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The Odd Fellows in Carlisle

''All at once I was startled by the howling of members and rattling of ponderous chains ... he grasped me with Herculean strength and shook me violently, dragging me up and down the room ... the funniest appearance was their grotesque and ludicrous dresses, and all wore burlesque masks" a member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows recalled of his initiation in 1832. 

Old Court Houses of Carlisle, Pa.

In preparing the following sketches and reminiscences of our former public buildings, in addition to old papers, we have carefully consulted several of our aged and best informed citizens in regard to the latter, both the have our own recollections confirmed or rectified, so far as they go back, and to secure assistance in reaching the truth where our own recollections were faint and unsatisfactory.

Old Market Houses of Carlisle, Pa.

At first like other towns in their incipient state, the people of Carlisle, may have largely depended on their own yards and gardens and out-lots for the supply of their wants with occasional visits by meat dealers and country people. Every family raised something both for summer and winter consumption, and “killing time,” or “butchering time,” as it was generally called, which occurred late in the Fall, after the corn and potatoes had all been housed, was always a season of great plenty, when many a well-fed steer and hog had to yield its life, and its flesh was prepared for future use.

The One-Room Schoolhouses of the Mechanicsburg Area

In the early part of the 18th century, public schools did not exist in Pennsylvania. Affluent parents who wanted their child to have a formal education enrolled them in a private academy such as the Carlisle Grammar School or the Cumberland Valley Institute in Mechanicsburg. Private or subscription schools were very expensive but would prepare a child for college and the professions.

A Past Standing Outside Time: The Election of 1912 According to Cumberland County Newspapers

In his book, The True and Only Heaven: Progress and Its Critics, Christopher Lasch cautions that "Nostalgia appeals to the feeling that the past offered delights no longer attainable ...," a past that "stands outside time, frozen in unchanging perfection." "The hallmark of nostalgia," he writes, "is a dependency on the disparagement of the present."

Penn Township in Kansas

Editorial Note. This list of Kansas emigrants from Penn Township, Cumberland County, was made by Dr. S.M. Whistler. It was printed in Carlisle Herald, April 4, 1878, and reprinted the next day in the Carlisle Mirror; from which it is reprinted here.

Penn Township: 125 Years

Penn Township was erected 23 October 1860 when the western half of Dickinson Township was made into a separate political and territorial body. Its creation was the result of a continuing effort lasting for at least twenty years. This subdivision was but one in a series of similar moves begun at the settlement of the Province and continued in Cumberland County until 1929.

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