Recent

Why Hampden?

In 1995 Hampden Township observed its sesquicentenary, causing one to wonder why it is called Hampden. While there is no documentary proof, it can with some confidence be concluded that it bears the name of a little known, almost forgotten hero of the English Civil War. Cumberland County's standard histories-Wing, Beers, Donehoo, and Godcharles-dutifully note the formation of the township in January, 1845, but none inquires into the name it bears. The county's prothonotary records the actions in civil court creating the township, but such transcripts offer no reason for the name.

A Traveller in the County: 1810

Cumberland County and Valley before the 1830s was one of the principal avenues to the American West. A steady procession of naturalists, farmers with their families and flocks, European reporters on American democracy, investors and speculators in land, fortune hunters and ne'er-do-wells came up from Philadelphia, crossed the Susquehanna, and, many of them, passed through Carlisle and Shippensburg over the mountains to Bedford, Pittsburgh, and the fertile lands of Ohio.

Middlesex: An All-American Truck Stop

Spinning off the Pennsylvania Turnpike at the Carlisle exit, the road-weary traveler might easily forget the considerably developed and congested 1.2- mile section of US Route 11 which serves as the only link between the Turnpike and Interstate 81, known locally as the "Miracle Mile." Presiding over this busy commercial strip is a distinctive red, white and blue truck stop called the "All American Travel Plaza."

Forty-Three Baltimore Street

The history of a remarkable African-American family in Pennsylvania begins, in a sense, with a two-story frame house at 43 Baltimore Street in Carlisle. The builders of the house, Jonas and Mary Kee, came into Pennsylvania in the mid-nineteenth century from Maryland and Virginia respectively. Their daughter, Margaret, married William James Andrews, whose forebears were in Shippensburg as early as 1790. The Andrews were the second generation to inhabit the house.

A Traveller in Cumberland County, 1807

Fortescue Cuming (1 762-1828) was one of the many travellers who passed through Cumberland County in the half century after 1785, and was one of those who kept and published a full account of the journey. A native of County Tyrone, Ireland, he had come to America after 1784 and been a resident of Connecticut since 1792. In 1806 he purchased land in the western country of the United States and the following year set out to the Ohio and Mississippi to inspect it.

Cumberland County in the Panic of 1819

Some idea of economic condition of Pennsylvania during the Panic of 1819 may be obtained from the report of a committee of the State Senate appointed on December 10, 1819, to inquire into "the Extent and Causes of the present General Distress throughout the Commonwealth." The long years of war in Europe and of the war of the United States with Great Britain, although they brought wealth and prosperity to some, also produced inflation and speculation.

Mechanicsburg's Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Park: A Local Response to the National Playground Movement

Americans have a love-hate relationship with the city. Thomas Jefferson wanted to create a country of gentlemen farmers because cities were a haven for men with radical ideas and dangerous to the "morals, the health, and the liberties of men.” The image of the city did not improve during the nineteenth century.

Pages