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THE BRADFORD ERA
THURSDAY, JULY 2, 2026
BUILT BY BRADFORD Pitt Forged. Bradford Inspired.
McKean County — Did you know? AMER250BANNERad.indd 3
Editor’s note: America250PA - McKean County provided the material featured here, created by the McKean County Planning Commission — Chairman Gregory Bell, Director Terry L. Hess and Associate Planner Jennifer Podowski. This history of McKean County was prepared by commission staff at the request of the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission for the winter 1982-83 edition of Pennsylvania Heritage magazine.
The French claimed this area, as they did the entire Ohio River Valley, based on the travels of a man named Celeron who reportedly buried a lead plate at some never discovered location along the Allegheny River. However, after the Seven Years War (French and Indian War) ended in 1763, the British laid claim to these lands. The British preferred to allow the Allegheny Plateau to remain in Indian hands and had very friendly relationships with most tribes. For $10,000 Pennsylvania gained an area which is today about one-fourth of the entire commonwealth. The area was eventually carved up into 15 counties and parts of five others. The advantages to the state, however, were not immediately apparent. Except for the Allegheny River Valley, this area was primarily one of the almost impenetrable dense pine and hemlock forests. Settlers from Connecticut had established themselves in Northern Pennsylvania by 1763, especially in the Wyoming Valley. The early rush for lands to legitimize the Connecticut claim led to frequent Indian troubles, especially during the Revolutionary War.
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acres of land in what was to become Annin Township. This tract of land eventually came to be referred to as Mount Equity Plantation. Early settlers were discouraged from locating in the northcentral highlands due to the great distances from existing population centers and the almost impenetrable pine and hemlock forests. There were reports of unfriendly Indian activity as well. Streams were the only reasonable avenues of transportation. Many settlers stopped to the south along the West Branch of the Susquehanna. Most settlers who located in McKean and Warren counties used the now famous portage route over the drainage divide between the Susquehanna and Allegheny basins via Keating Summit. Ceres, along Oswayo Creek, is considered the first permanent settlement in the county (1798), but there may have been a few settlers in other areas earlier. Francis King, an English Quaker from Philadelphia, was the surveyor and agent for the John Keating Land Co. who pioneered the Ceres settlement. The early settlers found food, clothing and shelter very difficult to secure. The nearest house to the Ceres settlement was 100 miles to the east. The nearest Post Office was 34 miles away. Jersey Shore, the closest supply depot with mills, was nearly as far. Trips to Pittsburgh for supplies were often necessary.
The Susquehanna Lands Co. granted some New England men a township called Lorana, at a location where the City of Bradford now stands. Eventually, six townships were created from these Susquehanna lands in the area which became McKean County. None of the township names survive.
The early settlers found food, clothing and shelter very difficult to secure. Compounding these supply problems were natural hardships such as early and late frosts, and frequent floods. Thus, at the turn of the century, occupants of the area to become McKean County were living at a level of subsistence that sometimes verged on starvation.
Thomas McKean, later governor of Pennsylvania, purchased 300
Nearly a century and a quarter after the creation of Pennsylva-
nia’s original counties, McKean County was formed in 1804, from a part of what was Lycoming. The newly created county consisted primarily of vast unsettled forest land. The Allegheny River crossed the northeastern and northwestern parts of the county with a jog into New York state in between. Four large tributary streams drain most of the county: Potato Creek, Tunungwant Creek, Kinzua Creek and Sinnemahoning Creek, the last draining toward the Susquehanna River. The newly established county was named for Gov. Thomas McKean, who served as Pennsylvania’s governor from 1799 to 1808. Gov. McKean was one of the most distinguished people in Pennsylvania history. He served as president of the Continental Congress and eventually as chief justice for the commonwealth. He was sincerely interested in this area. When created, McKean County was further divided into two original townships of almost equal size: Ceres and Sergeant. Ceres was the only settlement of note. The area was so sparsely settled that until the establishment of a post office at Ceres in 1817, mail had to be carried by horseback from Williamsport and Jersey Shore. In 1810, the U.S. Census reported only 142 residents in McKean County. The area that became McKean County was originally attached to Northumberland County. McKean was under the jurisdiction of Centre County at Bellefonte until 1814 and Lycoming County at Williamsport until 1826. Land for a county seat (228 acres) at the confluence of Marvin and Potato creeks had been given to the county by John Keating, but Smethport was not organized and settled until the 18101820 period. Finally, the courthouse was completed in Smethport in 1826. The first residents of the county were farm-
ers who cleared the dense forest by cutting and burning. However, lumbering became the first important economic endeavor. The lumber industry began in earnest in the 1830s as logs were rafted down the Allegheny River. The great log rafts, whose destination was Pittsburgh, were organized along the river at Canoe Place (Port Allegany), doubled at Larabee (confluence of Potato Creek and the Allegheny River) and doubled again at Warren. White pine was the most marketable product. The great white pine lumber rafting era lasted until after the Civil War. During this period, land transportation was very difficult. Some of the old Indian trails, such as the Olean, N.Y., to Emporium trail and the main Iroquois trail from Olean to Kittanning via the Kane area, became public highways. However, the waterways were the key early transportation routes. Streams were heavily used during the lumbering era. Oswayo Creek and the Allegheny River were considered as highways very early, and Tunungwant “Tuna” Creek was declared a public highway in 1828. Many towns became “ports,” such as Smethport and Port Allegany, because they were at the head of navigation or were used as ports of entry. It was the lumber industry which prompted more dense settlement and led to the organization of many municipal governments. In fact, the creation of nearly all townships coincides with heavy lumbering activity in that particular area. The two original townships, Ceres and Sergeant, were created because of early settlements at two locations. Ceres Township contained the northern two-thirds of what is now McKean County, while Sergeant, which lost large amounts of territory later when Cameron and Elk counties were formed, contained the southern one-third of what is
