and fashions and amuse­ men ts of the 1850's. My thanks to the R everend J ohn H . ess, Jr., Secretary and Curator of the Historical Society of the Evangelical SPIRIT WORLD, U nited Brethren Church, Dayton, Ohio, for the loan of the microfilm of R aber's Journal, for the material on R aber's 8i'IR1lIW'PIIIO," "lIEDlUJo[ WUIINO," ·PIIISlC.I.L Dl!l!ON:n1IAIlONS; obituar y from the J ournal of the Pennsylvania Conference, and for many favors a long the way; to the R everend H arry Fehl ol Quincy, Pennsylva nia, for the loan of the Pennsyl­ aJlt~ ·llIuttatlons. vania Conference's copy oE R aber's book; and to the Prince­ ton Theological Seminary Library for the loan of the only BY REV. H. MATTISON, A. M., avail abl e copy of R aber's book in the Philadelphia area (the .. ..-rc. 0. ,... l omr..ft'8.cn 1IIL .. ~ .... '10m!: ; .l.1TI'BOa or -X01IalI ~'t .~ •• IlII .•• r .... T1Ol'IOlrT. .. "mCla.::aoor. only one listed in the University oE Pennsylvania's Union Af'no.OIlT,-a o.. ZM. Catalogue), from which the title- page has been photo­ graphed. II. T he imporlance of R aber's book is that it sheds light on NEW YORK : POBUSHED BY'MASON BROTHERS, 23 PAJUC"ROW, the rev ivalist-sectarian approach both to folk religion and to popular culture. 1868. I am presupposi ng here that there are levels of culture: high culture, popular culture, and folk culture; a nd levels Spiritualism was a fad oJ the 1850's which grew of religion : (I) official or organ ize d rei igion, on the theo­ into a full-fledged religious cult afte? the Civil logical and liturgical levels; (2) popular religion-the lay­ War. It involved the idea, widespread in folk­ man's version of what religion is about, clothed often in the culture, that the spirits of the dead are available vocabu lary and values of the popular culture; and fin ally, for communication with the living. This book is (3) fo lk religion- those traditional levels of folk belief, those one of hundreds of an ti-spiritualist tracts that ap­ fo lk a ttitudes to life, death and the universe which, at least peared in the 1850's . in certain regional societies, exist partially alongside, parti­ all y underneath the official levels of religion. til e thinking and vocabulary oE the church by the attitudes Si nce 1957 we have been engaged at the Universi ty of .and "values" of popular culture. Pennsylvania in a study of the relation of Ameri ca n religion Official religion a nd folk culture have likew ise been part­ to the various levels of American culture- in particul ar, the ners in some cultures and opponents in others. In general relation o f official religion to those lower (and by theologian the European Ca tholi c cultures have worked out compro­ and eh urch historians o ften neglected) levels of popular cul­ mises with folk-religious attitudes and incorporated them ture and folk culture. somehow in their broader, sacramental view of life. Protes­ Our concern in this paper is with the church's attitude, in tantism, in its attempt ,to intell ectualize the Christian re­ mid-19th Century, to both fo lk culture and popular culture. ligion, tended in the long run to desacramentalize life and The cultures involved are the Pennsylvania Dutch folk cul­ has therefore often proved hosti Ie to folk-religious attitudes. ture and tile early American popular culture oE the 1840's Let us take for an example the question of folk heali ng. and 1850's. The church involved is the "Church of the Folk healing oE the occult sort was in the Protestant areas United Brethren in Christ," a small but aggressive revivalist driven underground, and h as for the most part been divorced sect that arose in the German-spea king areas of Pennsy lvania from official Protestantism ever since. Because, however, and Maryland at the time of the "awakenings" of the 18th the human desire to relate religion and healing is per istent, and earl y 19th Centuries. With the Evangeli cal Association religious heali;1 g is still practised on several levels in Ameri­ (later renamed the Evangeli cal Church), with which it fin ally ca n Protes tantism today: (I) It still exists as " powwowing"­ joined in 1946 to fo rm the Evangelical United Brethren occult folk healing-in the Pennsylvania Dutch country, still Church, it formed a kind of unofficial Pennsylvania Dutch underground and unofficial, unrecognized by the churches. arm of the great national Methodist movement, whose spirit (2) On a high intell ectua l level ti le idea of religious healing and motivation it largely shared. crysta llized into a cul t of its own, Christian Science, on the Official religion a nd popular culture have had a history of frin ges of o ffi cia l Protestantism. (3) Midway between the varied relationship in America, from the Puritans to Norman two, the Pentecostal sects attempt to restore the Biblica l Vincent Peale. If o n·e th inks of the Vi ctorian era with its charismatic gifts of religious healing, practicing them in the se ntimentali ty, its moralism, its preoccupation with death, context of the religious services, as part of the official re­ then it would seem that evangeli cal relig ion had a great ligion. (4) A fourth development, on the part of Episco­ deal to do with molding the po pular culture of that era. If pa lians in particular, has been to start formal hea ling se rv­ one studies the business men's ch urches of 20th Century ices, such as those sponsored by St. Stephen's Church in suburbia, one sees the opposite relation- the domination of Philadelphia under the auspices of the Order of t. Luke

38 and broke up the older religious communi tie and folk ~Pt 31ltmorq of fbt lltab. societi es ol the colonial era. Ju t as the community aspects of the Puritan ociety were broken up by the individuali t orienla tion of pieti t revivali m, so in the Pennsy lvania SEPULCHR ES Dutch country the community-based life of the traditional Lutheran and Reformed " union churdles"-where the in­ dividual was part of a larger " Old Protestant" cui ture- was replaced with the pietist or evangelical-revivalist type of Christianity which was ce ntered in the individual and his R T ED. sa lvation. OUR D EP A Beli ef in the devil was, in the 19th Century at least, a kind ot no man's land between folk religion and official re­ li gion. Where the officia l religion, as in the middle ages, BY accepted the belief in the devil, it was easy for the people REV. F. R. ANSPACH, A.M., to pre s on further into a duali ti c world-v iew where the .A •••• WOW ., .'.Tt • • D .· Kingdom of Cod and the Kingdom of the Devil were seen as struggling, Zoroas trian fashion, against each other, in the cosmo as well as in the individual heart. In the 18th and .. Iowen "hkb qbt, . haD da, t. tin, peri'u.me,. "ibM t!M ••_ .-ot'J from .. rood mUl', tomb. 8m II. 8. Ln'!'U. 19th Centuries, when Evangeli ca l Prote tantism revived and strengthened the devi l doctrine, the devi l's kingdom was equated with the forbidden "world" who e allurements the evangelical was told to fl ee in the working out of h is salva .f.Gndk thilian. tion. Here-as is made cl ear by R aber's book- the devil be­ comes a conven ient scapegoat for the preachers in their double- pronged condemnation of culture- the witchcraft­ PHILADELPHIA : fo lk healing as pects o[ the fo lk culture on the one hand and LINDSAY &; BL A KI S T O N . the popular amusement aspects of popular culture on the 185 6. other. Raber makes it plain that the devil has fa thered both sets of wickedness. Amaicans in the 1850's found a stmnge fascina· I n conclusion, the revivalist or methodistic sects of the tion in death, funerals, cemeteries, and the doc­ evangeli ca l movement tended to reject both the fo lk cultu re t1·ines of the afterlife. This book by FTedeTick and the popul ar culture. For the Pennsy lva n ia D u tch R ein hm-dt Anspach (1815-1867), a Lutheran minister bonl in Gentm l Pennsylvania, was on tlie co untry th is meant that in p lace of the fo lk culture they set Pmtestant best-selleT list in 1856. up a kind of evangelical "substitute culture"-(l ) the fe llow­ ship sect with its "brother" and "sister" terminology ta ki ng the p lace of the community-based church; (2) the camp­ meeting or "bush-meeting" in place of the militia- m u ter the Phys ician, with the co nscious intention of restoring and frolic, with spiritual ecstasy ("holyrolling" in 20th Cen­ hea ling to the realm of the church and the au thorized clergy tury terms) in place of the dance and alcoholic inebriation ; of the church. (3) the p rayer-meeting wi th its spontaneous " d10rus"-s ing­ In the Protestant Pennsy lva nia Dutch cultural area the ing in place of the singing-school and the songs of the twO occul t phases of folk reli gion-occult fo lk h ealing (ca ll ed S1)innstube-in other words, the spiritual in place of the in Pennsy lva nia Bmucherei or "powwowing") and witch­ popular ballad; (4) the "watch night" in place of the New craft (H exerei)-were once commonl y practi sed and believed Year's party; and (5) a subjective calendar of conversion and among most of the continental emigran t groups of the 18 th reviva l season in place of th e old objective chu rch year of Century. On the people's level of understand ing these holy fes ti va ls and the superimposed folk-year with its magic things were accepted . T hey were, in fact, looked upon by days of plan ting and harvesting, blessing and peril. Pennsy lva nia fa rmers as part of their religion. T he clergy To the "evangelica l" Protestant, all that counted were the of the churches (Lutheran and R eformed) may not have ap­ Bible worl d-view and the interior cl imate of ass ured sa. lva­ proved these aspects o f fo lk belief, but the people continued tion. Raised above all and penetrating all revivalist life their loya lty to them. T he clergy, fo r the most part, seem was the "Evangelical J es us," an idea which became a k ind not to have pu blicly opposed either the Pennsylvania fo lk of un iversal prism through which all ligh t, all truth, all religion or the Pennsylvania Du tch fo lk-c ul ture, its larger knowledge was fil tered. To the evangelical, the "world out setting, unlil the middle of the 19th Century. there" was seen only as refracted througi:l this symbolic lens. A basic shift in the relation between church and folk cul­ As this new evangelical revivalist spirit spread and pene­ ture ca me with the reviva list movement which reached its trated from the revivalist sects into the old Pennsylvania high tide {n the pre-Civi l War era. Beginning with the Dutch churches, and many Lutheran and R eformed pastor Creat Awaken ing of the 18th Century and CO nlinuing introduced the "anxious bench" and the Sunday School and through the econd Awakening of the earl y 19th Century, the rest of the revivalist " new measures," the old folk culture a new orientation in Protestantism, a new idea crys tallized was weakened fatally from within. into an aggressive movement-the so-call ed evangel ical or Of this changed world-view, with the focus of Protestant pietist or revivalist type of Protestantism- invaded most of life narrowed to include less of the old folk-cultural world as Am erica's Protestant churches and conquered them, wholly wel l as les of the American popular world of the 1850's, or in part, one after the other. R evivali sm has had profound Raber and his now forgotten book, The Devil and Some of effects on American life. For one, it individualized rel igion His Doings, are perfect examples.

