1600s through the 1800s
A Farming Tradition
04
As you walk up the wooded driveway, our tour will describe how this region was settled.
This area was settled by Welsh immigrants in the late 1600s. By the 1700s, saw mills, papermaking mills, powder mills and metal works lined the banks of Mill Creek. Through the Industrial Revolution, the area south of Mill Creek and west of the Schulkyill River (now Lower Merion Township) was predominantly ploughed farmland. It has been said that, due to its high ground, one could see from Lower Merion down to the Schuylkill River. During that time, the Ramsey family owned this land which was part of a 65 acre plot. They most probably farmed this land.
Ellis Ramsey (1808-1875) was the “Hotel Keeper” of the Green Tree Hotel at the intersection of Old Gulph Rd and Spring Mill Rd. According to the 1850 census, Ramsey and his wife Mary had eight children ranging from their oldest, Andrew (11), to infant twin boys, Howard and Sylvester (Sylvester died a week after this census was taken, and shares a headstone with his twin, who passed away at age 22). Two of their sons served in the Civil War: First Lieutenant Theodore F. (1843-1890, 15th Pennsylvania Cavalry Regiment) and Corporal William Horn (1841-1931, 1st Pennsylvania Cavalry, 44th Regiment). William later became a storekeeper and merchant, and after 1874, also served as Post Master in his General Store at the intersection of Lancaster Ave and Bryn Mawr Ave. Ellis and Mary passed away within weeks of each other in 1875, and two years later their heirs sold the 65 acres to a Pennsylvania Railroad Company executive Edmund Smith (1829-1895).
Now, as we approach Oakwell Mansion, we detour, stepping off the path and onto the grass toward a tall white oak where our tour will continue.
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