It was an ordinary day. Just recently finished reading a short story posted in The Journal of Lancaster County's Historical Society titled "If Logs Could Talk: Remembering Manor Street's Last Log House." Manor Street, in southwest Lancaster, was home to close to fifteen one-story log houses in the late eighteenth century. They covered much of the first two blocks of Manor Street. One particular house, an old log house at 442 Manor Street, was the last surviving member of that first generation of homes along Manor Street. It was demolished to make room for a parking lot. Luckily...it was the only house on that strip of Manor Street that had a photograph taken of it. The photo served as a good foundation for further research to tell the full story of the now-vanished house, thereby providing a glimpse of the earliest days of what were known as Cabbage Hill. The ancient log house at 442 Manor St. was one of the first houses to be built on Manor Street which at one time was known as Blue Rock Road. It stood on the southeast side of Manor Street for parts of three centuries. Its log frame and raised limestone foundation had been hidden from view for many years by weatherboarding, siding and concrete. Residents of the neighborhood had no idea that it was constructed from hand-hewn logs, or how old it really was. The years had not been kind to the old house, thus its historical significance was nearly forgotten. Then in the 1960s, the county government developed a list of eighteenth-century city buildings of historic and architectural interest with the idea of preserving the buildings. The log house at 442 Manor was the only building in southwest Lancaster that was included on the list. The report stated that the building should be protected from demolition. But, three months later, in the name of progress, the old log house on Manor was demolished for off-street parking. The Lancaster newspaper printed a story in the paper telling about another city landmark falling before wreckers. It reported that the house was believed to be one of the oldest, in not the oldest, in this section of the city....probably about 200 years old. The article discussed the origin of the house in the early days of Bethelstown, the first neighborhood on Cabbage Hill, dating back to the mid-1700. The story provided some background on the Bethel family who had purchased the land in the 1730s and then laid out building lots in 1762. And...just like that...the place was gone! All that remained was the black and white photo! The old log house had one story with an attic level above, as well as a cellar at street level in front.
The house extended about 23 feet along the southeast side of Manor Street. It consisted of four bays, with two windows to the left of the front door and one window to the right. There was a single dormer cut into the salt roof, which was steeply pitched and which projected over the front of the hose by about three feet. A single small chimney was located on the left edge of the ridgeline on the roof. The first level of the house was elevated six feet about the street on a rough limestone foundation that had been reinforced with concrete. Inside the house were three rooms on the first level and two on the half-story attic level, providing effective total living space of slightly less that 1,000 square feet. And...just like that...it was demolished!! During demolition it was discovered that beneath the weatherboards and siding was a structure made of thick, squared-off, hand-hewn logs. The logs were arranged in an alternating stacked fashion, and locked in place on the corners by morticed ends. Wooden pegs held the door and window jambs in place. It appeared from historical records, maps and photographs, that numerous modifications were made over the years. The house probably would have been characteristic of the Swiss-style variant of colonial Pennsylvania German architecture. It was thought that it was built about 200 years before. Betheltown was laid out in 1762 so it could be assumed that this house was part of that town. And...just like that...it was destroyed! Lost to history due to someone's idea that it should be demolished! I was born and raised it the historical town of Lancaster and never knew the story of 442 Manor Street until a few months ago. How awful that someone decided to knock down this place because the place was too old and didn't fit into the neighborhood. I wish I might have had the chance to at least take photos of the place before it was demolished. Never will happen! What else can I write? It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.
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