America's first historian, Abiel Holmes, records that by 1792 enterprising New Englanders were enjoying success in the cultivation of silk worms. The idea was to begin an American source for silk and thus avoid importing the luxury from France or other European brokers. Silk had been appreciated in the West since at least the days of Augustus, being brought from China to Syria by way of India.
In January of 1883, an eleven-year-old boy from the Laguna pueblo in New Mexico Territory wrote a letter from the Carlisle Indian School to someone back home. Here is the letter:
In a recent reorganization of the Cumberland County Historical library, two original Oaths of Allegiance from Cumberland County were rediscovered: the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy of April 13th 1761, and the Oath or Affirmation of Allegiance and Fidelity of June 13th 1777.
Oliver P. Williams, County Courthouses of Pennsylvania: A Guide. (Mechanicsburg, Pa.: Stackpole Books, 2001) xi, 244 pp, glossary, index, illustrated; paperback, $19.95 (ISBN 0-8117-2738-6)
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
When the women of the Civic Club of Carlisle purchased a new Studebaker Street Sprinkler in May 1903 to keep the streets of Carlisle clean, the club was not only embarking on new territory but also continuing an already impressive, albeit short, civic track record.
Wilhelm Schimmel, regarded today as one of America's most famous folk carvers, was a colorful itinerant who roamed throughout the Cumberland Valley region of Pennsylvania in the latter half of the nineteenth century. He likely immigrated to America from the Hesse-Darmstadt region of Germany shortly after the American Civil War.
In May of 1837, James and Eliza Geddes Weakley welcomed into their home in Mill Town (Huntsdale) their youngest son, James Geddes (JG) Weakley. The grandson of Samuel Weakley, JG was also the great grandson of the patriarch of "one of the most prominent families in the western part of the county," James Weakley. What act or acts did JG Weakley, a seemingly honorable man, commit in later life that caused him to be erased from the family tree?
Ann Kramer Hoffer, Twentieth Century Thoughts. Carlisle: The Past Hundred Years. Carlisle: Cumberland County Historical Society, 2001.
The story of Albert Abelt is one of both a talented artist and a natural-born athlete. His uniquely coupled talents, varying pursuits, and adventurous life make him a fascinating subject.