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The Cumberland County Historical Encyclopedia is an expanding publication on the history of the Cumberland County. Covering a wide range of topics and the entire Cumberland County geographic region, the Encyclopedia seeks to be an initial entry point to those interested in the County's history. Entries seek to provide a list of resources available as well as showcasing some of the Cumberland County Historical Society's own collections.

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A Year in the Life of a Village: Huntsdale 1910

Huntsdale--this photo shows two wooden buildings with logs and bits of wood strewn on the ground.

The humming of the saws at the mill could be heard as you approached the general store. Sheaffer & Williamson Dealers in General Merchandise reads the sign above the windows on the second floor of the general store. As in many villages, the general store also served as the Post Office, and the Huntsdale Post Office sign hung from the porch roof. Six men are standing on the porch staring at the photographer on the other side of the road. Wooden posts stand at the edge of the dirt road ready for customers to tie up their horses. The scene resembles other small villages in the county, but this is the village of Huntsdale on Pine Road in Penn Township, Cumberland County.

Indentured Servants

1775 advertisement in Philadelphia’s Pennsylvania Gazette

Indentured servants were men and women who agreed to work for a master without pay for a specified number of years, usually in return for having their passages to America paid. This 1775 advertisement in Philadelphia’s Pennsylvania Gazette announced that the ship Hawke had just arrived from London and was lying off the Market Street wharf with a shipment of “a few likely healthy servants” of many different trades “whose times are to be disposed of.”

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