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From: "David & Carol Eddleman" <>
Subject: Ayr/Air Twp.
Date: Sat, 8 Feb 2003 20:48:03 -0500

From The History of Bedford, Somerset and Fulton Counties, Pa., 1884,
Waterman, Watkins & Co., p. 632.

To write the complete early history of Ayr township and the earlier
settlement of the territory comprised within its original bounds would be to
write the history of that part of Fulton county lying east of the summit of
Sideling hill, and north of the Maryland line, as well as that part of
Huntingdon county now embraced in Dublin, Shirley, Tell, Cromwell,
Springfield, Clay, and part of Cass, and probably part of Union townships of
that county; as, also that part of Franklin county now embraced in Warren
township (Little Cove), parts of Peters and Metal, and possibly part of
Fannet townships, cover, at the time of the organization of Ayr, an area
almost equal to the State of Rhode Island, and fully double the present area
of Fulton county. To do this would exceed the limits prescribed for this
sketch and must therefore limit the history of Old Ayr--the "Mother of
Townships."

The name of the township has been variously written at different stages of
its existence. The first record of it is Aire. Since then it has passed
through various styles of orthography, as Ear, Eyre, Eyer, Ayre, Are, Air,
and finally has settled down, nearly universally, to the more correct and
classical Ayr; although ther are still some who adhere to the last preceding
orthography--Air.

The territory, as above described, had its first municipal life in
Cumberland county, as Aire township. The exact date of its organization is
not known. At the time (1750) of the organization of Cumberland county,
this territory was yet the unpurchased domain of the Indian, but on the 6th
of July, 1754, the Penns, by their agents, purchased it from the chiefs of
the Six Nations and it at once became a part of Cumberland county. The
Great Cove and contiguous parts were then, and had been for a long time,
settled by a considerable number of adventurous pioneers, and it is
reasonable to asume that as soon after "Purchase of 1754" as the case could
be reached by court proceedings, the township was organized.

(Fulton County was formed from the eastern part of Bedford County in 1850.)

This is the long answer!

Carol C. Eddleman

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