Preserving Reviving Appreciating Local History

Kasey Cox

Our bookstore, like many others across the nation, participates in the weekly reporting of our bestsellers. While we do sell our share of Stephenie Meyer and John Grisham, our report of top sellers is as different from the New York Times bestseller list as the Bronx is from Galeton. The main reason for this is not that we are Ridgerunners as opposed to Manhattanites; and, anyway, our bestseller list is compiled from books purchased by tourists and locals alike. Strangely enough, these are often the same books. We sell a disproportionate amount of our books from one section of our store – the shelf labeled “local interest, local history, local authors.”

When people travel, they want souvenirs that they can’t get somewhere else. Tourists seek out the “local color” books because they genuinely want to learn the history and flavors of our beautiful area. At first, I found this surprising; now I find it heartening. But this is a “secret” that Arcadia Press has known all along.

In the short review I wrote for the July issue of Mountain Home, I mentioned the excellent work that Arcadia Press does with the series of books they produce, focusing on the history of small towns or of city neighborhoods. Arcadia Press finds local writers and researchers who have a passion for working with historical preservation. Arcadia Press understands that the true history of America is told through the stories and pictures of individual places; this makes reviewing their books for Mountain Home such an excellent match.

Just as tourists enjoy buying books celebrating local flavor, the people from an area want books that describe their roots. I still hate disappointing those searching for increasingly rare and hard to find local histories that only had a limited number of copies printed. One such book is Bill Pippin’s thoroughly researched, amusingly told history of Galeton, entitled Wood Hick, Pigs-Ear & Murphy. This book was published in 1976, and owners of the book still jealously guard their copies. Whether you are one of those Wood Hick owners or are just waiting for someone to die so you can have their copy, I’ve got good news for you: in late June of this year, Arcadia Press published Around Galeton and Coudersport, by Ronald W. Dingle. Since this new book is part of Arcadia’s “Postcard History Series”, it features more photos than Pippin’s book, which is a treat, since many of the images come from the author’s private collection.

I found Ron Dingle’s book a welcome addition to information available on Potter County history. Ron himself obviously loves the area, since he has been coming here since the mid-1960’s, moving here permanently upon his retirement from the Chef Boy-Ar-Dee plant in Milton. Ron is currently a member of four historical societies in north and central Pennsylvania, giving him access to the people and information necessary to creating this book.

Dovetailing into the stories illuminated by the “Postcard History” of Galeton and Coudersport is another new Arcadia publication, Pine Creek Villages, by David Ira Kagan. This collection, which just became available at the end of July, chronicles the historic buildings, inns, stores, houses, train stations, and businesses up and down the Pine Creek watershed. Featuring separate chapters on Torbert and Tombs Run, Ramsey, Waterville, Jersey Mills, Cammal, Slate Run, Cedar Run, Leetonia, and Blackwell, delighted readers will be able to revisit places they thought they knew, to see what they were like at various stages from the late 1800’s to the 1960’s.

All railroad enthusiasts, be sure to take note of Kagan’s book, since much of the history of the Pine Creek Villages focuses on the logging railroads that went up into the mountains, the locomotives that brought down the virgin timber, and the people who came here to work in what was the frontier. The photos and stories in this book remind us that in order to “manifest destiny” in the United States, settlers often had to go through the Appalachians. Some stayed, but in many cases, this area of the country remained unsettled, wild, pristine, long after places farther west had bustling cities and towns. Reading this made me appreciate again the rugged beauty, the quiet, the pace of life we enjoy in this part of Pennsylvania.


Kasey Cox is the manager of From My Shelf books, Wellsboro’s independent bookstore. Both Ron Dingle and David Kagan will be visiting the bookstore in September. See their website for details, at www.wellsborobookstore.com