now McKean. There were only 22 changes in township names and lines after 1804. The oldest settlement in the county dates to 1798 at Ceres. The area became one of the original townships. Settlement in Sergeant, the other original township, dates back only to 1809 at Instanter and Bunker Hill near the present village of Clermont. Reportedly, the first school in the county was established at Instanter that year. With the exception of Sergeant Township, all early settlements were located along the Allegheny River and its major tributaries. By 1810, settlements had been established on the Allegheny River at Corydon (Corydon Township), Allegheny Bridge (Eldred Township) and Morrison (Hamilton Township); and on Potato Creek at Farmers Valley (Keating Township). By 1815, Canoe Place on the Allegheny (Liberty Township) and the Norwich Township settlements on Potato Creek were established. Settlements in the Tuna Valley along Kendall Creek and near the state line existed by 1825 (Bradford Township). As the lumber industry spread, Turtlepoint in 1836 (Annin Township), Prentisvale in 1842 (Otto Township) and Marshburg (Lafayette Township) in the 1830s, were settled. The settlement of the isolated central and southwestern portions of the county occurred very late, nearly half a century after the original settlements. This area was occupied by the followers of Thomas Kane (Hamlin and Wetmore townships). Finally, in 1880, Foster Township was divided from Bradford Township. By 1840, there were still only a few thousand residents in McKean County. Smethport had become the only noteworthy settlement and was incorporated as a borough in 1844. The county seat, named for an agent of the Old Holland Land Co., experienced the construction of a courthouse in
1826, the establishment of the first academy for educational purposes in 1829 (which did not begin operation until 1837), and the publication of the first newspaper, the “Forester,” in 1832. In the mid-1800s, streams remained the best routes of transportation. Some roads were established, but they were alternately dust paths and mud sinks. When wet, the roads were nearly impassable. What few roads were established followed old Indian trails, including the old Iroquois Main Road and the Olean, N.Y., to Emporium road via Smethport. Early roads were the Jersey Shore Pike Extension via Ceres, Kings Run and Two-Mile to Canoe Place; the East-West Route via Burtville, Canoe Place, Smethport, Lafayette and Marshburg to Kinzua; and the main north-south route and perhaps the oldest road via Emporium, Rich Valley, North Creek, Instanter and Tuna Creek to Ellicottville, N.Y. Stream crossings were very difficult. The only substantial early bridges were across the Allegheny River and Potato Creek. When formed, McKean County was much larger in territory than it is today. A part of Sergeant Township was lost to the creation of Elk County in 1843. An extremely large area, the Emporium-Shippen area of more than 100 square miles, was lost when Cameron County was created in 1870. McKean also lost small parts of territory along the Allegheny River to Warren County in 1864. All of these territorial losses were due to the difficulty of traveling long distances to the county seat at Smethport. One of the most interesting stories of early settlement in McKean County was in the southwestern part of the county. This area was extremely isolated and near no navigable streams. Thomas L. Kane, of Philadelphia, purchased large tracts ...continued on page A-3
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THE BRADFORD ERA
THURSDAY, JULY 2, 2026
Early history of logging, railroads intertwined By Jim Buck
According to lumber region historian Jim Nelson, the railroad engine evolved to accommodate the needs of the logging companies. The Shay and Climax engines were slow, powerful and lighter than their counterparts used on the main passenger lines. The nimble Shay and Climax engines did not require an expensive bed of gravel beneath the cross-ties — a necessity for heavier engines. The logging railroads were built to last only as long as the timber in a given valley — they often rested on rails secured to logs placed like cross-ties on the bare ground. And the logging engines, because they were not as long as traditional engines, were able to negotiate tighter curves. This saved the owners money because their rails could follow the twisting features of the landscape — the straighter the line, the more costly excavation was required. In a diary entry dated Sept. 30, 1889, Ferrin Blaisdell describes his brother Philo’s ride on a logging railroad: “Philo went to a mill last Tuesday about 14 miles away from Carrollton, N.Y. In coming back out of the woods, the train had 12 cars, and each one had its brakes set, and all the wheels were stopped, (but) the train could not be stopped and slid down the track with fire flying from each wheel. He felt glad when they reached the bottom and said he would never (again) be caught on a like train.” At this time, industrial expansion was at full throttle in the United States, and steam-powered locomotives, saw mills and log loaders helped increase the cut from year to year. The growing nation was developing an insatiable appetite for wood. Even though wood had been replaced by coal as the primary source of heat in most
Photos provided by the Bradford Landmark Society The men in this logging camp take time out to have their photo taken. At least one woman, seen in the window in the background, and child apparently also lived in the unidentified camp.
