Wednesday, April 5
Our niece, Karen, texted me saying that she would like me to come to the farm and take a picture of some writing on the wall.
Karen, her husband and son bought the Hershey Homestead (house and farm) from my brothers and are redoing the middle section of the house. They plan to move there in the near future. (I took this picture in 2012. The old tree is no longer standing.)
The sandstone part of the house, on the left, was built between 1819 and 1821 – according to writing on the basement and attic walls. We knew the middle section was built in the early 1900s. This writing in the plaster probably identifies it as 1904. The newest section (on the right) was built in 1997 when my brother Dale and his wife Dot lived there.
They uncovered the writing in the plaster after removing the tobacco lath and horse hair plaster when preparing to insulate the outside walls.
This part was built when my great grandparents lived here. My grandpa was born in June 1895 – and would have been almost nine years old in May 1904 when the writing was put in the plaster.
While standing in this room that was stripped bare, I tried to imagine the excitement of a nine-year-old boy running through the new part of the house, examining the freshly plastered walls.
I don’t have any pictures of Grandpa when he was nine. Only this one when he was three or four and lived in the sandstone part of the house.
The next one I have was when he was a teenager. By then the frame part of the house was probably nine or ten years old.
Now back to the writing in the plaster. A. B. Young – May 3, 1904.
Who could that be?
Our son Jeff thought he might have been a fork maker. Jeff enjoys antique sales and said there was a Young who made wooden forks.
I called my friend Doug Shaw who lives near us (Penryn) and makes wooden forks. Doug said, “No, that was M. B. Young.” He suggested that I call Manheim Historical Society.
I got the answering machine, but told them about the writing in the plaster.
Two days later, someone called me saying, “I think we found your man. We found the obituary of Amaziah Benton Young in the Manheim Sentinel, August 18, 1932. He was a cigar maker and plasterer.”
Interesting.
It appears that we have deciphered the writing on the wall and found the plaster of the house in 1904.
I found that to be very interesting.
That was very interesting! I enjoy history like this. I can imagine it was very special to you to learn more discoveries involving your family history!! In reading the obituary I noticed that AB Young had a sister Mary Coleman. I wonder if she was related by marriage to the Coleman’s who made a lot of history in Lebanon?
I thought about that too. Wondered if she was part of the Lebanon Colemans.
What were your Hershey grandparents names?
Milton and Nancy Hershey. He was a preacher at our church – White Oak Church of the Brethren.
Interesting stuff. I like local history & mysteries. Any idea who built the old part of the house back in 1819/1821? That would be neat to know. I traced the ownership of the land my house sits on back to an ancestor, Hans Groff, who lived during the early – mid colonial times. The house is a bit newer than that, say 200 years just about. lol In a way, we bought back our land. Now I appreciate it alot more. Anyway, would love to know more about that old sandstone part of the house Karen lives in. Had a few ancestors that lived in Rapho starting around the time it was built. Wondering if one of them built it or someone else.
I am not aware if we have record of the builder. My great-great grandpa, John Hershey bought the farm in 1875. My great-grandpa Jacob Hershey bought it in 1888. They are the ones who had the middle section built in 1904. My grandparents bought it in 1920. My parents bought it in 1949 and my brothers bought it in 1980. The most recent purchase was my sister’s daughter.
so interesting,ours was a old toll house for the Manheim-Sporting Hill turnpike
Imagine the stories some of these old houses could tell.