Not many people owned buggies when I was a young man. They cost from $200 to $250.Father bought a two-seated surrey from Hale Clark of Saltsburg. Father went to Kiskiminetas Township to vote. He got tired of going such a distance and along about 1860 he got John Smith, of Eldersridge, who was a surveyor, to make a survey to form a new township called “South Bend,” taking off three school districts from Kiskiminetas Township.

When it came up first and was put to a vote, Father lost out and was very angry, but by the time of the next election, enough public sentiment was created, and he was successful in having the township created.

Previous to this, he got a new road surveyed, which started at the locust grove on his farm and ran down to Sam George’s run. Silas King was very angry over this, as it caused him to build some extra fences, satisfied to the change.

The Indiana County Fair was a yearly event.

Father was a stonemason by trade. He was five feet, ten inches in his stocking feet, and weighed about 160 pounds. He was a rugged, hard-working man.

Large families were not uncommon. Seven or eight children was the average size family. Some had nine and ten children.

Father took the contract for building three schoolhouses in Kiskiminetas Township, the first of three frame school buildings. He built the Wherry School, the Barrel Valley and the Olivet. Dan King and Ben Kinnard did the carpenter work. At that time the lumber had to be planed, plowed and grooved by hand. The lumber was hauled from the “Pines” to the lower (Jim Wray) farm and prepared in the barn.

Father used to own a horse called “Mike.” When Judge White went to the army and wanted a horse to ride, father got Alexander Montgomery to ride “Mike” up to Indiana, and he was chosen in preference to three or four horses brought in for the same purpose. The horse was a good loper. White was then a colonel in the army and in some battle was taken prisoner to Libby Prison, where he later made his escape. Bloodhounds were sent after him and he was recaptured, returned to prison and later exchanged for another colonel. Another soldier jumped on Mike and rode him out of the battle and made his escape. Later Harry White’s brother Richard got the horse.