homes, the coal mines were consuming huge amounts of wood for pit props. Then there was the wood that went into railroad ties, railroad bridges, oil derricks and homes for the growing population. And with the Civil War came a huge demand for leather — a product produced from animal skins treated with tannin, a substance derived from the bark of hemlock trees. The first tannery in McKean County opened in the mid1850s in Port Allegany. Three decades later, Coudersport would become the regional hub of the tanning industry. Companies such as U.S. Leather (later renamed the Central Pennsylvania Lumber Co.) bought up over one million acres of forest land to ensure a steady supply of hemlock bark, a crucial raw material, according to Nelson. In 1888 alone, McKean County yielded 225,000 cords of hemlock bark, while Potter County produced 150,000 cords. There was a time at the beginning of the tannery boom, during which the bark was peeled and the hemlock trees were left to rot because there was no market for the wood. However, the extent of this practice may have been exaggerated by uninformed observers. Normally, the peeled hemlock trunks were
sometimes left to dry in the woods for a year before being sent to the mill. According to James E. Defibaugh, author of “History of the Lumber Industry of America,” an average one-acre stand of virgin hemlock yielded about 15,000 board feet of timber. But the yield would have been about 40,000 board feet for well-watered sites and occasionally a single acre could yield up to 100,000 board feet. Between 1872 and 1885, McKean County’s logging industry began to be shaped by new men, whose family names remain associated with this area even today: Kane, Blaisdell and Goodyear. John Kane was a wealthy Philadelphia judge who served as the executor of an estate that included
132,000 acres in McKean, Cameron and Elk counties. Judge Kane’s son, Tom, arrived in McKean County around 1872, looking for opportunities to promote railroads and coal mining. Between 1874 and 1876, Thomas Kane went to a tax sale and picked up 95,000 acres in Sergeant, Wetmore and Hamlin townships, and soon became the proprietor of a saw mill in Kane. Between 1876 and 1883, Thomas Kane built two railroads, the first to Mount Alton — where the coal seam was quickly exhausted — then to southern Elk and northern Jefferson counties, where coal was more abundant. On the death of Thomas Kane in 1883, the family business was taken over by Elisha Kent Kane, who put
up a new saw mill in Kushequa. He quickly found that more land would have to be purchased to keep the mill supplied with timber. The first local effort at reforestation was launched in 1901 by Elisha Kane, who had spruce and basswood saplings planted on the denuded hillsides around Kushequa. Historian Thomas Taber describes the result: “The trees grew too slowly in comparison to the cherry and maple saplings that soon sprouted and choked them out.” Today, the hillsides around Kushequa are thickly covered with black cherry, maple and other hardwood species that present a canopy of green to tourists who ride the excursion train out onto the bridge that Kane built over the Kinzua Creek near Kushequa. By 1907, the timber on the Kane lands in McKean County was exhausted and Taber reports that Elisha Kane made the trip to Georgia and took an option on a large tract of virgin pine. The family was forced to decide whether to stay or go. Taber recounts the moment this way: “Possibly, (Elisha Kane) didn’t want to leave for he is remembered as a person who honestly liked his employees and would do everything he could for them. The question — should we move south and increase our wealth or remain in
Horses were often used to transport logs. The size of this log yard can be gauged by comparing it to the large draft horses in the center aisle.
Kushequa? The vote was unanimous. They stayed.” In 1908, the Kushequa mill sawed its last log, but a year later the town was reborn thanks to the clay in the surrounding hills. Within a short time, three brick and tile plants had replaced the defunct mill. The Blaisdell family’s presence in the area began in 1885, when they built a kindling wood factory in Carrollton. The family had gotten into the kindling business three years previously and found it to be a profitable business. Kindling factories bought the scraps produced by saw mills and turned them into little oval bundles about three inches across and two inches thick. This bundle was wrapped in flammable string that terminated at the paper label. To light a coal stove, you placed the bundled kindling among the coals and lit the label, which in turn would light the string, the wood and the coal. The little bundles sold for 2 cents each in New York City. To work, the kindling had to be dry, and the pieces had to be small. Therefore, the kindling factory contained a gang bolter that cut the scraps into strips one inch thick. These strips then passed through a 19-saw gang to be cut into 2.5-inch lengths. A conveyor belt then carried the chunks to a silo-type drying kiln lined with steamfilled pipes. Finally, the dried wood arrived at the bundling room, where children ran the machines that made the finished bundles. According to Taber, bundlers were paid 16 cents per 100 bundles, and a real good bundler could do 1,000 in an 11-hour day. Philo Blaisdell invented the bundling machine. His son George would later invent the Zippo lighter. By the mid-1890s, the Blaisdells owned 22 such kindling factories, ...continued on page B-7