Image: Dam on Mountain Creek by Jim Bradley
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.
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.
Interview of E. Jean Bixler of Boiling Springs, Pennsylvania for the Elizabeth V. and George F. Gardner Digital Library. Bixler discusses growing up in Boiling Springs as well as her family.
Thomas Craighead’s slave Venus: Sister of the first published American Negro poet Phillis Wheatley. T.C. was Thomas Craighead (1789-1865) the son of John Craighead and his wife Jane Lamb. The “old Thomas Craighead” he refers to in his letter was his grandfather who died in 1807. In 1845, T.C. also contributed a history of incidents relating to his family that was published in I.D. Rupp’s History of Dauphin, Cumberland, Perry Counties…. p. 440-444.
When Sarah Filey was growing up in rural Cumberland County in the 1830s and 1840s, she could not have imagined that ten years of her life would be spent more than 5,000 miles away in Constantinople, Turkey.
Letter: William B. Murray to his brother Joseph A. Murray in Pittsburgh, 1835. William B. Murray (1808-1890) and Joseph A. Murray (1815-1889) were two of the five children of George Murray and his wife Mary Denny of Carlisle.
Letter: Aunt Nancy Denny to her nephew Joseph A. Murray in Pittsburgh, 1834. “We had a splendid dinner at three o'clock. Rachel Baker was my chief cook and bottle washer and everything was in [style].”
Letter: Christmas Day 1832. To Joseph A. Murray in Pittsburgh from his Father George Murray, Carlisle “The Varioloid is rapidly declining in Carlisle… and I would wish you to get vaxinated [sic].”
Largent discusses his experiences growing up and his time working for a railroad company. Watch Story...
“The Dillsburg and Mechanicsburg Railroad was built with the backing of the Cumberland Valley Railroad primarily to haul iron ore from the vast reserves around Dillsburg to furnaces in the Harrisburg region. Read Article...
Reproduced below are a number of the photographs which were displayed at the Cumberland County Historical Society as an exhibit "Hey Ollie, Let's Go Railroading." Over 250 photographs were put on display as a tribute to all the railroaders, both here and gone, who worked in the Cumberland Valley. Read Story...