“Old Crofty” Mary Kraft: A Carlisle Market House “Institution.”

Little did Mary Kraft know that for decades after her death she would be mentioned in the published reminiscences of Carlisle’s old timers. Known as “Old Crofty,” “Mammy Crofty,” and Mrs. Croft, she kept a stand on Market Square from the 1830s to the 1850s.  

Until a grand “Victorian” market house was built in 1878, the Market consisted of sheds on the southeast portion of the public square. Open to all kinds of weather, Mary and her fellow stall holders “had wintertime pots of burning charcoal to keep their feet warm…” an old timer remembered.¹

Another old Carlisler wrote that “…the cake and small beer stands which at that day did business around the old market sheds and court house…were presided over by Mrs. Crofty, Mrs. Bender and Mrs. Shats. My, oh my! how the boys did devil those poor women and play them all kinds of mean tricks!”²

“Old Crofty” aka Mary Kraftaen—“An ‘institution,’ long known as “Old Krofty,” died on the 4^th inst. in the 81^st year of her age; having been born at Ettingen, Wurtemburg, (Germany) in February 1780. For more than thirty years, regardless of heat or cold, she kept her seat in the Market House, dispensing fruit, cakes and taffy, to young and old. By dint of close saving, she had acquired considerable property, and some years ago, she made a will bequeathing the house in which she resided to the German Lutheran congregation, as a parsonage. This will, at her request, was placed in the corner stone of the church, at the time of its erection; (1854) and on Monday last, the wall of the church was opened and the will obtained. The house is probably worth twelve hundred dollars, the rest of her property goes to some distant relatives.” ³

It is most likely that Mary was the widow of Lewis Craft (Croft/Kroft) whose distillery was located on North East Street.⁴ Lewis Croft died sometime between 1826 and 1830. Mary Croft eventually moved to East Pomfret Street where she was living when the 1850 U. S. Census was taken. Her house was across the street from the future site of the German Lutheran Church, which was built in 1854 on the northwest corner of Pomfret and Bedford streets. 

In 1860, the year of her death, the U. S. Census recorded Anna M. Crofty with real estate worth  $2,000 and personal property worth $300. She was buried a block from her home and the church in Carlisle’s Old Graveyard. Her stone reads “Mrs. Ann Maria Kraft, dau. F. Berstecher  4 Feb., 1780–4 July, 1860.”