39 THE DEVIL AND DELUSIONS pretence has been made to it by many of the Devil's mis­ c rea nt ~, is placed beyond question. That there were, and are The work of Satan upon earth was characterized III the even now, per ons hollow-hearted enough to pretend to commencement, by deception, and the same has ever been possess this supernatural wi sdom and power, is altogether one o f its leading features . His whole work is a work of delusion. Volumes might be written concerning popular a pparent. . But yo u may refer me to the statements made concernmg follies, which have spread far and wide, and taken deep root the Magicians of Egypt; and their divining rods, in another in the h ea n s of the people, cl early showing their wrong­ chapter. Please, sir: That was altogether a different matter,! headedness. W e can, however, promise to give only a brief God had a wise purpose in view in that caSt, and il the power notice of some, out of many, remarkable delusions which the I was there writing about, would have been Con sidered the Devil imposed upon the credulity of perverted minds. It is power connected with witchcraft, I should have placed it not only possible, but reall y quite probable that, Imay tramj) under that caption. That was a case of the Devil 's power, the t oes, of some very good m eaning people, before I have granted or given him for a wise object in the mind of Deity. done with this chapter; but as that is not a premise in the \Ve have there stated the facts in that case, and you are left book, I can only advise you to betake YO Ul-selE to h earty to draw your own conclu ion . vV e proceed with the subject prayer for an unprejudiced heart first, and then to read on. in hand, hoping yo u will have the kindness to refer to the m atter spoken o f in this paragraph, and e~ p ec i a ll y to the WITCHCRAFT introductory remarks in that case. WITCHCRAFT is the fir t delusion o f Satan to which we Of the r ise o f witchcra ft, such as when, where, and how, we shall ca ll your attention. This specie of deception has been have nothing to say. H owever, the pretension to this busi­ in existence a long time. On account o f it antiq uity, it ness is of great antiquity, but as time passed on, the Devil gained considerabl e ground, deeded to its individual pur­ added such improvemen ts as wo uld keep it in vogue among poses, during d ifferen t periods of time. At times the de­ th e credulous. \Ve read of pretenders to this bl ack art in the lusion amounted to a mania, and when the best was said, it differe nt books of Moses; and such persons were looked upon was not far behind th at idea There were days that it was with abhorrence by the Almighty, threatened with awful rather dangero us to be an aged and infLrm woman, for they puni hments, and indeed, ' ve re forbidden to live, cursing the were generall y the victi ms of blind superstition and cruelty, earth with their vil e impos itions. A misconception of dLffer­ be ing looked upon as gilled in the imaginary net o f witch­ ent texts, sucl1 as, "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live," craft ; and indeed, man y of them, poor creatures, shared a has led man y into the wild notion o f the reality in witchcraft . bad fate, through the perverted imaginati on of hypochon­ But what was, and i , a witch? A ch eat, a deceiver, and so on. d ri acs-the wild fa ncies of h ys terica l women-and the prej­ Mackay 2 says: " From the best authority, it appears that the udices of conceited nincompoops and simpletons. Fanatical H ebrew word, [which] has been rendered, ven efica, and reli gioni ts, too, cast more than a few mites in to the treasury witch, mean a poisoner and divineress-a dabbler in spells, of this folly. or fo rtune- teller. The modern witch was a [very] different I t was believed that the Devil empowered those creatures character, and joined to h er pretended power of fore-telling known as witches, wizards and such like, " to walk invisible, future events, that of working evil upon the life, limbs, and to fl y in the air, ride upon broomsti cks, and other wooden possessions of m ankind_" gear, to interpret dreams, answer (hard) questions, betray I t was generally supposed that p ersons obta ined super­ (profo und) secrets, to talk (gibberish) the unive rsal language, natural power from the Devil, by selling their souls ·to him, swell winds, bring up spirits, disturb the dead, and tormen t and signing 'th e bargain in blood, without a ny idea of claim­ the living, with a thou and other needful tricks to amuse the ing deliverance at any time in the future. England, France, world, keep themselves in veneration, and carryon the Devi l's empire in the world." Why the Devil a lways, or 1 Beca use of their biblicism, Protes tants of Raber's stripe were placed in the ambi g uo~l s positi(:H1 o( having to defend th ~ B, ~bl~ c al nearl y so, walked among, talked to, a sociated with, and "miracles" whde denyll1 g medieva l and modern Ca th,ohc ITIlr~ ­ bargained and employed the most deformed and the uglies t c1es." A New England cOnlemporary of Raber, S. B. Emmons, 111 old creatures h e co uld find , is something to be philosophized his vo lume The Sj)irit Land (Bos ton, 1857), includes a chapter on "Modern Miracles" (Ch . XI), whi ch tell s us, "There .are some who upon in witchcra ft. And why the people thought that a profess to beli eve in modern mi racl es. But s ~ c h . b e h~f ne cess ar~l y poor feebl e old woman should h ave no other pleasure, and partakes o( superstition. The aVlOr gave no lI1t1m atl ?n that ,~lr ­ acles should co ntinue after the es tablishment of Chnstl alllty (p. no greater delight tha n to punish men, women, children, and 79). Christ's promise of healing powers and related spiritual phe­ animals, is a po int h ard to defin e_ And to the shame of nomena "did not extend beyond th e immediate co nverts of the thousands, who wish to be looked upon as sen sible and Te­ apos tl es." "In (ac t," he concludes, " th.er.e ,~'as no necessity for mi ra cl es after th e es tablishment of Chnstl anlty. They were firs t sp ectable, be it sa id, that, the m atter h as been turned into a wrought as so many tes timoni es that Jesus was sent of G.od _ .." (p. proverb, to express the natural consequen ces of old age, 80). An other mid-cenlury vo lume, MagiC, Pretended M !I-a~ l es, an d which should be honored, "as ugly as a witch _" Boys and Remarkable N atu ral Phenomell a (Philadelphia, n.d.), published by the America n unda)'- chool ni on in conjunction with the Re­ girls in the street, a re h eard to ridicule the decrepit, by yell­ li gious Tract ociet)' of London, takes t~ e s am ~ ,iew: " Nl~mb e rl es s ing-as ugly as a witch . . were th e miracl es wrought by Jehovah 111 anCie nt tlln es, 111 behalf The read er may think we might have given some definL ­ o( his chosen peo ple. In vain does infidelity obj ec t that the con ­ tents o( th e books of i\f oses lIIay not be true; since, had they been tion, or expl anation o f the term witchcra ft, in the commence­ fa lse, it was abso lutely imposs ible that they co uld have obtamed men t of this cha pter ; but the fact is, there is so much ' any credi t" (pp. 178- 179). ,\nd th e e fin al examples of evangelical apologeti cs: "In vain do Romani sts co ntend (or th e cO I1lIl~u a n c e of embraced within its long arms that, we scarcely know where mi racles" (p. 190) . "Miracl es have passed away; but we stili possess to commence. The most common idea connected with it is th e gloriou gos pel of th e bl essed God" (p. 191 ). . as foll ows:-"A juggling pretence of supernatural knowledge 2 Charl es i\I ackay's M emoirs of Extra ordinary Pojm /ar D el~ISI O ? S all d the Madness of Crowds appea red in a three-volume echtlon .m and p ower ga i~ e d ~ )~ entering into con~p ac t. :vi_th ~h e i,~ : London in 18 11. It was one o( th e mos t popular of the rationalist habitant of the spLfLtu al world, ca ll ed famdLaI SpLfLtS. exposes of witchclaft and related phenomena in 19th Century The reality or truth o f th e matter, is not only to be doubted, literature. I have used th e two- volume London edition of 1852 . The secti on quoted in this paragraph is found in Ma ckay, II, but to be rejected as unworthy of a ra tional being. That 102- 103.

40 lVI TCHES' DANCE ON THE BLOCK BERG- Th e engrave1" GilbeTl's venioll o[ the " WaljJUrgisllacht" 1'evel, [1'Om Conrad Zent/e1"s PhilacieljJ/iia almanac, tli e " Americanisch eT ladt und Land Calender" [01' 1824 .

German y, anet a whole train of other nations, have at differ­ day, a [ter which I may gath er up difIerent points that ce ntre elll times been thrown into the wi ldest co mmotion, by being in witchcraft, and were bro ught a bout by the old 'Weird inundated with the witch mania. Ca lamities o f all kinds himse lf.3 were se nt, without comment, into th e fi eld of witchcraft. If An old gentlema n res id ing in A---, Pa., was very much a storm b lew down buil d ings and pro trated timber,-if distressed on account o f the Dev il having witches beleaguer di sease ca rried ofI ca ttle, or a fA iction entered the household, his premises. Every night he was attacked by them without - if accidellls occurred, eith er to man or beast, with more mercy or quarters. His own narration of his witch troubles th an a thousa nd other things, some poor de pised hag, or would run somewh ere near the fo ll owing:-I n the eve ning gy psy- like looking creature in the comm unity, was surely a fter retiring to rest, or rather in his case, /07-re t, the witches bl amed as being a witch, and bl inging about such distre s wo uld. immedi ately after he had fallen into a slumber, make and confusion. The wi ld lea ps of a di ordered imagination, their ·appearance. They would enter his chamber through or unhinged digestion- the spectres, visions, a nd conceit ol the key- hole, and a ppear in the form a nd sha pe oE cats; a fter the hijJfJed-and every strange pra nk o f the curio u a nd some ce remon y they would set up a n aw Eu l screaming, a nd marvelous, iI'as ascribed to th e power of rejected a nd out­ :1 I have n t thought it necessary to identify the motifs in these cast wrinkled old crea tures. J shall nOt pass over th e old very co mmon witch ta les. ince they are from the sa me area (South Central Pennsy lvania), see m y ca refull y annotated "' Vitch Tales trodden track to notice th wonderful upersti ti ons a nd de­ from ,\ dallls County," reco rded in 1958, a century after Raber's lusions connected with witchcraft, _in ages gone by; but shall book, in Pen nsylvania Folklife, Vol. X II o. 4 (Summer 1962), take th e privilege to introduce in print a few ases in a later 29-37 .

41 enter into a fan tas tic dance, and hold a hellish jubilee. All this time he lay sweating in anx iety, distress, tremor of the whole nervous sys tem, and the deepest agony. Presently one large cat, i.e., witch, a fter giving a few licks of the lips, fright­ ful grin s, and rolling of the great glaring eyeball s, would in one leap p lant herself firml y upon the poor old man's breast. His breathing ceased- his limbs became helpless-his eyes ~Qt$ Uni~trra('~raum6ud), darkened-his body shook-death tared him in the face. In his agon y of body and mind, with almost superhuman effort o ~ t r he succeeded in groaning, and at last crying out for help. That instant the ca ts, i.e. witches, fl ed-he wakened up all in !Vet boDl1ani>ige fear, fee ling doubly grateful that the inhuman creatures were gone, and for the narrow escape he made. The whole of the foregoing circumstance resolves itself into this: ,... H e was ~rau m~tlu ~ 1eg er subject to the I GHTMARE! In ----, Pa.[,] a farmer's callIe were, as he said, be­ witched. They became lean and were seized with a kind of staggers. His horses were very poor, and the milk of his cows unfit for use. The appearance of his entire stock was ~ f durn ett, d istressi ng. The witches were among them, led on by some poor old woman, a neighbor, to do him such mischief. His hay-mow was empty-his feed-boxes ditto-his stock was ~(pbabetmjgig tingericbut. shamefully neglected-and the whole of the affair amounts g]n6gtlogtn QUe btu 6cQrifttn to this: His cattle, and so on, were bewitched by their owner. Cause: Want of hay and grain , and mean, unmerciful Don neglect.4 tfrifiott( ~u l ret'~p,. In P----, Pa.[,] the Dev il had a number of sinners be­ mrtimeboru~ ID2t1anctQ [\ n lieve that their affli cted children were bewitched, and set 2t'rb macon :ru nen U6 them upon a plan to discover who was doing the mischief. ~Qrttr 2 i (~ The clothing of the children were pounded, and pinched by ~ {'. \1! i 6tiu~ the doors.~ After this operation, with some myste rious cere­ .f)coftr mony, the witch was to be taken down by sickness . Sure ~aT~tn 7£-topompu& enough, about the time of their witch detecting agency, a tljdlmoft ~r~on, 1C poor dropsical old creature, who had h ad no greater desire than to serve her Maker, was very suddenly seized with -- difficulty of breathing-and a whole train of other distress­ 2tu6 ~tm tnQlifc6tn Uebuftat. ing things. She was entered upon the list as a witch. But this problem may be solved se nsibly, by knowing that she was subject to palpitation of the heart, of which she had an attack about the t im e the Devil had his simpletons engaged in beating and wringing the apparel of their little ones. Thus we m ight fill pages from personal knowledge, but we forbear. The age in which we live, and in this happy, ffie(l~in9: sensible America, witchcraft is losing ground. The witch­ craft laws are cast to one side, and the burning, gibbeting, Q)ebrucft fur ben .~auftr, 19~!. drowning, and a dozen other painful deaths, inflicted upon human bein gs for supposed diabolical power exercised to " The UniveTSal Dream-Book" published the injury of others, is looked upon as unworthy of a at R eading, Pennsylvania, in 1821. Christian people_ The g ibble-gabble of witchcraft, is to a great measure, confin ed to the ignorant and superstitious, and indeed should be disregarded by every se nsible ma n and woman in the country. "Ve sha ll notice several o ther subjects bordering on, and ASTROLOGY belonging to witchcraft, therefore dismiss this point and ASTROLOGY. This "was the art which professed to dis­ move forward to no ti ce things that embody fore-telling the covel- the course of human fortunes from the appearances of future, fonune-tell ing, and such like Satanic stuff. the stars." " It took its rise from as tronomy, whi lst astronomy was in its imperfect state." In early ages it struck its roots 4 This is of co urse a co mmon altitude among the non-believers in witchcraft in an area wh ere witch beliefs are still ali ve among deep and spread its branches far ancl wide. The Devil raised so me of the population-to rationali ze the witch tales. Cf. Ken­ up men, who pretended to foretell future events, "cast nativ­ neth S. Goldstein's discussion of this problem, "The Co ll ecting of Superstitious Beli efs," Keystone Folklore Quarterly, Vol. IX o. 1 ities, aided in the recovery of stolen good , prognostica ted (Spring 1964). 13-22. happy or unhappy marriages, predicted whether journeys :; Pinching the children's clothing is a co mm on anti -witchcraft would be prosperous, and note lucky moments for the com­ technique recorded in Central Pennsylva nia. On May 14, 1964, after it lecture on powwowing to the teachers of Wes t York Area mencement of any enterprise, from the setting up of a Hi gh Schoo l, York, Pennsylva nia, I was told by one of my audience cobbler's shop to the marching of an army." 6 that the technique she had heard in the area was to turn the sick child's clothing in id e out and pinch it in the door. r. The quotation i from Mackay, I, 243, changed into past tense.

