A roller skating craze swept the country in the 1880s. Opinions were divided on whether roller skating rinks provided the public with “healthful amusement” or were “pits of perdition” as some preachers claimed.1 Regardless, roller skating was so popular that rinks were built in Carlisle, Mechanicsburg, Mt. Holly and Shippensburg.
"Daring Robbers Visit Daniel Drawbaugh's Residence at Eberly's Mills" ran the headline in the newspaper. Daniel Drawbaugh, known as "The Edison of Cumberland County," for his invention of the electrical telephone in the 1860s, was 76 years-old at the time of this incident.
The son of Carlisle silversmith George Hendel and his wife Rosanna Jumper, George Hendel, Jr. was born on August 20, 1815. He did not follow his father’s profession, and by 1837 he was in the livery business with James Gaulagher.