cornerofmadness

Dad wanted me to see this American Revolution/ French & Indian war etc in Cross Creek PA. There was a fort here once, Fort Vance and a school for preachers and doctors, Cross Creek Academy that was there from 1826-1890. It is pretty amazing to be so big and popular at that time. It was at least a day if not two from Pittsburgh by carriage. Hell, there's still almost nothing there.

A neighbor spotted us and he was talking to us, telling us some of the history and eventually sold me a book on it. I didn't mind the 10$ since it will go to keeping the place nice. I uprighted veteran flags and tore out some invasive ivy that was destroying stones.

There were very old stones made of basalt which means they're in excellent shape compared to the limestone ones that have melted away. I got some nice symbolic stones plus two that I have never seen again and I've gone through six symbolism sites to no avail. I'll show them if anyone can id them.

The strangeness however is in a few things I observed like almost 3 dozen Revolutionary war vets buried here and not one died in the war. Almost no baby burials and very few teens. In fact most were aged over 80 years with many nearing 100 years. Giving that this was from the 1770s-1900, that is astounding. And it's giving me a story idea about spirits giving long life and luck.

And there was another strange thing as well, they had many headstones that said consort instead of wife. I'm not sure if that meant wife back then or not. I've never seen that either. One was spelled concert (oppsie)

ETA _ I forgot to mention Dad took me on a back road to see if we could spot a marker for Fort Vance (we couldn't) and then down another road I hadn't been on in 30 years to show me where his Aunt Mary was buried. Well, I've never heard of her. She apparently died very young before he was born. He, his brother and his cousin all remember going to the cemetery at the top of this ridge to care for her grave when they were young. It's got houses there now and Smith Township swears there was never a graveyard there even though the locals know better. WHo wants to bet they pulled a Poltergeist and just removed the headstones and someone's pool is on top my great aunt?

( hey look something other than San Antonio )