42 God never designed in the wise and merciful arrangements DIVIN TIO of his providence, tha t man should know the future. This DIVl ',\ TIOI\'. O f thi there are man ' orts. umbers would no t increase his ha ppines , but would va tly add to have e)..ploded, but the Devi l alway had some other to fill his misery. Therelo re, there is as much impiety in astrology, up their place. '" e ca n only notice a few, a nd tha t brieAy, as there is superstition a nd delusion. Its race is no doubt wh il t we hall name some of the rest. H ow the Devi l suc­ nea rl y run. Yet th ere arc fragmen ts of it left, and a few ceeded in gathering up all tho e omancies, I shall have to covetous co nscience less wre tches, are engaged in fl eecing leave yo u to conjecture. the simple. Divining by th element is called tarcomancy,-by fire, \ Ve might have named many astro logers, with thei r delu­ PYI07llan c)" by candl s and lamps, Lampadomancy,-by the , ions a nd disappointments, a nd how Kings, princes and many earth, eomancy,- by the air, /Eromancy,- by the help of 01 the worldl y grea t, co untena nced and patro nized them, a nd demons and bad spirits, Demonomancy,-by the soul, how the " inferi or rank" consulted those agents of the Devi l, P [y] c/zomancy,-by the God, l dolomancy,-by name, On­ but leave you to refer to other works, should yo u be desirous omanc),,-by fishes, l cthyomancy,-by lo ts, Klel'omancy,-by of knowing. There arc ye t a few whose souls arc mean smoke, !{apnomancy,-by ve els of water, L ecanomancy[,] enough to publish in the face of heaven and the H oly - by knives, Nlacharomancy,-by saws, Axinomancy,-by shad­ Bible; reason a nd commo n se nse; literature a nd civilization; ows, Sciomancy,-by cheese, T ypomancy [T yromancyJ,-b y moralit) a nd Christianity, such adverti ements as the a ny kind o f grain , Krithomancy,-by cripture, Theomancy; following:- a nd thus we might name at lea t fifty of the Devil ' omancies. "ARRIVAL OF DR. C. W . ROBACK AT BALTI­ There are several to which we ha ll devote a page or two.8 MORE, la te of Philadelphia and N ew York. The cele­ ONE lRO IANCY, or as another ca ll it "Oneiro-Criti­ bra ted DR. C. W . R o back, from Sweden, Professor of Astrology, Astronomy, Phreno logy a nd Geomancy, hav­ cism." Thi is divining by dream , or more commonly ing just arrived from Boston, where he has met with the known as, The Interpretation of Dream.n This sort of most ex traordina ry success fo r the las t two years, now divining ca n justl y lay cl aim to great antiquity. Dreams may offers his ervices to the citizens of Baltimore a nd vicin­ b ca used by the Lord and good a ngels; by the Devi l a nd his ity. C. ' '''. R oback being the seventh son of the seventh son, and having made Astrology his exclusive study since angels, and by a " multitude of business." It cannot be de­ the earl y age of fifteen years, enjoys the adva ntages d e­ nied but that God spa ke to many by dreams; but the manner rived from traveling a nd reAection th at is possessed by of interpretation is unknown, but surely not as every wise­ none in this country or Europe, and being so gifted by acre te ll s yo u, by co ntrari es. The fa t kine were a representa­ nature, and having cultiva ted this blessed gift, he is pre­ tion o f plenty-the lea n of famine; but now yo u must re­ pa red to ada pt them to the foll owing use, and the im ­ mediate consummation of the following topics: verse, therefore the lea n would re present plenty, a nd the full, "H e ca n be consulted a t his office or by letter,(if pre­ fam ine. When God sa id : "Take the young child a nd Aee paid,) and he is prepa red to make use of his powers on into Egypt," he meant just what he sa id. Wha tever may any of the following topics: Business of all descriptions, have been in ages gone by, we leave, and turn our minds to traveling by land and sea , courtship, advice give n for its wha t the Devil teaches in modern times, and what superla­ successful accompli shment, speculating in stocks, m er­ chandise or real es ta te, the recovery of legacies in dis­ tively ridicul o us dunces receive as facts. pute, the purchas ing of tickets, and the safety of ships at sea. H e has a lso had the honor of receiving a certifi­ i Roback was a familiar fi gure in Philadelphia ~ nd else\yhere in cate from the Hon. C. John Bernadotte, formerly the urban ,\ merica in th e 184 0's and '50's. Advertisements for hiS fortune-telling and as trologica l services appear in th e Philadelphia King of Sweden, which it will give him great pl easure to papers in the 185 0's. See his large vo lume, The M ys tenes of As­ show to those who may fa vo r him with a ca ll. H e also trology, and the W onders of Magic: Including A History of the RIse offers his services respecting hea lth, wealth[,] marriage, and Progress of Astrology, and the Various Branches .o f Necro­ love a ffairs. journeys, lawsuits, difficulty in busines, mancy; T ogether with Val~able DI rectIOns and Suggestlons R ela­ fraud, sickness, death, past, prese nt and future events, tive to the CastinO' of iVa tz vltz es, and PredIctIOns by Geomancy, and a ll concerns of life, and invites all to call who are Chirommlcy, Physiognomy, &c'. Also Highly interestin~ Nan'a­ affi icted corporeall y or mentally. a tivities calculated tives, Anercioles. &c. l /lustrat.lVe of the Marvels of WItchcraft , and read in full, according to the oracles of masculine Spiritual Ph en omena, and the R esults of Supernatuml Influ e ~lc e (Boston, Published by th e Author, 1854), 238 pp. He ca ll s hun­ signs. . .. sc lf "Dr. C. W. Roback, Pres id ent of the Astrologica l Co ll ege of "TERMS.- Ladies $ I ; Gentlemen $ 1. 50. N a tivities Sweden. and Founder of th e Society of the Magi in London , Paris, calculated accord ing to G eomancy. For Ladies in fun and Sl. Pctersburg." The handsomely pri l~ted vo lume, which has , 3; G entlemen in full $5. on its f' olll lid a cut of "Dr. Roback's Fam!l y Summer R es ld ence- " Persons a t a dista nce ca n have their N a ti vities drawn wed en" and a frontispi ece of his "ances tor" Magnus Roback th e by se nding the da te of the day o f their bil:th. . . astrologer, is dedicated "To the People of the United States, A " .\11 letters containing the a bove fee wtl l receive UTI ­ Nation ;-.re ither keptica l nor Cred ul ou , But Ever Ready to Hear, mediate attention, a nd Nativitie will be se nt to a ny Rea d, and Inves ti ga te-Ever Willing to Recogni se and Bow to Truth . In Whatever Guise She 1\fay Appear-A nd Ever Eager to pan of the worlel , wrillen on durable paper. . . ,\ ccord to Lea rn ing and Research th e Merit They Deserve." " All letters o n the above topics, if post-pa id, wtll be S This secti on on the "-mancies;' including the section on a nS\\'ereel gra ti s. "Oneiro manc),," is fr om lackay, T, 25 1-252. He is the "another" ",... His Offi ce i at 10.65 East Lo mba rd treet, be­ who ca ll s it "Oneiro-Criti cism". tween Exeter and Lloyd , Baltimo re, Md." D The rebtion of dreams to official reli gion is an area where boundaries were not co mpletely drawn in mid-19th Century. In another ad vcrtisemt nt the sa me ce lcbmted Doctor ays: Drea ms have parted co mpany from reve lation in th e 20 th Century, -",\11 le tters will be reli giously a ttended to, if pre- paid ;" but among th e Puritans of th e 17th and th e Evangelicals of the 18th Century, drea ms were loo ked upon as so urces of guidance, "All co mmunica tions kept reli giously secret." R cligio usly' warning, illlimati on of peril or death . Drea ms were quite re­ What kind of R eli gion, this wiseacre does not say; probably spectable in religious circles. Ministers' diaries analyzed th em, such as a H indoo possesses. Such superl a tive superstitio n detail ed th em, studied them. loo ked in th em for messages and touches of th e prov id ential governing of th e universe by God. and Moholll et;l n delusion is unworthy of a n Egyptian. But Even Pennsy lva ni a's Quakers, es pec iall y in the Quietistic period as this teamed ig noram us is the "Seventh so n o f the seventh when psychic aspects of the ministry were emphasized, made much of drea ms. ee Rufus 1\1. Jone , The Later Periods of Quakerism son " he has left Swcdcll to a ttend religiously to revealing the (London, 192 1), 1, 92-9~. The co mm ercial dream books of mid - luture to such as the De\'i lmay inAuence to "give him a ca ll." 19th Century American popular culture were, of co urse, another HoI\' deep the /)I .'S reli gio n runs, "depo ne nt does not say." 7 thing.

