Image: Dam on Mountain Creek by Jim Bradley

The Elizabeth V. and George F. Gardner Digital Library Logo

An initiative of the Cumberland County Historical Society the Elizabeth V. and George F. Gardner Digital Library seeks to fulfill the Society's mission of collecting, engaging, and sharing the stories of Cumberland County.

Highlighted Stories

Sylvia A. Waters

Interview of Sylvia A. Waters for the Elizabeth V. and George F. Gardner Digital Library Memory Bank. Waters discusses the history of her families connection to Cumberland County, PA including her father's family in Newville. Waters then talks about growing up on B Street in Carlisle and attending the old Wilson and Lamberton Schools.

The following is a machine generated transcript:

Michelle Ward and Danielle Ward-Smith

Danielle Smith-Ward

Michelle Ward and Danielle Ward-Smith interview by the Orton Family Foundation on the Mount Tabor AME Zion Church and cemetery. Both Ward and Ward-Smith discuss connecting with their past as well as community.

Highlighted Entries

Susana McMurray Higgs (1794-1877)

Photo of the stone house at corner of Bedford and Louther Streets, operated as the Sign of the Thirteen Stripes tavern.

Daughter of a Carlisle tavernkeeper, wife of an English iron worker, Aunt to a well-known actress, and benefactress to the poor, Susana McMurray Higgs was born, lived much of her life and died on the same property in Carlisle.

Isabella Oliver

Photo of the cover page from Oliver's Poems

Isabella Oliver, (July 16, 1771—June 7, 1843), once known as the “poetess of the Conodoguinet,” or more colorfully as that creek’s “muse,” was the second--and the first female--published Cumberland County poet in 1805 with Poems on Various Subjects, following the unknown writer of The Unequal Conflict in 1792.