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Intention of Project
More than just strict gathering of those who were Quakers, profiles here show associations with others in the general community in this part of Montgomery County PA. In record keeping, the minutes of Gwynedd and Plymouth are often seen to be one and the same. See Roberts, page 67
Location
bounded on the north by Whitpain, east by Whitemarsh, south by the Schuylkill river and the borough of Conshohocken which used to be part of it; roughly 3 1/2 by 2 1/2 miles. Before Conshohocken was lopped off, it contained 5,661 acres. Conshocken is 321 acres.
In 1858 there were 58 lime kilns and there was iron discovered in many nearby locations as well, something that, with the coming of the railroad caused boom years for Conshohocken. The Alan Wood Iron Works was one such business
Population of Plymouth Township
- 1800 : 572
- 1840 : 1,417
- 1880 : 1,916
- In 1850 there were 220 houses, 234 families and 91 farms
- In 1883 there were 498 taxables (all from T.W. Bean p.1029 in his History of Montgomery County, c. 1887
The Quaker Influence
“The world is better for their having lived in it, which is more than can be said of some of those who in their generation have filled a larger space, perhaps in the public eye. They lived simple and unostentatious, but useful lives. They cared little as a rule for the good or evil opinion of the great world beyond them. They did what their hands found to do, regarding not the applause of men. Aspiring not to high honors, they were content to meet faithfully the requirements of duty, and to satisfy, as well as they could, the demands of conscience.” ~• Ellwood Roberts , from his account of the Plymouth Meeting (1900) and closely related communities
Plymouth Meeting and Fugitive Slaves
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hovenden_House,_Barn_and_Abolition_Ha...
in part: "The earliest and only abolitionists in Plymouth and Whitemarsh townships were Samuel Maulsby , Joseph Corson and [his son] Alan Wright Corson ." < Alan had his own safe harbor for the underground railroad: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_West_Corson_Homestead
"Maulsby and the Corsons co-founded the Plymouth Meeting Anti-Slavery Society in 1831, which initially had seven members and met at the Plymouth Friends Meeting House. They also co-founded the Montgomery County Anti-Slavery Society in 1837, which initially had about twenty members and met at various locations in Norristown."
"Frederick Douglass, former-slave and abolitionist, was the keynote speaker at an August 1847 anti-slavery convention held at the First Baptist Church of Norristown. His lecture was disrupted by about sixty ruffians standing outside and pelting the church's windows with rocks. A plot to abduct and lynch Douglass was thwarted."
Albertson and Dickinson Houses
2130 Sierra Road, Plymouth Meeting
"Home of the Plymouth Meeting Historical Society, the Albertson and Dickinson Homesteads were the first houses built in Plymouth Meeting. They helped jumpstart the economy here, and the first baby born in Plymouth Meeting was born in the Dickinson House."
https://www.plymtghistory.com/albertson-and-dickinson
https://pmfs1780.org/about-pmfs/history/
https://library.udel.edu/special/findaids/view?docId=ead/mss0255.xm...
- The majority of the correspondence and documents in this collection concerns Jacob Albertson's two sons, Josiah and Benjamin. In the 1830s and 1840s, Josiah and Benjamin were involved in the lime business, mining their land as was common in the Plymouth Meeting area of Pennsylvania.
- The Albertson family participated in building the Plymouth Railroad which was organized in 1836 to deliver lime. Josiah, who signed documents with the title "engineer," became manager of the railroad in 1839. The trains, carrying both freight and passengers, were pulled by horses. At the Conshohocken terminus a basin was dug, and train cars carrying lime traveled over the basin to dump their loads into waiting canal boats. However this process did not prove profitable and resulted in sheriff sales, litigation, and a removal of the tracks in the 1860s."
Sources
- Historical Society of Montgomery County, Pennsylvania. Bulletin of the Historical Society of Montgomery County, Pennsylvania. Norristown, Pennsylvania: Published by the Society. No. 12 (Fall 1959-Spring 1961). pp. 84-86.
- Roberts, Ellwood. Plymouth Meeting; its establishment and the settlement of the township . Norristown, Pennsylvania: Roberts Publishing Co., 1900.
- First Davis family of Plymouth Township https://www.jstor.org/stable/20085640?seq=3
- Hinshaw Quaker records
Maps
- http://maps.archives.upenn.edu/WestPhila1777/browse-parcels.php & http://maps.archives.upenn.edu/WestPhila1777/map.php 1777
- 1857 Plymouth Township
- 1857 Whitemarsh
- 1868 Plymouth Township
Contacts
http://www.plymouthmeetinghistoricalsociety.org/
2130 Sierra Road Plymouth Meeting, PA 19462
(267) 421-8252
Send message
info@plymouthmeetinghistoricalsociety.org
https://www.plymouthmeetingquakers.org/
2150 Butler Pike, Plymouth Meeting PA 19462
Tel: 215-542-8738 Email: office@plymouthmeetingquakers.org
Norristown Friends Quaker Meeting https://www.norristownfriends.org
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hovenden_House,_Barn_and_Abolition_Hall
https://www.plymouthmeetingquakers.org/Groups/341729/Burial_Ground....