43 The Devil has put the notion of publishing dream books T o meet a n ass, a sow, upset a nd spill salt, thirteen at one ta­ into the minds of some, who, proba bly, cared more for money, bl e, and hundreds more, a re unfavorable omens. IE you than truth a nd a good conscience. By examining th em, you meet a piebald horse, spit quickly three times, a nd any sensi­ will find something like the following:-To dream you have ble and reasona bl e wish yo u may form , will be verifi ed in money, signifies that yo ur purse i or will be empty,- of three times twenty four ho urs. IE a strange cat or dog follows snakes, fri ends will turn enemies,-of losing teeth, losing yo u, don't drive them back, it is a very good omen. A swaIm fri end ,- of the dead, yo u will hear of the li ving,- of fire, of bees lodging on yo ur premises, especially in your garden, quarrel, or news from afar off,-of little pigs, or wallowing in is a blessed sign. The truth is, th at the Dev il has turned an y, the mire, good fortune,-clear water, orrow, a nd so on. The a nd every thing into omens for those who are blind enough breakfast table was often made the place for the relation and lo make themselves unhappy, or imagina ril y happy by them. interpretation o f dreams. Different days, too, a re devoted to various purposes to unfold I have not said, neither do I intend to say, that all dreams the future by signs which we shall not occupy space to notice. are mea ningless. God may still at times giv e some noti ce of I do not doubt but th at God at times may give so me prese nti­ a pproaching danger. and so on. But I do say that, the inter­ ment of a pproaching things, but that has nothing to do with preta tion give n in dream books is a farce, and the explalla­ Satan's omens.ll tion given by "old women" is to be lnoked upon with much SuspIcIO n. Su ch as give n in the fore-going paragraph, the CHAR is AND PAW-WAWI IG Dev il has a fin ger in, lO lead the thoughtless a nd unwa ry into CHARJ\IS AND PAW-, ,y j\WI G . H ere there is open be­ su persti tion. fore us a large fi eld , and something with which the Devil has Let us give the meaning of dreams, upon the principle of cut some high capers. I scarcely know where to begin, but c011 traries a nd see how it works. /\ man dreamed it was suppose I will dispose of charms first, and then give paw-waw­ morning, and th at he awoke and arose as usual. It was just ing, or IJow-wowing a shotJ2 so, a nd he neither slept nor was in bed all day. Also, h e If you are walking on a warm day, and get a pain in your dreamed that it was day-light, and the sun was shining, a nd side, lift a stone- spit where it lay-replace it-go on your it was so. R everse, or c011trary don't a nswer here. In the way-look not back- and the stitch will be gone. If yo u are following case, I suppose every wiseacre in Christendom a fraid of slJoo ks,13 or any supernatural hob-gr.blins, press would be put to his wit's end, and be strangely puzzled. I yo ur thumbs in the palms of yo ur h ands and the ghosts will was in company, at one time, with a man who told me that not come near yo u. Write the names of three [of] the he dreamed he found a large sum of money, a nd whilst he was crossest women on paper, and throw them into your vinegar gathering it up he thought: "W ell now, I h ave often dreamed cask, a nd your vinegar will become awful sour. Why they I found money, but this time I am not dreaming- it is real­ must be the names of women, a nd cross ones, too, at that, ity." H e awoke, but where was the money? Now the idea the Devil doth not say. Stir your lixivium with a sassa fras is that; "he drea med he was dreaming" and what of the rule sti ck and you will soon have good soap. Carry the brain­ of c011 traries? Contraries would interpret his dream cl ear tooth out of a sw ine's head in your vest pocket, and you will a nd clean o ut of existence. never have the tooth-ache_ Easy preventive that, for so pain­ ful a n affair. Use rue, to keep off witches-a coffin nail on the OMENS threshold of your door, to drive off phantoms- purslain in OMENS. It does seem that man is not miserable eno ugh, your bed, to prevent visions- and sew a four-leafed-clover therefore foolishly follows the Devil out of the way to gather in a ny of your wearing a ppa rel, and good luck will follow you up a bundle, the carrying of which , increases the bitterness wherever yo u go. Thus we might.go on to indefinite lengths, of hi s life. H e appears determined to render himself as un­ ~ nd show how the simple are deluded by charms, and Satan.14 happy a nd wretched as he possibly can. Satan h as him con­ Paw-wawing, or pa-wawmg has m ade considerable h eadway jure up everything to make liEe a burden. Addi on says : among a certain class of people, especially among our Penn­ "W e suffer as much from trifling accidents as from real evils. sy lva nia Germa ns. It is astonishing into what degree of I have known the shooting of a star spoil a night's rest, and credulity the Enemy has led hundreds. In every village and have seen a man in love grow pale and lose his appetite, upon neighborhood a re found some conjurers of both sexes. I the plucking of a merry-t hought. A screech-owl at mid­ have known of persons going, from ten to fifty miles, to some night has alarmed a famil y more than a ba nd of robbers ; nay, old d octor woman who had gained more celebrity and noto- the voice of a cricket has struck more terror than the roaring of a lion. There is nothing so inconsiderable which may not 11 At first glance this might seem a good li st of Pennsylvani a omens. However, Raber borrowed it, rewritten of course, from appear dreadful to a n imagin ation that is fill ed with omens Macka y. Naturally many of th em have been recorded in Penn ­ a nd prognostics. A rusty na il or a crooked pin shoots up in lO sy lvania too. prodigies." 10 12 It IS interesting that Raber spells powwowing "pawwawing·' as we ll as III the more u s u~1 wa y. This reR ects earli er pronuncia­ Fa ith in ome ns is not confin ed to the ignorant and un· lion, and so me Pennsy lva nI ans still pronounce it in this wa y. Some learned ; the big a nd wise of the earth h ave been equall y in­ of the earli est references to th e term in A meri ca n writing spell it flu enced, with the former, by the Devil, a nd made themselves ·.. powawing" (New English Dict ionary, VII, 1216). Defoe's Polit­ Ical History of the D evil (London, 1726) spells the word "pawaw­ miserable. Let us hold some of those gems (omens) to the ing" in :1 section (Ch. XI) dea ling with 'Orlh America n Indian light. prac L1 ces. A dumb dog in the street howling, or crying at, or towards 13 The word "SpOOK " in Pennsy lva ni a has German dialect roots, alth ough for th e rest of Am erica th e Holland Dutch culture of the moon , is a sign that some one will die. To hear the ti ck­ New .\msterdam was un doubted ly th e larger fa ctor in il1lroducing ing of the death-wa tch , prognosticates d ea th. Sudden chills the word into the Am eri can vocabulary. See E. C. Ll ewell yn, The coming over one, signifi es that an enemy is that moment, / n(11I I' IlCe of L ow Dlitch 011 the English Vocabulary (London, 1936), Publica tions of the Philologica l Society, XII; New English Dict ion­ moving over the pl ace where your grave will so me day be. ar\" IX . 660-66 1. ].I Several of th e items in this paragraph- th e techniques for ]0 Addison's essay on old maids' superstitions and related sub­ so uring \ in egar and fl avoring home- made soa p for exa mple- have jects, appeared in th e Spectator, No.7, Thursday, March 8, 1710- a distinct .\merica n rin g. In other words, Raber did not borrow 1711. Raber quotes the passage [rom fackay. them from ~r ac ka y . THE ORCERER DRA W A MAGIC CIR­ CLE-an engraving by Ma­ son, from Conrad Zentfer's Philadelphia almanac, the "Americanischa tadt und Land Calendd' f01' 1843.

riety, III curing nume ro us diseases by words, than those in o ut of the question, a Christian community.17 To cure by the i r illllll ecl ia te ne ig h borhoocls. How th is species of wi tch­ words a nd manipulations would be pe rforming a miracle, craft has becolll e ;0 popular, 1 must leave you to conclude. anel where would that superna tura l powe r come fro m ? The The re is no question, however, but that the seed s sown into answer from every paw-wawer is, w ithout conscie n ce or com­ the heart, ol children, by pa rents and o thers, has Illuch to ment- from the L o rd. vVe ll[,] le t us see. The sixth ver e in do in the matte r. The D evil trying to have them cherish su ch the ixteenth cha pte r of Ezekiel is used to stop bleeding, by notions as they g rew up, and finall y succeed ed in settling inserting the first na m e of the bleeding pe rson before the thelll into the faith of "curing sick people by saying words word livel S Now in tha t verse is a si militude of J e,fU salem over thelll." ,\nd \\'ho are our most celebrated p aw-wawers? under a n eglected , wretched infa nt. Apply tha t to a n indi­ e e ne ra ll y, per o ns who ha\'e much to say about the L ord and vidual with a bleeding nose, or otherwi e, a nd Holy ''''rit is the Bible: good and bad people; infidels a nd the faithless in violently wrested o ut of its orig inal m eaning, by which a their blind ;ystem , and who are as ignorant of the true prin­ miracle is to be performed. Will God do such a thing? I ciple; 0 1. Christianity as any H o ltentot in the worlel. I d o not it in accordance with his cha racter as God, or commensurate say, nor mean to say, that all a re such, but I must confess tha t with the truthful n a ture o f his a ttributes? M y d ear reader! I h;l\'e ve ry seldolll met with any of those characters, who had Such things are not from G od . H e cannot agreeably with ga in ed any reputation in the art, but the most ignorant a nd his veracity as God, bless a wrong a pplication of his Holy conce it e d .l~ 'Vo rd to perform a miracle. Pa in m ay ;olll e times be re li eved , by rubbing the place 1\ S this humbug is so prevalent in som e parts of the world, afTIicted with the palm o f the hand, without saying a n y I shall e ndeavor to show the "cloven foot" by inserting some, wordsIl; W ording it over people belongs to P aganism, from of the very m a n y I might give, of the words a pplied or m a d e whence it came, and is unworthy of an en lightened, leaving use of, to cure the a fTIi cted. I h ave before me a m all work published by a prime minister of this hocus-/JOCUS foole ry, l~ The powwower is generall y co nnected with the ch urches, but operates in spite of the clerical prohibitions of his work. Some 17 The reli gions of 'Wes tern civili za tion, with the exception of powwowers have claimed great knowledge o f the Bible- " I ca n certain fringe sects and my tical movements, have no " holy words" quote the Bible as well as the preacher," one of them, a Schuylkill such as the Eastern mys ti cism specialize in. A Ithough in W estern Countian, told me. In a sense, as I have pointed out elsewhere, the reli gion, beginning with Judaism, magic tends to be outlawed, the powwower in the Pennsy lvania village or rural selliement is a kind relations of magic and player are very close, a nd Protestantism has of folk c1ergYlllan, a priest or priestess of th e unofficial and largely tended to downgrade magic and upgrade prayer. Ernst nenz pro­ unorganized folk religion. whose "powers" are recognized by the vic\cs a great dea l of illumination on this difference in spirit be­ "believers" in the co mmllnity. See my Twen/y Questions on Pow­ tween Wes tern and Oriental religions in his essay, " On Under­ wowing (Kutztown, Pennsy lvania, 1963). standing Non-Christian R eligions, " in l\Iircea Eliade and Joseph lG A Dr. J. H. Myers sugg-ested the sa me thing in the A l7lerican 1\1. Kitagawa (eels.) . The His/ol)' of Religiolls: Essays ill !Hellw­ Lutheran for 1870: " Who has not heard of pow-wow-ing for a dology (C hicago, « 1959), pp. 11 5- 131. For an analys is of the felon or a burn, or other a ilment? Old l\1 rs. Somebody has learned "holy \l'ord" co ntent of the folk hea ling charms of Europe, see to pow-wow. She won't tell an ybody how, as she ca n only impart Irmgard Hampp, Beschwo/'!wg Segen Gebet(Stuttgart, ©1961 ). the gift to one person, and that one must be of the opposite sex. I~ E7ekiel 16:6 is standard procedure for blOOd -stopping in Dulch There are certa in words that lllust be said or the pow-wow-ing Pennsy lvania; another is the charm "J es us Christ's dearest blood, would be ineffectua l. All this we ca ll superstition , and so it is; all that stoppeth the blood, in this help N. ." The Evangelical move­ except th e curing. But that cures are effected by it is undeniable. lIl elH made the g-reatest sy mboli ca l li se of the passion and blood of It is nothing more nor less than layi ng on of hands with the Christ on the sa ll'a tiona l level; the fo lk religion makes use of the superstition added to it." ,;\lll e concept on the folk-cultural level.

