Halfway Brook

Photo of ice breaking up under the Barryville-Shohola Bridge with a middle support. Photo courtesy of M.B. Austin.
One very cold morning, about the first of January 1865, three teams of horses and mules were crossing the Barryville-Shohola bridge with two heavy loads
of wood.
The upper cable of the bridge (completed in 1856) parted near the center [...]

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This letter was written to Mary Ann Austin in Eldred, New York, from her niece, Addie Austin who lived in New York City. The bridge referred to is the Barryville-Shohola Bridge over the Delaware River, shown in the posts before and after this one.
New York, March 18, 1865
Dear Aunt Mary,
We have all been sick again [...]

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Postcard of Barryville Shohola Bridge and Lookout Mountain.
Courtesy of M.B. Austin.
Until 1856 there had only been a crude rope guided ferry that connected Shohola, Pennsylvania, to Barryville, New York. There became a need for a bridge with the building of the Erie Railroad Depot at Shohola, Pennsylvania.
A suspension bridge, designed by John Roebling, was built [...]

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During the winter, large quantities of lumber from the Halfway Brook mills were drawn to Barryville, made into rafts, then taken to Handsome Eddy, two or three miles further down the river. There they waited for the spring freshets.
At Handsome Eddy, considered a safe place for rafts no matter what the water level, the rafts [...]

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There was still no good way to travel on land in 1828. Whether you walked or rode a horse, the roads were rough and through the wilderness.
Whether by foot, horseback, canal or all three, Doctor Perkins left Poughkeepsie, New York, in 1829, and managed to arrive in Lumberland, where he would be the only physician [...]

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Sears Gardner was the Town of Lumberland’s supervisor in 1825, when a school was started for children in the area of Halfway Brook Village and Barryville. James Eldred, was the Town Clerk, Commissioner of Highways, and in July, Town Marshall.
The community felt a school was needed, and as was done in those times, a subscription [...]

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In late 1824, Garrett Wilson and three other men purchased Shohola Lumber property in Shohola, Pennsylvania, across from what was then called the River Settlement, now Barryville.
Mr. Wilson became the sole manager, and the company was
“…constantly engaged in cutting logs, drawing and placing them in the Shohola Brook where they lay until the water of [...]

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In 1800, Lumberland (then two years old), had a population of 733, most of whom had lumber-related jobs. Saw-mills operated on various streams. Halfway Brook was said to have had ten sawmills on its nine miles.
Enormous amounts of lumber were made into rafts and floated down one of the many rivers or brooks in the [...]

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The Halfway Brook (there is another one in New York) I write about, is in a most gorgeous area called the Upper Delaware River Region, in New York State. This Halfway Brook was the name of a nine-mile stream, before it became the name of the Village which is now Eldred.
Halfway Brook flowed [...]

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Note: I don’t know who wrote the following letter. “fs” is read as “ss”.
Narrows Burgh, March 1848
To Mifs Mary A. Eldred, Lumberland
My dear Friend,
I thought I would spend a few moments this day noon in writing to my long cherished friend. The scholars are playing outdoors and I am left alone in the schoolhouse. So [...]

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