THE OLD HOME WEEK BOOK - History of the Village of Prospect, PA


Made up of SKETCHES of History, Biography and Reminiscences pertaining to PROSPECT, Butler County, Pennsylvania

By Andrew White McCulloch and David Luther Roth - 1912

Announcement for Old Home Week Services, September 29-30, 1907.
Please announce services in the churches as follows:
Thursday - 10 a.m. in the U.P. church
Thursday - 2 p.m. in the Lutheran church
Friday - 10 a.m. in the M.E. church
Friday - 2 p.m. in the Presbyterian church/
In agreement of the Clergy of the four churches


Foreward
The inception of this book arose with the celebration of Old Home Week, September 28-30, 1907. From the journal of the writer the subjoined extracts are taken as bearing on that point:

Wednesday, 28 - Went with Warren, Katharine and Carl to Prospect to attend the Old Home Week celebration. Met Elvira Kinkaid and Emma Breedon on the train and many other companions when we arrived. The old home village never looked so beautiful. Saw a game of baseball in which Prospect beat Butler 6 to 5. This evening A.W.McCulloch read a historical sketch of the town. The young people had a corn roast.

Thursday, 29 - The day was perfect as to the weather and as to the celebration. The churches were opened for services, of which I attended those at the U.P. and the Lutheran. Mr. Martsolf was buried from our church today. Then I arranged for the publication of A.W McCulloch's history and took subscriptions for over 100 copies. We got some of the old drum corps together and paraded the streets just as of yore. A basket picnic filled out the day in "Kirk's Woods." This evening we had music and speeches in the grove. It was fine.

Friday, 30 - J.C. ("Coon") Buechle brought to me a copy of my great grand-father's will and two copies of "The Butler Centinel" of 1821 and 1826, one of the first newspapers published in Butler county. Came home this evening. Never was there a more pleasant re-union than this in Prospect. Thousands of people were there, yet no drunkeness, no disorder and no police. I was tired but happy, happy, happy.

So far the journal. Mr. McCulloch's health was impaired and he was prevented from completing the work so well begun in the historical sketch which he read and which gave tthe idea which was the nucleus of the effort to have him prepare a more complete history. The money received on subscriptions and the promise given that a history should be published made the writer morally and financially responsible for its appearance. Under the circumstances he has prepared what is now presented, in the hope that his effort may not be condemned - seeing it is the work of a substitute for that of one far better qualified than himself to write the history of our dear native town. The writer began his work as here presented, Oct., 1911.

A few remarks explanatory are in order here,

First, It is not to be expected that much history of more than local interest has ever been made in a little inland village of fewer than five hundred inhabitants.

Second, What history has been made has been largely lost because nobody recorded it.

Third, The attempt is now made to gather such chapters of what has not perished as may be possible; which will be necessarily presented in fragmentary form and without any special continuity.

The paper of Mr. McCulloch, with which this book opens, covers the earlier portion of the history as completely as it will ever be written. The journals and memoranda of the present writer, going back to the time when he was sent away to boarding school in 1864, a period of almost fifty years, are all that he has to rely on to assist his memory in drawing the picture of the vanished life of Prospect.

D. Luther Roth

Pittsburgh, Pa., 1912.

CONTENTS

MR. MCCULLOCH'S PAPER
Mr. McCulloch's Paper

Chapter I
A Pioneer's Testament

Chapter II
A Newspaper of 100 Years Ago

Chapter III
Settling in the Wilderness

Chapter IV
Sports

Chapter V
Spellings and School Exhibitions

Chapter VI
Hunting

Chapter VII
Droves

ChapterVIII
The Big Fourth

Chapter IX
The Robin's Nest

Chapter X
The Old Stone House

Chapter XI
Mohawk

Chapter XII
Our Soldiers

Chapter XIII
Morgan's Raid

Chapter XIV
Cyrus Dunlap

Chapter XV
Eliza Keyes Warren

Chapter XVI
House Cleaning

Chapter XVII
Surveying the Franklin Road, The Big Storm, Jacky Jones and Buckheart.

Chapter XVIII
Christmas

Chapter XIX
Blackbirds and Wild Pigeons

Chapter XX
The Indians

Chapter XXI
Biographical

Chapter XXII
Reminiscences of Thomas Critchlow

Chapter XXIII
The Roth Family

Chapter XXIV
Addenda



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