45 with the ti tle page as roll o II' : " DE R L\NG VERBORG E E Transla ted : FR EUN D , odeI' Gell'enel' u . ChTistlicher Unterricht fuel' " T O DRiVE PMN OUT OF A WOUN D A DC RE IT. J ed erm a n n ; en tha I tend II' Und erbare und pro bemccss ige MIT­ " \"'ound, tho u sha lt no t heat; ' Vo und, tho u sha lt no t sweat ; TEL lind KUEN ST E," a nd a fo rth. " H erau sgegeben vo n \ Vo un d , tho u , ha It no t water, J o ha nn Georg H o hma n." 10 N o w this John G eorge H o h­ ,\ s litt le, as the V irgin ' ~I a r y sha ll give birth to a no ther son. m a ll pub li shed hi " L o ng Co n cealed Friend" in 1840, a nd t t t " says he i a ci ti 7e n o f " Elsass T a unschip, Berks County, Pa.," R eader ! a rc yo u astonished ' a am l. C an it be? \Vill any a nd no t very ra r fro m R eading. \Vill you " Berks Coun ly'" o n e wi th commo n sense beli el'e, o r place a n y confiden ce in carefull y look a t som e o f his long hidden treasure with which >ut h su perci I io us trash' 1 su ppose the fo ll o wing rem ed y h e intends to bless the world. Pity h e ever gave to the pub­ 1I'0 uid be of som e ben e fil lo r people \\'h o pretend to perform li c his " Mitlel und Kuenste." Mark you, h e says, " T r ue a nd cures with the lo regoing: " i\lild laxati ves, m agnesia, cha lk, Christia n Instructio n for Ever ybod y." H ere then you h ave car bona te o f sod a-attentio n must be g iven to diet- not som e o f his truthlul a nd trustwo rthy m ethods fo r p erfo rming IJrood over a n y ;ubject- ta kc exercise a nd be cheerful." The wo nderful things. rew 1 ha ve quoted a re a " la ir specimen " of all in Hohman 's "EIN MITTEL FUER DIE DARMGIC HTER. book. " Ich wa rne e uch , ihr D a rmgichter ! Es ist einer im T o cure cattle tha t a rc bewitched , you will administer the G ericht; er spricht: G er echt oder ungerecht. D arum fo ll owing : hue tet e uch ihr D armgichter. SAT 0 R t t t ARE P 0 " FUER BOESE LEUTE. " Dullix, ix, ux. J a, du kanst nicht ue ber Pontic>; TEN E T Pontio ist u eber Pilato. OPE R A t t t ROT A S I will tra nslate this one, sen seless as it is. How the D evil And h ere is som ething the Devil a nd m a n y of his p aw-waw ever got such m eaning less things into anyone's mind is a ninnies say will keep o ff wizards, witches, a nd all kinds of mystery. witch craft. " FOR CROSS PEOPLE. I "Dullix, ix, ux. Yes, you cannot get over Pontius; N. 1. R. Pontius is over Pilate. I t t t Sa n ctus Spiritus The three crosses arc to signify tha t it is said a nd done in I R . 1. the na m e of the three p ersons in the Trinity. I " FUER DEN ROTHLAUF. " G od ble s m e h ere time ly; there ete rna ll y." " Rothlauf und der Drach' flogen u eb er einen Bach . H e re is som e thing tha t will not only stop bleeding when D as Rothla ufen verga nt; d er Drach'verschwa nt. t t t " placed upo n a wo und in the form. of a letter, but when Translated : m a rked upo n a knife blad e will prevent the blood froIll " FOR ST. A THONY'S FIRE. fl owing from a n y wound m ad e b y it, a nd ke pt by one's per­ "St. A nthony's fire a nd the Dragon fl ew across the son , will e n a ble him to sta nd, without injury, befo re a ll his brook. St. A nthony'S fire disappeared ; the Dragon en emies. vanish ed . t t t "1. m . 1. K . 1. B . 1. P . a. x. v. ss. Ss. vas. 1. P . O. unay L it. D a m . mper vobism .["] ' '''h o ever knew tha t St. Anthony's fire could fl y?- and that it a nd the dragon were in compan y? o w that is downrigh t 1 a m incl ined to think if 1 conclude this par t of the D evil's fa lseh ood a nd superlative nonsen se, to which the n am es of work by a kind of universa t rem ed y, you will cry o u t enough! Fa ther, So n , a n d Holy Ghost are blasphem o usly a pplied . Carry the fo ll owing, in the fo rm of a letter with you, and you ,\nd such things a rc do ne in o ur midst by person s wishing to will succeed in a ll your undertakings in thi life. It will be be called wise. Sham eless D evil! yo u r finger-board a t a ll times, a nd point yo u the right way. Lf you can confide in the word o f the D evil a n d his conjurers, "W U NDEN U D SC HMERTZEN ZU VERTREIBE J " Wund', du soll st nicht hitzen ; yo u have the ir a Lith o rity gratis. H ere it is! ' '''und', e1u sollst nicht schwitze n ; " Ut n em o in sese tenta t, de rcendere nem o." Wund', du soII st nicht wccsse rn, So wenig, als die Jungfra u M a ria e inen a nel ern So hn thut geb rehre n . * t t t

In John George Hohman was a Europea n emigrant, Roman * * Ca th o li c in reli gion . who cmi grated to Pennsy lva nia in 1802 as a 1 edemptioner. " ' hen he had ach ieved h is freedom he su pporled himself by se lling books and broa dsid es. His cl ass ic L ong L ost t t Frien d (1820) is th e mos t important and mos t influential occult book wrillen in the United Statcs. II. has gone thro ugh a great man )' editions. German and Engli sh . It is signifi ca nt that Hohman's charms, mostl ), from th e folk reli gion o[ R oman Ca th ­ oli c Europe, were used so widely by Pennsy lva nia's Protes tant pow­ wowers. Raber sco ffs at H ohman's ca lling his book " true and Christian instructi on [or everybod y." To Hohman these things we re re li gio us, to Raber thcy were not, despite hi s belief in the Dev il and his doings. The mos t I'alu abl e secti on here is R aber's " ,\t praeced enti sp ecta lLlr m a ntica tergo." (O mmCnl , on Hohman's '· cl cv ili sm". " M a n thut am besten , m a n probirt es."

46 THE RA TTLLVG KELETO.Y - Another engraving by Gilbert, from the Philadelphia almanac, the "American­ ischer tadt und L and Calender" for 1835, pub­ lished by COI11'Cld Zent­ leJ". T hrillen such as this, catering to the fo lk­ l'eligious belief in reve­ nants, provided en ter­ tainment at many a Pennsylvania firesi de in the 19th Cen tury,

SUPERNATURAL APPEARANCES Somc ca rc, 1 , uppose, ho wever, is necessary in o bserving SUPERNATURAL APPEARANCE . Who ha 1I0 t read thc 1I 111 11 c/,y dO)'I, which are in each mo nth a [o ll ows:-J an­ a nd heard ghost stories? ''\' ho h a not seen a nd known o f uary 1,2,3, ,I. G, 11 , 12. February 1, 17, 18. M arch 14, 16. ha unted ho uses, cl osed up a nd ten antless? The tories o f .\pri l 10 , 17, 18. i\ Iay 7,8. June 17. July 17 , 21. August d o leful groans-m ys teri ous o pening of doors-stra nge a nd 20. 2 1. September 10, 18. O ctober 6. N ovember 6, 10. unna lllra l ra ppings-d o loro us sounds-frightful ra ttling of December G, II , 15. H e tha t ha ppen s to have been born o n heavy cha ins-the a ppeara n e o f unearthly beings, with d eep, an y o l these " unlucky d ays," no twithHanding the T alisnw11 ho ll o w, sepulchra l vo ices-the fl ying o f lights-and a thou­ give n, must ta ke " pot luck," a nd " play the gra b gam e" all sa nd more such uperna tura l a bsurdities, have thrown weak­ his " na tura l life time." bra ined and over-credulous m en into a nx iety a nd terro r o f This ' ee m ~, certa inly is, too much [o r a n y san e ma n , mind, a nd fil led them lI'ith the most pa inful a pprehensio ns, woma n . o r evc n child o E common under ta nding, to beli eve. - h ys terica l women into spasms,-h ypocho nd riacs into fear Sa la n is in thc II'h o le ma ller. C od n ever taught su ch Su­ a nd mise ry-and child ren into d eep and wild distress, en e­ premc fo ll y, a nd, I h ad almost sa id, m adness. In this case Ie s, or a t least injudic[i]ous pa rents, have re lated in the pres­ th c Dcvil a nel his cl o\'en root go together. H I would have en ce a nd hearing o E their children, stori es a bou t h ob-gob li n s, g i\'en '>o nl e o f I-To hma n 's remedies, 1 was ashamed to g ive, you ''<,pooks,'' a nd h a unted place; children have to ld the sa me might sec still grea ter d e\'ilism a nd bl asphem y. Oh, tha t m en ta les to each, and vouched for the Ir truth b y saying: " Fa ther wo uld be foo ls lor Sa la n no lo nger! said it-mother sa id it, an d I know wha t fa ther and mother R cad II' ha t thc Lord ,a),> con ce rning those things, a ncl you say is true," (Poor little creatures! Father a nd m o ther h ave may, il )(w have la ll en illlo the snarc o l the o ld Fowler, tolc! yo u so many things t hey sho uld no t have told you.) Old break loo'>c: " \"hCll lhou ;Ilt come ill to t he land II' h ich the gra nd-mother , kind a nd good neigh bors, to be sure, h ave the Lord thy Coel g i\ elh thee. ~ho u , ha lt n ot learn to do a[ter congregated together with their sweet cented old p ipes, in lhe aIJolllina tion, ol tho;e na ti ons. There shall not be found fire corners and chimney p laces, tel ling ghost stori s until alllollg )OU (/llY 011(' that makelh hi, son or hi'> daughter to every child's eye grew large and g li sten ing-the b lood chilled pa'>'> lilloligh lhl' fire, OJ that meth eli\ ination, OJ an observer in their lillie anerie; and vein -the nerves sei7ccl w ith

01 timc'>. 0 ) an cn(ilanlC), 0 ) a witch. 0 ) a cha) nle) , or a con­ tremor-the colel chil ls running races over their sys tem - '>llitCI I\'ith falllil iar ;pirit'>. or a wi/arel. or a nl'uomancel. and their shadow" at the wal l caused them to shriek, leap, anc! FOI al l that do the,>c things (lIe an aIJolllination lInto the tllrl1 frantic with fear. The fo ll owing night wa one, to the Lord," J) CUtCIOllOlll) xviii 9-12. That stllcl, i,> -"Thus poor f) ig-htened little creatures, of dream of ugly people. ,aith the L(Jld," with restles,ne)S. \\'e ha\'e often known of su ch devil ish

