Section 37:  Killing Frosts of 1859

The heavy frosts of June, 1859, made that a gloomy summer. The apples were as large as pigeon eggs and they were frozen to the core -- not one apple was left in my lot and but few in the county. The wheat that year promised an unusually good crop. It was well grown, in the shooting blade when struck, and full of sap and the heads were frozen dead.

Old man Myers had a nice patch of three or four acres on the Potter farm. Not a grain of wheat was left. Some time after it was cut for hay and it made good feed for his stock. Pretty much all the fall grain in the county was cut for hay. At that time it looked hard for our people. I could not see how actual want could be avoided. Not the one-half of the laboring men and farmers had anything laid up ahead to fall back. I immediately ordered flour from Pittsburgh to last me a year and paid a round price for it. But all the farmers went to work to sow buckwheat and it turned out a good crop. Special attention was given to potatoes and corn. I suppose there was no absolute want in the county. It was reported some Dutch settlers up about Lucinda Furnace lived for a week or two on buttermilk and potatoes, but the year passed with less trouble than was expected.

The wheat was not killed on the Fox farm at the mouth of the Clarion and Samuel M. Fox made himself popular that fall selling wheat to the farmers for seed at a dollar and a half a bushel when the selling price was two and a half and as high as three dollars. The loss of the wheat crop was felt less from the fact that Clarion County always imported flour ever since I came into it. When the furnaces were in blast in the county, a large portion of the flour was brought from Pittsburgh and today the flour sold by our merchants is principally imported from abroad, though most of them have less or more county flour -- which I prefer to the Vienna or White River and always use.