Swatara Furnace Area History

The Furnace Company Store

Some Williams Family History

The Swatara Furnace/Forge "Big House", Company Store and Carriage Barn

We will start this post with the Furnace/Forge Company Store. Go back to my post: "Saturday, March 5, 2016", The Mountaintop view of the Furnace/Forge complex. You can see the whole area in this photo. I have enlarged the above section of the Mountaintop picture as much as I can, further enlargement destroys the sharpness of the small section of the big picture. Number 1, big red circle, is the Company Store, I will explain what is in the small red circle, Number 2 later on in this post, I just found what is inside the small red circle several weeks ago when I enlarged the above picture even larger than what is posted above. The "Store" is showing up more and more as I get further and further into the Ledger, I have found some pages that are "Store" purchases from nearly top to bottom of a page.

Before we continue with the "Store" I need to furnish some of my Williams family information. My Grandparents, William Thomas and Georgia (Britton) Williams were living in Lebanon, on 111 High St., where Grandpa Williams was a "Roller" at a local Iron and Steel Company; they lived in Lebanon with their five children, Ruth, (my Mother to be), Helen, Lloyd, and the twins, Dorothy, and Aaron (Bill). Both Grandpa and Grandmother loved to fish. Sometime early in 1921 they were told about an excellent fishing stream just North of Suedberg. As soon as the 1921 fishing season opened they took the train from Lebanon to Suedberg and went up Mill Creek to a spot called the "Deep Hole", from there they fished down the stream to a wooden bridge that crossed the creek. I have heard the following story told to friends by my Grandmother more times than I can count, there were a few variations in the tale from time to time, but, the ending was always the same. 

"After we finished our fishing for the day we spied a large stone house and barn through the trees on the other side of the creek, we crossed the bridge and went into the yard of the house, the place looked abandoned, the grass in the yard was knee high, we walked up to the house and found there was at least one resident in the place, a cow walked out of what turned out to be the kitchen, that kitchen door was hanging on by only one hinge. At this time we walked back to Suedberg and caught the train back to Lebanon."

Sometime between the opening of the 1921 fishing season and June of 1921 my Grandparents decided to rent the Big House for the Summer of 1921, they wanted to spend their weekends and vacation time there to fish and get away from the heat and noise of Lebanon. Things did not work out the way they planned though. The four months rental of The Big House turned into forty years and  three months, we had to vacate the place as of November 1961

This is turning into a two part post. Part two will have more about The Company Store, a little more family history and my finding out about The "Store"