47 meetings, and Satanic conversa tio n, and uperstltlOus tales. SEVE TH SON Close your doors to such simple, childish old beings, or to EVENTH 0 . The over-credulo us teach, as they have advi e the least, tell them you don't allow such " pookism" been ta ught first, by the " fa ther of lies" that, the seventh so n, to be related before your children. T each yo ur children, o r the seventh son of the seventh, is more gifted in all respects not " the black man will ketch yo u- the boogy-boo is coming," tha n a ny other huma n being.22 I have before me a work but the fear of the Lord. As soon as parents, and old women, cil il ed, "The M ed ical Lighthou e," written by o ne who seems and simple girls, wi ll cease talking about haunted ho uses and to glory very much in his own name, qualifications, and the places, a nd di countenance the sa me before the yo ung, there word D octor. This gifted genius expa ti a tes quite extensively will soon be a manifest i~prov e m e nt in this matter.20 upon the number seven, after surro unding himself with It is a fact beyond contradiction that, during popish dark­ eight, (he got one too many!) distinguished characters, such ness a nd superstition , superna tura l visita ti o ns were more as ,I\'ashington , Franklin, 't\Teb ter, J e nny L ind, and so on. numerous than at present. The Devil then seemed to have ,\ bove his cran ium, wh ich stands as erect as an empty rye- head , "fair play" in this piece of his m echanism . H e h ad a wicked, is his na me; under hi feet is "7th SON PHYSICIA ." After hypocritical, covetou s, a nd deluded priesthood, who in their doing gros violence to the word of God-twisting a nd screw­ blindrless led others into superstitio u path. And turn the ing the J ews into his own opinion-and referring to the leaf as you wi ll , there is this h o ur more ignorance, a nd faith Sabians, Pithagoras, .r\ puleiu , "the seven-stringed lyre of in witchcraft a nd ap[pJaritio ns among Pa pists than among Mercury"-David, a nd H enry C lay, 11 e remarks as follows:- Protestants. The reason of this is a pparent, from the ma ny "The seventh son is endowed by na ture with peculiar o ther superstitions within the borders of Pa pal R ome_ The powers a nd perceptio ns; a nd for thousands of years it has truth is that, it is hard to find a R oman Catholic, that is not be'e n observed tha t the seventh son is a natuml born physi­ a believer in ghosts a nd witches. H owbeit, to the great hame cian, g ifted with those particular mental q ualifications r eq­ of thousa nds of Protestants be it sa id, that, they have taken uisite for the scientific medica l man, a nd possess ing them to the pla tform, a nd sta nt. upon a level in Pagan, a nd Papist a much greater extent a nd power than other persons." rodomontades of the supernatural. No doubt at all, sir, but Wonderful discove ry! He then turns to himself and com­ that shallow-bra ined, muddy- headed, unphilosophical, a nd mences a new paragraph thus: "The a uthor of this book is ? mulish priests in their voluptuous hallucina tions gave an seventh son, a natural physician-gifted both with qualifica­ im petus to ghost inconsistencies, that h elped the matter for­ tions to become renowned in the great art of healing the sick, wa rd vastly to the gratifica tio n of Lucifer.21 a nd a ppointing length of days unto the despairing." Won­ W e might quote and rela te hundreds of ghost tales, both derful indeed tha t, n ature ca n confer the n a tural qualifica­ old a nd new-ancient and modern, but we shall not, gladly tions upo n some, not o nly to restore the afflicted , but to have believing that the humbug is losing ground every generation. power to "appoint length o f days" to those in despair. He Wha t the foundation for believing tha t God will se nd, or per­ goes on by saying: " H e was born with two vei ls over his face" mit spirits, to visit this earth, rendering themselves vi sible, - wonder if they were ever removed! "And gifted with a rare by assuming hideous bodies a nd sha pes, to frighten his intel­ a nd peculiar insight into ca uses, character, modes of preven­ ligent creatures, not one of all the ghost-craft has ever yet tion, a nd cure of cU seases of the human frame, and with a a ttempted to d efine. That the ha ppy spirits of those who na tural controlling power over them." If some one else have fallen asleep in J e us, may visit the earth on missions of would have written that concerning him, it would have less mercy, we will not dispute. But that they shall come in the the a ppearance of egotism. The inquiry is: Did this distin­ sha pes of dogs, cats, calves, m en without h eads, a nd many guished personage, squeeze to death a ground-mole when in more forms, even as swine and devils, is blasphemous in the his seventh year? If he did not, the Devil for once neglected extreme. If they do visit the earth, they are invisible, a ne! his duty since h e turned Devil. God never desig ned that they should frighten a nd terrify by This learned Sampson, a nd intellectual Anak, who pub­ all ma nner of hideous looks. As for the lost, they are all as lished a book to advertise his m edici nes, concludes his closely incarce rated, as was, a nd is, Dives. seventh son tomfoolery by saving: "And as the a uthor of this 20 One of Pennsy lva ni a's most famous Hicks ite Quaker preach­ ers, John Co ml y (1773- 1850), strikes a similar note in his a uto­ 22 Roback's melodramatic a utObiography has an amusing (and biography. Writing of his boyhood days in th e 1770's and 1780's, I hope fi ctional) accoun t of his discovery of his own seventh-son­ he fe lt that psychological harm wa s done by th e common Indian ship: "It wa s about this period that my elder brother Frithiof massacre stories and occul t folkta les that were to ld even at Quaker imparted to me the history of our famil y. He informed me that fires ides: "Nor was I exposed on ly to a prejudice aga inst th e In­ our race had been renow ned for th eir prophetic gifts, and th eir dian character; but being subject to th e hearing of strange stori es skill and attai nments in Magic, Astrology, and other occu lt lore, about supposed witches a\)paritions and marvell ous things, my for more than four hundred yea rs. He spoke of Magnus Roback yo uthful mind was injured by fears, im aginati ons and terrors our grandfath er, and of the fame he had acqui red as an Astrolo­ ari sing from th ese so urces of injudicious exposure. How great gist, and of an uncle, now resident at SI. Petersburgh, and enj oy­ th e need of unremitting ca re in parents, to preserve the sensiti ve ing the co untenance and friendship of th e Emperor Ni cholas. minds of children from prejudices and imaginary fears, th at may ' But: sa id my brother, 'it is in th e seventh son of a seventh son, imbitter th eir after li ves, or produce a morbid state of th eir men­ that the prophetic gifts bes towed upon our family must be looked tal and even physica l powers! How much toil, anxiety, and care for in their utmos t intensity . You occupy that extraordinary may be req ui site to extirpate the ev il s of such exposure, none can position. Our rath er, Gustavus Adolphus Roback, wa s the know! A single tale of ghosts, witches, and romance, may make seventh so n of Magnus Roback, and yo u are his seventh child.' impressions of terror on the memory, that imaginati on may apply T his disclosure wa s made to me in th e 'Hall of Shields: a vast to innumera bl e Objects and in cidents in after life, so as to pro­ apartment of the castle, the walls of whi ch were hung with the duce unhappiness, anxiety and trouble, wh ere but for such a targes, spears, and battle axes of my warlike and daring progelll ­ prejudice no evil or alarm mi ght have res ulted" (jouT17al of "~e tors; and as 1 co ntemplated th ose weapons of strife, I sa id within Life and Religious Labours of John Comly, Late of Byberry, myse lf, 'my gifts are not of war but of peace, not of hatred and Pennsylvania [Philadelphia, 1853), pp. 8-9). vio lence, but of benevolence and philanthropy. IE I ca n foresee 21 Protestant attitudes tow ard "superstition" vary from church and foretell dangers, wh y ca nnot I also teach the parties im­ to church. This passage seems to refl ect th e anti-Roman Ca tholi c peri ll ed how to avert them. Such shall be my mission'" (C. W­ spirit of th e Protes tants in the 1850's, when the Nativist move­ Roback, The M ysteries of Astrology [Boston, 1854], pp. viii-ix). ment was in its heyday in American politics. To get the other The Medical Lighthouse vo lume whi ch Raber quotes in this sec­ side of th e co in, see Archbishop Spalding's witty essay, "Our New tion is Harmon Knox Root, The People'S M edical Lighthouse 'American' Literature," in his Miscellanea (Baltimore, 1875), (New York, 1852); the author fo ll owed it with The Lovers' Mar­ 6th edition, I, 762- 771 , on the Know -Nothing books of 1855. riage Lighthouse ( ew York, 1858) .

48 work was unmistakably pointed out from his birth, a eventh factorie. \nd man) pieces of hi workmanship have uch so n, to become a physician, he but obeyed the voice of Nature .,hop' sent out. The [ollie I am going to write about, have and R evelation in entering the field of medicine for the bene­ at time., amounted to a perfect mania. entences, word, un­ fit of the suffering of the human race. To atte t the truth meaning and sen eless phra e , place, per on , and thing, of this, everything conspires; and with full faith in his ca lling hal e been handed flom tongue to tongue-pa ed from being of omnipotent des ign, he embraced and ultivatedthe periodical to periodical- wunded in the streets and a ll eys­ Hea ling ,\n, with what success th e thousands who have been roads. lanes, and field -and have been applied to different cured at hi, hands, through the providence of God, will bear goods and wares. witness, a, th ey rejoice in the health they en joy." \\That a Much has been preached, lectured, and written concern­ great pity, according to that, that docton arc not all seventh ing tile \ icc, crime, miseries, and ulferings of the human sons; they would then be of more usc to mankind than the} famil). We shall. howe\er, briefl g ive a notice of a differ­ are so. There would be a vast number less, prematurely ent subject. 1 he D \'iltries to di\en the attention from guilt sent across the Jordan of dea th than there are as it is. Thi and \\Tetchedness, b) such mean as will continue people in mod rn runner-a head of a ll the medical world, winds up hi~ his sen ice. ill ) words a nd hallow-brained s ntences h ave egotism by mangling the Word of God. H ear him! "And as ga ined a worldwide renown. And, those who Irst uttered I have been lifted up. 'the sick have been drawn to me. them, or set them moving, a rc getting a great harves t. "They Therefore, 'Walk whi le ye have the li ght' of medicine before hal e sown the wind, a nd they sha ll rea p the whirlwind." 'Ve you, lest ye walk in the da rkness of ignorance: 'for he tha t shall occupy pace to notice only a few Out of the Legion of walketh in darkness knowe th not whither he goeth'- he those popular fool eri es, that have been weeping over our stumbles in sickness, and fa ll s straightway into dea th ." Nice, country like a m ighty avalanche, carrying overboard th e is it not? Who " lifted him up"? I have seen him lifted up simple, illy, idle, trifling, a nd hair·brained. in his own adverti emel1Ls. Strange, that one who gives some "jim Crow," accompanied with it blackened faces-dis­ ev idence of some mind a nd knowledge in other parts of his torted countenances-unnatural ge ticulations-grote que book, should permit himse J( to be led by atan into such out­ twists of the body-ludicrous leaps-sung by the vil e who were landish egotism. Probably the DoctOT had better go to Utah ta ught to stea l their way through the world-and the ob­ among the sa tellites of joe mith, as the seventh so n is such scene, filth y urchins who had ne ither manners nor se nse, had a gifted genius, there might be some chance to become their its day.2G The hellish song no longer grates upon your ear miracle-worker. Where is Dr. Roba[c]k. the "seventh son of in the street, nor the fralllic jumps pain yo ur eyes. "Long the seventh son ," astrologer, and magician? ' '''hat does he Tail Blue,"-"Zip Coon,"-"Da n Tucker,"-" ettin on a say, with Pmfesso !" Rondout, the match·framer, a nd ''''yman R ai l,"-and a hundred more, have followed "jim Crow," and the ' '''izard? Such fellows might form a new colony some­ are no longer falling from the lip oE the Devil's hatless, where, for they are a head of the " notorious Mike ' NaIsh ," 23 shoeless, and coatless democracy in the bar-room, a nd 011 the and if Gcneral Humbug Barnum would be appointed Gov­ streets. They have passed from the stage, with many more enID!", there would certainly be a jolly time for the getter-up of their kind, with a reluctant motion. The Dev il oon had of the ir ystems, and his imps. others in their place and kept the ball in motion, which is still rolling with as much velocity as ever; only changing its SPIRIT RAPPI GS co lors to meet the demands in the Devil's market. PIRIT RAPPI GS, a nd the Dev il 's pranks JJ1 it, I had "H e's a hard one,"-"Brown tout,"-"Does your ma mmy some notion of commenting upon; but as it is spi nning hemp know yo u're o ut?" 2i-"H e's a bad egg,"-"Decidedly a good for its own execution, I will not disturb it at its work. The egg,"- and scores more, are sharing the (ate of their prede­ day of its cxaltation upon the caffold is drawing nigh; th ere­ cessors, and are being numbered with those buried in the [ore, I shall leave it to commit grari ll al suicide.24 past. "Whig Songs" and "Coon Process ions,"-"H ard Cider" POPULAR FOLLIES and "La tch Strings," 2 -"Harrison Medals," "Hugh Lind- POPULAR FOLLIES. It is ev ident that, if the Dev il can­ 2·; ]n his negative allitude to "popular culture," Raber here nOt make his dupes happy, he does his utmost to make them reflects not on ly hi s evangelica l fear of the "world ," but rural foolish, and bring about something ludicrous to gratify th ir fear of th e city environment. l\luch of America's co nflict of mores depraved hean s. There has been, and still is, a system of co mes from rural Protes tantism's fea r of city wa ys and city life. This fear has had wide [ ect on Amelica n politics, reli gion, and popular foolery, generally originating in cities and large oth er social movements. ativism, Anti-Ca tholi cism, Temper­ towns, then gradually making its way into villages and ance, Social Gospel, Fundamentali sm, all arc related to this country plac es .2~, The Devil ever exerts himse lf to produce ques ti on. 2G For th e minstrel tradition, see Dailey Paskman and Sigmund some new thing to engage the attention of th peopl e, and Spaeth. "Cell/lemen, B e ealed!" A Parade of the Old-Time keep them active in his kingdom. Idle brains arc his manu- MillS/leis (Garden City, New York , 1928); for minstrel songs, see Julius r.raufield, Variety iIIusic Cavalcade 1620-1961: A Chron­ ~;l ,\like Walsh (ca. 1815-IH59), I, ish·horn politician and edito' ologv of Vocal and Iml nl/nen/al Music Popular in the United in New YOlk City, was the se lf-st) led champion of the "s ub­ Slates (E nglewood Cliffs, New Jersey, ©1962). For contemporary terranean" Democrats ignored by Tammany. He founded a materia ls. see The Neuro Sillger's OWIZ Book (Philadelphia and periodical ca ll ed the Subter!"aneall in 1813 and edited it until New York , [1846']). Mackay allacked th e minstrel tradition in 1817 . He served in the New York Assembly and Congress, advo­ Britain b) mentioning that an ,\meri ca n actor had introduced taling SOCIa l Idorm in the onbern cities. until, as his biog­ "a vile so ng ca lled 'Jim Crow'" (II, 217). rapher says, hi s career was "distredited by growing intemperance" 27 l\lackay includes a chapter on " Popular Follies of Great See Die/ iOllary of IllIIerieall lJiograjJ/zy, XIX, 390-39 I. . . Cities," which memions th e ca tchword "Does your mother know 24 Spiriwalism was one of the popular subj ects of dI SC USS Ion yo u're out?"-used, he says, LO deflate swaggering yo ung people and clerical allack, in the 1850·s. The movement did not, how· "who smoked cigars in the stree ts, and wore false whiskers to look ever, "comm it gradual sui cide," but organized itse lf as a cu lti c irresistible" (II, 2·1'1). form of .\merican Protestalllism and sti ll exists. For so me con· 2R These arc popular reliC' of the Campaign of 18'10 , the "Log temporary literary descriptions of it. see Fred Lewis Pattee, The Cabin" or " Hard Cider" Campaign. The " latch string." sym­ Fell/inine Fifties ( ew York, 19·10) , Chapter XVI, "A Cable Lllle boliling ,\ merican fromier hospitality, appeared conspiCUOUSly Acro s the Styx," pp. 239-2 19 . The extensive "Henry Seybert on so me of the log cabin medals of the 1810 campaign. See J. Libral ), of Modern Spiritualism" in the Van Pelt Library of the Do yle De\vitt. A Century of CamjJaign Buttons 1789-1889 ([Hart­ University of Pennsy lvania dese lves study. forc/. Co nnecticut), 1959), p. 52.

