A PIONEER WOMAN’S ACCOUNT OF LIFE IN POTTER COUNTY PENNSYLVANIA

During the nation’s Bicentennial celebration in 1976, the Potter County Historical Society published a book featuring stories on the life of early residents. One of those articles featured recollections of life in the 1800’s for Annis Coleman.

Much has been written about the pioneering male and the hardships in providing for his family, but little has been recorded about the pioneer wife and mother. The following paragraphs may help, taken from a newspaper interview of Mrs. Annis Coleman on her 92nd birthday.

Mrs. Coleman, whose father was John Keating Burt, married Andrew Horace Coleman on September 23, 1856, and he died on September 11, 1933. His grandfather was the first postmaster at (Port Allegany) Canoe Place. Mrs. Coleman died October 18, 1960, at the age of 100 years having been born on March 25, 1860, on the same spot where she died.

Speaking of pioneer days in Burtville, Mrs. Coleman was comparing prices of then and now when she came to flour. “Flour?” she questioned. “We raised our own wheat and carried it on horseback to a mill to be ground. I have no idea what it would have cost on the market then! The same with sugar. We tapped our maple trees and made sugar every spring to last us a year! We raised sheep for wool and my mother carded it, even making the wool batts for our quilts. Some folks raised their own flax too.”

She tells the story of her Grandmother Lyman rushing out to bring in the cows before a thunderstorm struck late in the afternoon. Her husband was away at the time. Getting the cows to the river, they became frightened of the storm and refused to cross. Laying her baby under a tree, she finally drove the cattle across, but darkness had fallen when she returned, and she could not find the baby. Wolves were beginning to howl, and she was about done in from her frantic running up and down the riverbank when another flash of lightning finally revealed the baby under the tree.

“With six brothers, there was a lot of knitting to be done,” she remembers. “We knitted socks of wool for winter and cotton for summer. We also knitted suspenders for the men, using the leather tops of old shoes to make the ‘ends for the buttonholes. We also knitted “elastics” from string to hold up our long stockings.

The settlement of Burtville was larger in her early days than it is now. There were three stores and a United Brethren Church. The latter was struck by lightning and was never rebuilt. In later years she remembers the circuses that traveled by foot from Coudersport to Port Allegany to Smethport passing by her home with the calliopes, camels and other animals. Elephants, however, would not cross the bridge at Burtville, having to be led down over the bank, through the water and up the opposite side.

Bread was baked from the family’s own flour. Raised pancakes were made in the fall using buckwheat grown on the farm and soda instead of yeast. Each night some of thebatter was saved to start a new batch of pancakes in the morning. Sometimes this was kept up continually until spring with the batter pan never going entirely empty. Cook stoves were huge black iron affairs with baking ovens in the lower part, warming ovens over the top and a deep side well for heating water.

Pioneer women cored apples, strung them on string and placed them along with ears of corn in the attic for winter use. There were no canning jars at that time. Socially, there were raising bees when neighbors gathered to erect a barn, quilting bees for the women, hayrides and sleighrides for the youngsters. Toys were unheard of as even the children had much work to do. Housewives made their own candles for home1ighting and for use in lanterns.

Historical Sketches of Potter County 1776 -1976 So Your Children Can Tell Their Children

Pages 64-68

Photo: Page 21