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~ Olde Attleborough

EASTBURN
MILLS
ATTLEBOROUGH
TEMPERANCE
NESHAMINY
RIVERS
FERRIES
UNDERGROUND RR
 

Delaware Valley Advance 1929 by Samuel C. Eastburn 1929


I will write of "Olde Attleborough" as I remember it seventy-five years ago - (1854). But there have been so many changes in houses and environment that it seems necessary to antedate at the first its incorporation as a borough, that the present generation may understand what I am writing about, and it will probably be the more striking if I recount its earlier history and the things that Attleborough did not have, bringing it out in sharper comparison with things we now have.

My first thought is that the houses in the town were almost all of stone or brick. with very few exceptions, the frame and stucco houses which we now have, have been built in the last hundred years. Necessarily any account of them will be disjointed and discursive and more personal than I would like.

As I have said in previous papers it was first called "Four Lanes End." This was important to the early comers in the country, because the known roads and stage routes crossed here, but it did not mean very much to the settlers around here. They still had their English ideas that "landed estates" would create an "aristocracy of land" as they had known it to do in England, and the "settlement" meant, to them, a public house, a store, and the artisans or mechanics of the neighborhood.

There were probably not more than half a dozen log houses until after 1700. then there was a store, a "house of entertainment for man and beast," and a "smithshop." The log houses were not replaced by stone until after lime had been discovered in the back country, and brought down the Durham road and traded for goods at Richardson's Store at "Four Lanes End." This store was not only a center here, but, from an inspection of its accounts of that time and later, it was the department store of the period, dealing in everything - cord wood, deer-skins, rum and sugar with a few importations from England of necessities of wear.

Joseph Richardson, during this time, went on a sailing vessel to visit friends in Jamaica, and doubtless, incidentally, looked after his business with the goods that were brought in considerable quantities from that island. after the Richardson's quit store-keeping (between 1740 and "50), the store was taken by an Englishman by the name of Atlee. he evidently came with the great increase of settlers between 1720 ad 1750. (as many as 6,000 are said to have come into Pennsylvania in one year during the time.) The neighborhood spoke of going to "Attlee's Store," and then to "Attlee's," and as they had known almost universally in such settlements in England they easily added" bury," and it was known as "Attlebury," and so written in the many deeds and documents which I have, until after the Revolutionary War. then Young American escaped from English ruin, made everything English "taboo," as previously everything English had been cherished and it was called "Attleborough." This name was probably not confirmed until the establishment of their first post office under that name in 1805, with Robert Croasdale as its first postmaster.

They had no railroad to split the fresh air with noise or befoul it with smoke. There were no stone roads in or out of the settlement. Later, a turnpike road was built from Oakford through Byberry and Bensalem to Philadelphia. This was more than two miles away and a turnpike road from Bridgetown to the county town at Newtown. these two roads were built by local people to get to market and to the county town. They charged tolls and it is interesting to note that they passed free people who were going to invite to funerals, or attending them, going to church or meeting.

"The farmers' wives went perhaps twice a year to Philadelphia or Trenton shopping, seated on a bag of oats alongside of their husbands in white top, muslin covered market wagons. There were two or three "rich farmers" who had family carriages, rather heavy but roomy and strong. One had a "coach" which he had had imported from England. The trip to Philadelphia took four (4) hours at best. Others bought at the local store or walked to Bristol or Trenton.

Would you believe it, but it is true, that when Adrian Cornell built his large stone house just this side of Richboro, two masons and a carpenter walked to and from here daily for nearly six months, a distance of at least twelve (12) miles, worked ten (10) hours and were paid a $1.00 a day! They had no telegraph or telephone offices or connections. Its streets were not stoned and on account of our "fat" land, "Middletown Mud" was the topic of many a ribald song and story. There were no autos, and the young man who had a buggy was a noted sport; no gas or electricity, no coal, oil or gasoline. A few had whale oil lamps, but mostly a home was lighted with candles. There wasn't a bath tub or equipment in the town. Water was pumped from deep wells, or dipped from the rain water cask back of every kitchen doo9r. There were no continuous concrete or other side-walks; no cash grocer or drug store, only one candy store, only one ice cream place, and that open on Wednesday and Saturday nights only. Attleborough was simply the largest settlement in Middletown township, and it was the center of its political, social, and educational interests.

There were many open lots. These were fenced in and were pastures of adjoining neighbors who generally kept a cow. These cows wandered around the streets or were tended by barefoot boys along the roads on the edge of the town. The town did not have trees along its streets except some thorny locusts, and occasional allanthus (the Tree of Heaven) and some very large buttonwoods (the Platanus Orientalis), a few elms and ash, large trees which had been left from the forest stood in its streets, and when these begun to be lined up were always in the wrong place. Occasionally there was an Edgehill flagstone pavement, laid in front of the house, or an always - out-of-repair brick one. Perhaps some property holder spread a load of tan bark, another a load of Buctoe sand on his front. Later, someone put down a boardwalk, but with the cattle and horses pasteurizing in the streets, these were often trodden in and were broken and were not satisfactory.

I remember, as an interesting incident of this, that the Hicks tannery, which was on the corner where the parry building now is and back of it, had liquor tanks sunk in the ground and lined with two (2) inch oak plank. These had been abandoned many years and, with the march of improvement, were filled up. It was thought these planks would make everlasting sidewalks. They were cut up for the purpose, but they were so hard that they couldn't drive nails in them and, having been sunk in the shade for so many years, they split terribly in the sun and were finally voted a nuisance and were burned.

 

 

 

 

 

Page last updated:      August 21, 2021       Broken Links and to contribute additional data email - Nancy

ABRAHAM LINCOLN (1864) 2nd Inaugural

With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan - to do all which may achieve a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations. 

 

 
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