49 seys," ~n and " Buckeye Blacksmiths" 30-are al l, with a \Gllter. a blessed , hower,-ancl a cloud of Huma nity and thousand others, entombed in the se pulchre of what has been. Phil;lllthropy, that is to say, ,\,Hi-Slavery, arising, larger "Pa lo ,\Ito C loth"-"Kossuth I-Tats a nd Feather "-"J enny than II 111 (/n '.1 /wnd, in the 10rth, and the thing did in no Lind Slippers" :il-and so on, are still lingering upon the way p lease his Satanic Majesty; he call s an infernal mass shelv es of our merchants, but are growing o ld a nd mouldy. meeting o l all his devi ls, and resolutions are passed, and " 0 . U. I."-"Hou arc you enny-how"-"How do-y' u sell y'ur dia l)olica l pl ans are concluded upon to put a quick stop to had"- and " there he goes"-are yet heard, but are becom- lho,e anti-d evilish movem Ills.:J3 'i Vh en this convention of ing stale and obsolete, a nd may soon have Ichabod written d cmons adjourned, every d ev il in hellish determina tion, gave upon them. ,everal angry grins, rustl ed his d ark wings in wrath, and was " Whig and Tory" first got lame, then walkless,-"Mason about his business, to stay, at every poiI1l, those two, (Pro­ a nd ,\ nti-1\fason " stepped into their shoes,-"'I'Vhig a nd hibition and I\ nti-S lavery) heaven-pla nned and heaven-blesl D emocra t," 'vVild Cats and Ramrods" ran after, and were IlI casurcs. .\ n .\ w(u l ,LOrm , (not such a storm as witches driven orr the road by " J-Ta rds,"-"Solts,"-Silver Grays,"­ 1)low up.) \1'<1, ra ised , accompanied by fiv e thunders, wh ich a nd others, who are, to a n extent, taking their places. "Free "pake, in order, as follows: - Soil,"- " Old Line,"-"Harn-burners,"-and " Hunkers," sing The fil!>1 thunder slowly groans in the South, a nd the sound out, " 1\1£ TOO!" :l2 1\ 11 these, with a m a n y more, it seems is consulted upo n. Our craft is in danger-our wealth is wcre insuffi ciclll to keep up the attention of the Public; placed in jeopardy-our money is in our slaves-how can we therclore, the D evil , always ready to accommoda te a nd g iv e them up and stoop to cu ltivate our own soil -the matter please, conjures up, or Out, as yo u choose, others to keep the ",ill never do-let LI S bestir ourselves-let us be up-we must community agitated. so that they may [orget the duties they take Iresh a nd more te nacious grip, and hold on to our sable owe to God. '>ons 01 Ham. The second thunder rolls in the 10nh, among. I-Ie, I mean the D ev il , all' a cloud of ]\Jercy, that is to sa), 1 will not say sheep-faces, but wi ll cha nge the term for once Temperance, gatherin g over the United States, and ready to into- Goal-faces. Our influence must be with the South­ o ur sy mpathy must be with the slave-holders-if we wish fat 20 Hugh Lindsay was one of the most famous of Pennsylvania's offices we must form a league-we w ill walk ha nd in hand­ lural s howm e_~ and puppelleers. See his aUlobiograph y, History side by side. A compromise is con cl uded upo n,- 10rthern of til(' Life, J ravels and i llCidents of Col. Hugh Lindsay. The Celebrated COll1edtal~, For a Period of Thirty-Seven Years. Writ­ dough-faces a nd outhern ari stocrats a nd nabob form a con­ ten by HlIllsel[ (Philadelphia. 1859) , 96 pp. The on ly recent spiracy for the very peculi a r benefit of their own pockets, lrealment o[ LlIldsay, and lhal on acco unt of hi s bilingual char­ acter (Pennsylvania DUlCh and English ) has appeared in Alben purses, a nd appetites. T he thunder g ives the loudest sound F. l~uffingto n (ed), The R eichard Collection of Early Penns),l­ as its pass ing on-"THE UNIO 1 MUST BE PRESERVED!" vanta German Dtalogues and Plays (Lancas ler, Penn ylvania, The third thunder is heard, so unding North, East, outh. 1 96~{, Vol. 61: Pennsylvania German Society Publicalions, Chapter I V, Hugh LlIldsay and the Pennsy lvania German Puppet Play," and \ Ves t, and the hue and cry is raised,- Fore ign influence pp. I-4. Illust be chec.ke c! - rimina ls a nd pauper must be se nt back­ 30 The "13uckeye 13lacksmith" wa s John W. Bear (UlOO- 1883), emigraLion laws must be more stringent-natura lization a Maryl and-born residenl of Zanesv ille, Ohio, who achieved in­ Slant fame in the 1840 H ard Cider Campaign lhrough his folk y la\\'s must be improved-"AMERICANS MUST R ULE electioneering in blacksmilh dres. A[ter his immediale success ,\ 1\ IERIC,\ ." The fourth thunder mutters, a nd is accom­ in Ohio he campaigned ol'er Kenlucky , [rom whence the \ Vhigs panied b y a d eep. hollow, portentio us and startling so und. "assigned him to Pennsy lvania and Maryland, where his tOurs were emotional triumphs" (E milius O. Randall and Daniel J. The .J es uits are digging away the founda tio ns of our g lorious Ryan, History of Ohio: The Rise and P rogress of all American R e public a nd blessed Liberties- Popery is sapping the life­ State, IV [by Ryan], Nell' York , 1912,34-37). Bear as a Whig' and laler as a Republica n poli tician wa s well known in Pennsy lvania. current of our hea\'en-bles t Institutions-the " m an of sin" is ee The Life and Travels of john )11. B ear. "Tile Buckeye Black­ stretching himse lf for universa l empire-the " m ystery of slllit h." Wrillen by Himself (13altimore, 1873), 299 pp. iniquity" is \\'ork in g in secret conclave to r ule o u r country­ :U These of course are echoes of the Mex ican \~ r ar (Palo ,\ ltO) and the popular inOuence, on coslUme, o[ America 's illlernational " !',\ PISTS 1\ [UST BE KEPT DOW "-we must erect our guests o[ the 1850's, Lhe Swedi sh singer Jenny Lind and th e Hun­ finger posts- build our light-house - raise the a lann-our garian patriot Louis Koss uth. co untry is in danger. Th~re is a compound of truth and 32 Most of the references in lhis paragraph are lO political fac­ Lion s in the 1840's and 1850's, the period immedialely preceding error in the foregoing. But that is the way the D evil does Raber's book. The "13arnburners" and "Hunkers" were factions business, and carries on the work in o ur age. o[ Lhe DemocraLi c Party in New York in the Van 13uren days o[ The fiflh thuncler is the loudest, a nd after it is hea rcl the Lhe 18 10's . The 13arnburners supposedly go t lheir name [rom a folk story o[ a DUlchman who burned his barn to get rid of ilS senseless noise,- " Don't Know,"-" am's in town,"-"Have raLS. The opposition, the Hunkers , later spliL inlo Sort Shell yo u seen Sam?" :H _ "Young r\ merica,"-"Put none but Ameri­ Hunkers or "So[ts" and I-lard Shell Hunkers or ·'H ards". The "Silver Grays," a lso ca lled "Snuf[-lakers"-mosL ly older members ca ns 011 the outposts,"- associa ted w ith grips, pas worcls­ o[ Lh e Whig Party in New York SlaLe, roughl y in the sa me period, scratching of eye-brows- a ncl fin gering of jackets. The po­ were opposed by the "Wooll )' Heads" or "Seward Whigs," led b y litical \\'orld assumes a new face. \ Vh ether it is any cl earer William H . eward. For li ght on Lh ese con [using relalions, see Hans Sperber and Travis TriLlschuh , American Political Terms: than any former face is much to be questioned. The m as k is An Historical Dictional y (DeLroiL , 1962); also th e vo lumes on be tter, to be sure, to man y. tha n the former masks; but uncler­ politics in the 1850's by Roy Franklin Nichols, Frallidin Pierce: nea th lhere Ill ay be a pair of very g reasy eyes. The cry then is Young Hickory oj tlte Granite H ills (Philadelphia, 1931), and The Disrupt iOIl of A mel iea ll D emocracy (New York , 19-18). ra ised: Let the SOllth and Sl a\'er y a lo ne, with its God-defy- a:J As a u.n., Railer favors bOlh plOhibiLion and a nLi slavery. For Lh e co nnection o[ the Pennsy lvania DULCh revi\'alisl sects with 3~ While Raber shares so me oE his church's allLi-Catholi c bias the temperance mOl'emenl, see my Penllsy'vania SjJirituals (Lan­ he is so mewhaL crilica l o[ Lh e NativisL movement. "Sam" was caSLer , Pennsy lvania. 196 1), pp. 85-86. 1\ IosL lya Northern church, code for Lhe I now NOLhing Party or a member of il. "Have YO ll lhe U.13.'s could afford to be more co nsislenLl y anLis lavel), lhan seen Sam?" was asked lO lest a slranger on the SLreeL-a party Lh e nalionall y spread Methodist Episcopal Ch urch , which split member would relurn the password. ee Sperber and TrilLschuh, inlo northern (a nlislavery) and so ulhern (prosla\ery) wings in oj) . cil., p. 38 '. for th e Nati\'e Am eri ca n movement and ilS polit­ 18 15. 13 enjamin R . Hanby's hit so ng of the 18 10's, "Darling Nelly ica l and religious implicalions, see R ay .\ . Billington, The Prol­ Gray," is a popu lal expression of Unil d Brethren antislavel') estallt CII/sade, 1800-i860 (New York , 1938); a lso _\I ice felt Tyler, inlcres l; Hanby's fath el "'as an Ohio u.n. circuit-rider, editOr, Freedolll's Fennellt: Phases of AlJlerican Social History to 1860 and bishop. (Minnea poli s,

50 THE DR U .\'[{ARD' · MIRROR -flom lhf' "Amoicanisch e)' ta dt lind L and Calender" fo), 1832. Th e almal1ac was published in Philadel­ /Jhia by Conrad Zen tier, l h e e 71 g l' a v i 71 g i s b)' Gilbe1'l.

