We report here that evidence for the 1779 Carlisle Deluge still exists. In the Summer, 1996 issue of Cumberland County History, Whitfield J. Bell described what he called the Carlisle Deluge. Bell used primary sources, mainly a letter from David Rittenhouse to Benjamin Franklin, to describe how, on the night of August 19, 1779, a thunderstorm with copious rain opened a gash on the south side of North (Blue) Mountain east of Flat Rock and northwest of the present Bloserville. Rocks and trees were carried down the mountain.
The life of Charles Francis Himes, professor of physics at Dickinson College from 1865 to 1896, was one of many and varied pursuits. He was a scientist, an educator, and a historian; and with each of these roles his interest and achievements in photography were integrated. In the late twentieth century photography is taken granted. Anyone nowadays can buy a camera and take a picture, regardless of knowledge or skill; development and printing are done commercially; and photographs are used in every discipline.
Charles Lochman operated a photography studio at several different locations in Carlisle and Newville between 1859 and 1874. He is appreciated today for his views of the ruins of Chambersburg in 1864 and the fact that A.A. Line, a better known Carlisle photographer, was his apprentice.
I shall not call this an infant school, because I do not intend the children to be schooled, but to be allowed under the gentlest treatment to develop freely. -Friedrick Frobell
The Carothers or Carruthers families (Carruthers in Scotland, Carothers in America) were among the first settlers in Cumberland County; in 1750 when the county was formed, there were seven established Carothers households in West and East Pennsborough Townships
The early history of Pennsylvania is sprinkled with the exploits of daring, energetic, and forceful individuals. One of the most fearless and dedicated, yet least remembered of these personalities, was Christian Frederick Post. A humble man of God, he spent over forty years among the Indians and Whites of colonial America, spreading the Gospel and working for peace. He passed some of this time traveling through or living within the present borders of Cumberland County.
When John Bratton, editor of the American Volunteer newspaper, paid a visit to the village of Churchtown in April 1875, and then wrote about it in his newspaper, little did he know he would rile up the editor of a competing newspaper and send him off on his own trip to Churchtown.
Among the historical records that are included in the archives of Cumberland County, are those of the Civil War Board of Relief. These records provide an opportunity to learn how the war affected the day to day lives of military families in Cumberland County during this tumultuous period of our history.
In the summer of 1863, the Cumberland Valley was awash in fear and excitement as General Robert E. Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia came northward, culminating in the Battle of Gettysburg on July 1st, 2nd and 3rd. Much has been written since then, 'indeed perhaps too much- by one estimate more than 5000 books and articles have been written about the Gettysburg Campaign of June and July 1863.
Col. Magaw was a major in Colonel William Thompson's "Battalion of Pennsylvania Riflemen", the first troops from the South to reach Boston. Colonel of the Fifth Pennsylvania Regiment. Assigned by Washington to defend Fort Washington. Paper read before the Hamilton Library Association, Carlisle, Pa. -- The Historical Society of Cumberland County, Pennsylvania.