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From: "janice olds" <>
Subject: [PA-LAC] ATHERTON Surname History of Dunmore 1937
Date: Mon, 11 Aug 2003 00:35:33 -0400

This look-up was for the surname ATHERTON though there are references in the passages to other surnames.
jho

"History of Dunmore Commemorating Seventy-Fifth Anniversary 1937"

p. 9, EARLY SETTLERS, Road Building
"For years before William Penn received this land from the English King, the Indians followed a well-beaten path over the Moosic Mountains, traveling between the Delaware and Susquehanna Rivers. The first settlers to this part of the valley some one hundred and fifty years ago [1937], widened this path enough to allow their rude ox carts to pass along. Thus the old India trail became the Connecticut road, and has since been variously designated as the Upper Wyoming Road, Wilderness Road, Shehola Path, Cobb's Road and the Army Road.

In November 1772, a public highway was built on this route by the Susquehanna Company of Connecticut and called the Connecticut Road. Every person owning a settler's right in the Wyoming or Lackawanna valleys assisted in the construction of the "Rode from Dillaware River to Pittstown" according to the records of Westmoreland. The men set out to work on the eastern end of the highway were paid "three shillings a day lawful money," but those working nearer home on the Moosic Mountains were voted "one shilling and six pence per day and no more." Isaac Tripp, who had charge of the construction was allowed "five shillings lawful money per day."

The travelers toiled toward Wyoming with heavy burdens drawn by oxen used this road for twenty years. It was not kept in good condition and evidently some of the settlers became dissatisfied with the original location of parts of it, for the Luzerne County court records, November sessions, 19792 contain this entry:
"On petition of Constant Searls and other inhabitants of the township of Providence praying for viewers to be appointed to view and lay out roads. The court orders that Constant Searls, Isaac Tripp, Cornelius Atherton, James Lewis, James Abbott and Daniel Taylor be and they are hereby appointed to view and lay out the road - from the township of Pittston so far toward Shehola as the township of Providence extends."

The road was load out as directed and a report of the work duly returned to the court. The report gives the exact location of the old Connecticut Road through what is now Scranton and Dunmore, as it existed during George Washington's administration..."

pg. 32 History of Churches and Cemeteries - Dunmore Cemetery
"In 1828 or thereabouts, Levi Depuy, who lived on the Blakely road above the built-up portion of the village of Dunmore, donated one-quarter of an acre of his land to the public for burial purposes. Gabriel Dunning was the first, or among the first, to be interred in this plot. Inasmuch as the lot was not fenced, nor cared for, and the people were free to make interments where they chose, the appearance of the cemetery was slovenly and far from attractive. The quarter acre was soon occupied and the adjoining land was being encroached up for interments without warrant when the Depuy farm was purchased by the Pennsylvania Coal Company. John B. Smith, superintendent of the company, thereupon proposed to give five acres additional, from the adjoining land for burial purposes, on condition that it be kept fenced and in good order.

In pursuance of this generous offer, in 1864, an association was organized, and application for a charter for the Cemetery Association of Dunmore was made by eighteen incorporates to the Court of Common Pleas of Luzerne County, and the charter was granted by the Court on December 5th, 1864..."

pg. 52 History of Churches and Cemeteries (con't from pg. 32) Dunmore Cemetery

"...Original Incorporators
William Letchworth, William Harper, Daniel Swartz, Daniel Wagner, Stewart Dilley, James Young, G. B. Wert, Andrew C. Bryden, David Smith, John G. Nichols, Henry Stewart, Joseph Comstock, C. H. Derby, William Pearson, D. P. Barton, S. W. Ward, Henry Webber, James C. Bryden, George Filer.

The total number of interments shown by the records as of June 16, 1937 is 13,584.

The present officers [1937] of the Association are as follows:
President - George G. Brooks; Vice-President, Charles S. Weston; Sec'y-Treas., Charles P. Savage
Board of Trustees: George G. Brooks, J. Curtis Platt, Worthington Scranton, John H. Williams, Charles H. Welles, Jr., W. W. Inglis, Charles S. Weston, and John Atherton."

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