In g. anti-go,pe l and inhuman laws. L e t thc T e mpcra n cc is a popular d c lusio n , and like m a n y of its political ha rbing­ and Prohibition movc m c nt take its own way,-just oppose c rs, wi ll have it · day a nd its end, wh ich may not bc fa r off; Forc ig ncrs. II'ho havc f1 cd among us for refuge, a nd proscribc for peoplc \\'ill n o t continuc crazy upon onc them c, esp ecia lly Roman Catholics. ,\ nd soon m e n who wcrc red-ho t Anti­ II'hcn o n cc it loses its birth-right, nove lty, a nd phantasm ago­ Slavcry. and bla7 ing Prohibitionists, wcrc heard braying ri as. Thc hoof o f " o ld horn y" is a lrcad y scen. That serpe nt 1I(' lIllI/ii l y upo n tho c points. in the ir n ew creed, as lo ud as o f h c ll. Sla\'c r y, is a lrcady looking " with eyes gla ring rcve n gc­ did Balaalll\ ass. ,\ nti- lavcry and Prohibitio n werc the n full y, barbed tonguc thrusting o ut thrcateningly, and rattles by this ig- noblc ordcr thrown into thc sha d e, (savc a fe ll' men o unding a larm ing ly," a nd showing its h e llish fa n g to with ,0111 5 in thcm who raiscd a protest at a certa in Gene ral frightc n thc pcople o[ the North, which is not an easy task . Council.) What the c nd o f this n ew-fa ngled political RIIIll '>c ll c rs arc cloaking with the organization , which w as '>c heill e. II'hich is trying hard to introducc Christia nity a nd seen in a place not fifty miles [rom herc, wherc oyster-gor­ th c Ilil)ic within its bordc rs. \\'i ll bc, must bc a\\'a itcd . The Illands :1:; and brandy-gulpcrs, from differe nt quarte r , som e­ fllturc lI' ill in duc time g ivc a revelation. C in cinna ti , and times mec t fo r a cc rta in number of dollars a d ay, drawn from o the r r iti e,> and pl s 0 1 thc " bonc and sincw" o[ the country. Thosc, groa ning in thc columns of thc ir jo urna ls a lrcady. To say (f mcan rums II c rs,) pcnitentia r y, ja il , poor-house, a nd luna­

the iea,t th ;lt C;1I1 I)e q id i,>: ][ thc D evil did no t commcnce lI C a,ylum buildcrs a nd fill e rs, wh o sprcad misery, distress, it. which I \\'ould not likc to say, hc is, o r has fa ll c n in , a nd a n g uish , a nd d cspa ir a m o ng thc ir [clioII' be ings, a nd causc is GIIT ) ing it on. Secrccy is bccoming unpo pular, a nd to a tcars, broke n hearts, widows a nd orphans, w ish to go on in dcgrec i, bc ing donc away w ith. the ir 1I'0rk of d ea th, by selling bites a t thrce, six, a nd twe lve ] t may rcasonably be cx pcctcd , tha t " Yo ung j\ mcrica" was CC nts a picce, to fill thc ir hcaven-c ursed pockcts, and l ive rcarcd on the mushroom ,ordcr, a nd that " AM " is running :1:; The "oyster-cell a r" was lOO urban a n institution [or the rural ;It ,>uch a ,>pccd as to c ndangcr his o\\'n hcad a nd brains. It United Brethren preacher with his puritan tastes.

51 upon the murders they comm it. The goat-foot a nd the Devi l they possessed supernatural properties and power. Accord­ are going together in the ranks of Know- othingism. The ing to advertisements and certificates they were a kind of ma ntle with which Satan covered the rotten places, is a bout cure-all affair. Their day, however, has closed. "Shennan's being removed , and Missouri bullyism, rowdyism, and Loze nges," and a long train of other are following them. devilish laver y ism, a nd rum ellingism is a characteristic of But their name is till L egion. Hundreds have proven a So uthern America1lism, by which the Bible is to be continued curse, instead of a bless ing, to th e user. At this time th e in o ur public schools, and the Gospel to be kept up in our Dev il has ma ny poor fellows drugging themselves into disease la nel . Such m en preserve our li berties? Begone with such and mise ry by those "all-c urative" nostrums. 0 sooner is egregious nonse nse I Men in our age are put on pack-mules th e internal arra ngement somewhat unhinged, than patent by the Devil to ride into office on. Southern demagogues pills, billers, or some other curse, must be sent wholesale after have long ince been squeezing Northern dough-faces into as the disease, which in place of arresting· it, urges it forward. ma ny shapes as they pleased, to keep going, if even on Hundreds of those " Patent Medicine" men deserve about as crutches, their "peculiar institution." But the Devil with all much respect as the "Slow Poisoners" in the seventeenth cen­ his devil s, invisible and visible, cannot prevent Slavery and tury. Their "compounds" are sent into every inhabited Whiskeyism from faIJing. May they soon go, and Popery corner, carrying a pestilence with them, that does its work with them, and be given over to curse the earth no more. of death "slow but sure." They have sen t hundreds to pre­ SECR ET COMBINATIONS mature graves, and carried misery and lamentation into SECR ET COMBINATIONS. T h e time was, but that families. So general has this drugging become, that all man­ time is no more, when Free Masonry was stalking through our ner of nauseous stuff is taken without inquiry, care, or con­ la nd Golia[t]h-like. But it had its day. I t became old a nd cern. The D evil h as led many to commit suicide by inches . wrinkled. However, as parent, it reared a numerous prog­ Every druggist's shelves are loaded with Sarsaparillas, Syrups, eny, which the Devil sent o ut into the world with washed Ointments, Plasters, a nd what not. H and-bills, alma nacs,38 faces, white dresses, a nd pink aprons, calling them man y nice a nd certifi cates of cures are with unblushing servility thrown names. They looked rather tidy and n eat for a time. In­ into your houses to belie your families. Patent medicines is stead of Free Masonry, we have now, "Odd Fellows,"- "Sons one way to kill people for pay, a nd calomel a nother. It ap­ of Temperance,"- "R ed Men,"-"Good Samaritans,"- a nd pears the people are given over to delusions, to be se nt out many others.3 G And reaIJy those creatures become so re­ of the world. The Devil has some poor creatures, living ligious that, to refu se to join in their charitab le business, moving, itinerant drug shops. was rendering one's self guilty. Men ran into lodges a nd I shall wind up this cha pter by remarking, that I had in­ halls with gigantic strides. One order after the other spra ng tendcd to talk some about Mormonism, Millerism, and some up un til there were more than a score a nd their adherents other isms, but finding that my book is already much larger were ho pping a bo ut like the frogs at one time in the land of than I first des igned, I shall pass them over for this time. Egypt, entering into almost every house. But it so happened Public nuisa nces, such as theatres, circuses, opera troupes, that the D ev il slipped out the cl oven foot, a nd people see a nd so forth, might lay cl aim to a sh are of the Devil; but as that there is n either charity nor benevolence in drawing out they are now visited mostly by the lawless, reckl ess, character­ by first paying in. They are no t so easil y taken in now as less, a nd obscene, and going out of repute, I shall leave them . they once were. Some men with hearts in them have r aised The " hoof" is so visible in them, that scarcely any but the their voices a nd employed their pens to show the "hoof" in reprobate give them a ny counteRance. There are a host of them, and wage war against those temples of Gerizim. The public amusements in which the " cloven foot" is not so much people are beginning to see the deception, intrigue, a nd anti­ seen, which I shall only n ame: such as steamboat a nd rail­ Gospel principles in them . R ead R ev. John Lawrence's road excursions, Twenty-second of Fe bruary a nd Fourth of " Plain Thoughts on Secret Societies." 37 July celebrations, a nd Pleasure Trips to Fashionable Water­ ing Places, in which the D evil has very often a share in the PATENT MEDICINES bargain or contract.3D PATENT MEDICINES. H ere is another of the D evil's I am inclined to think that, if you will form proper con­ delusions. " Bra ndreth's,"- UMoffatt's," - and "Sugar Coated" clusions from what I h ave written a nd you read, it will prove pills used to be all the cry. M any of the imaginary thought of benefi t to yo u. Whe n viewing the popular delusions in o ur midst, the heart sickens, a nd the head swims, to see im­ 3 6 Protestant American males, suffering (rom lack of European Catholi c emoti onal and esthetic outlets, seem to have nu rsed mortal beings running, reeling, staggering, a nd jumping h ell­ th eir frustrations in a series of "(raternal orders" on various w,ard , with a grea ter velocity tha n, (it does seem,) the Devil leve ls of sophisti ca tion (rom Freemasonry to the "Red Men ." wishes or cares about driving or leading them . Many are Beca use of th eir populari ty, th ey were eventually copied, in self­ protection, by Ameri ca n Judaism and America n Ca tholi cism, who trying to o u ~- d ev il Satan himself. Some are engaged in may not have needed th em a(ter all. The panic over "secret wholesale devilism, whilst others indulge in a species of re­ orga nizati ons" among the American Protestalll clergy in the fined wickedness, a nd the Devi l himself may at times be 1850's and 1860's seems to stem not only (rom the earlier anti­ maso ni c movement but from th e genuine fear that th ese organ­ thrown into amazement to see that h e has so little tro uble izat ions, with th eir rilUals and pass words, trowels and (eath ers, to turn the world in his favor. The Devil somehow, has were co mpetition to the churches, wh ose sac rosa nct preserve they found out a short way to work mad fellows with, who throw were invading. Some sects (the U.B.'s an exa mple) and some chu rches (the Misso uri ynod Lutherans) re(used to allow th eir open the doors of their hearts, giving him egress a nd regress members to join "secret orga niza ti ons." Two United Brethren as he chooses ancl pleases. schisms in Pennsy lvania, th e United Christi ans and the United Brethren (Old CO nstilUtion)- the lalter centered in Raber's ow n 38 An interesting reference to the growing genre of the medi cal area of York, Franklin and oth er co unties- still oppose member­ almanac, on the level of "popular med icine" rather than "folk sh ip in secret societi es. med icin e," but worthy of seri ous study. 37 The onl y ava il able co py in the Philadelphia area seems to be 3D Raber, U. B. to th e end , went all the way in co ndemning a German translation, Einfache Gedanken iiber Geheime Gesell­ popular amusements. He does not mention, however, those en­ schaften; aus der 5ten englis·chen Auf!. iibersetzt von ] . Degmeier lering wedges of popu lar culture in the church's own rea lm- th e ... (Dayton, Ohio, 1855), 171 pp., in Lutheran Theological Semi ­ Donation Party, the Ch urch Fair, and the Sunday Schoo l Picnic­ nary Library, Ml. Airy. whi ch are topics worthy o[ doctoral disscrtation treatment.

52 p--- Contributors to This Issue-.....

DR. EARL F. ROBACKER, '''' hite Plains, ew York, is well kn own to the readers of Pennsylvania Folklire as our Antiques Editor. A lifelong coll ecLor of Pennsylvaniana, he h as writLen widely on a ntiques and folk art o f the Dutch CounLry. His mos t rece nt book, T ouch of the Du tchland, ba ju t appeared, A. S. Barnes and Company, 1965.

HE RY GLA SIE, Philadelphia, is a grad uate llIdelll in the Folklore Department o f the University of Penn­ sylvania. Formerly a student o f Prof. Fred KnifIen at Lo ui siana Sta te Unive rsiL y as well as of Louis J ones and Bruce Buckley in the new Cooper town program in Ameri can Folk Culture, he represen ts the cultural geography a pproach to maLerial culture. His wide fi eld work in the South and the Middle tates has produced articles for M oun tain L ife and rVo1"k, the New YOl'k FolkloTe QuaT /el"iy, th e Geogmphica l R eview, and the T ennessee Folklol'e ociety Bulletin.

DR. BERTON E. BECK, New York City, is a native o f L yco ming County, Pennsylvania. In this iss ue be re­ tells the tales of his boyhood days-tales o f the "Bl ock H ouse" se ttlement in L ycoming and Tioga Countie , from the d ays when the timber was Lall and th e wo h'es and panthers still roamed the mo untains o f North Centra l Pennsylva nia.