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Sullivan County offers many natural points of interest worth exploring. From Ricketts Glen State Park to Worlds End State park, the Loaylsock Trail and everything in between, read about them here.
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Game Lands
Silent Whispers
Notes From the Ricketts Ghost Town
Two young ladies stand along the railroad tracks. The surrounding trees are heavy with wet snow under a slate-gray sky. They are wearing long woolen coats and boots made of leather. Kerchiefs on their heads offer minimal protection against the cold and wind. They are not smiling. Behind them the tracks sweep to the north and follow the Mehoopany Creek before turning back again towards the town of Lopez. Behind them and to their left, a wooden footbridge strikes across the creek. On the far end of the bridge several steps drop down and connect to a crude plank walkway that leads to the town hall. The two are facing in the direction of the general store and stave mill. To their right on the hill sits the hotel, Wyoming County schoolhouse, and a number of mostly modest homes.
The man about to take their picture re-positions his camera and makes some final adjustments. He is a professional free-lance photographer in the lucrative business of making postcards. Postcards are very popular these days and he has the local market cornered. The shutter is released with an audible click and the moment is forever frozen in time. The photographer gives the young ladies a nod and a smile in appreciation of their participation. It is all he can do. As a child of five he barely survived a battle with scarlet fever, measles, and whooping cough that left him deaf and mute. They part ways.
The names of the women near the tracks are unknown. On this day they are somebody’s daughters. They will become mothers, grandmothers, and great-grandmothers. They will pass away. The photographer is Ranald Douglas of Syracuse, NY. It is the winter of 1908. The name of this town is Ricketts. It is located atop the North Mountain in Northeastern Pennsylvania and is oriented in a Southwest to Northeast fashion in both Sullivan and Wyoming Counties. On this day it is a booming lumber town home to over 800 people of various lumbering occupations and their families. It has been here since 1890. It will remain here in its current form until roughly 1913.
State Game Lands #57 and #13 combine for an area of nearly 100,000 acres and stretch across and into four counties. These game lands are mostly mountainous and home to a wealth of wildlife including deer, black bear and wild turkey. It is a popular hunting ground for countless hunters, many from the Wyoming Valley. State Route 487 ascends North Mountain in Luzerne County passing Ricketts Glen State Park before dissecting the two game lands into more-or-less equal parts. This is the largest tract of contiguous game lands in the state of Pennsylvania, for all intents and purposes.
On the plateau, the road can feel desolate with game lands on either side for many miles. Sections near the park may give a person the impression of being in Maine. Boreal hemlock and spruce swamps make up a large portion of this area. Seeing a moose cross here may be unlikely but somehow seems plausible. There is a game lands parking lot on the west side of SR 487, just past Mountain Springs Road that beckons travelers to rest and try their cell phone. It offers hunters an ample place to park and start off into the woods in search of game. It is here that a few concrete foundations can be seen among a thick growth of spirea and blueberry bushes. A short walk across the road may find a visitor walking along a service road that follows the Mehoopany Creek.
After passing a few more foundations and the remains of a railroad trestle, the road sweeps to the north and follows the Mehoopany Creek for a short while before turning back again towards Lopez.
I have been serving as the Game Commission Land Manager for these and other state game lands in the Northeast Region since January of 2008. The primary mission of the agency is to manage wildlife and its habitat for current and future generations. However, game lands across Pennsylvania also often have areas that contain structures and other tangible property of historical significance that should be protected and preserved whenever possible. Game lands regulations highlight this concept by making it illegal to remove, or attempt to remove, any archaeological or historical artifacts. I have the honor of playing a part in managing, protecting, and providing informational education on such an area. The town of Ricketts played an important role in the development of the region, and the products produced there had statewide implications.
Today I find myself looking up at the old railroad bed from a flat area below, where the Mehoopany Creek and a small feeder stream meet. It is early spring and the growth of ferns and shrubs that will make searching for clues more difficult is only a few weeks away. I am trying to determine where the young ladies and the photographer stood and find remnants of the footbridge. Mostly, I am trying to verify the exact location of the Ricketts Town Hall.
The town of Ricketts was named after civil war Colonel Robert Bruce Ricketts. R.B. Ricketts was the fifth of nine children and was born on April 29, 1839. His father was a merchant and farmer in Orangeville, PA. The heroics of Battery F of the First Pennsylvania Light Artillery during the battle of Gettysburg are especially well known to civil war historians. Perhaps the most notable highlight of the military career of then Captain Ricketts was the role he played as the commander of “Ricketts Battery” in the successful defense of Cemetery Hill on the late afternoon of July 2, 1863. After the war, colonel Ricketts returned home to Orangeville a hero. For the rest of his life he was famously referred to by just about everyone simply as “Colonel.” The colonel soon started purchasing large tracts of timber land in Luzerne, Wyoming and Sullivan Counties. By 1873 he had amassed over 66,000 acres, most of it on North Mountain.
Colonel Ricketts eventually leased thousands of acres of land on North Mountain containing valuable virgin timber to the Trexler and Turrell Lumber Company toward the end of the 19th century. The town and related lumber operations that developed as a consequence of this business venture included a massive sawmill on the Sullivan county section of town and a barrel and heading mill on the Wyoming side. The two areas were (perhaps with a little tongue-in cheek) referred to as Uptown and Downtown Ricketts. The uptown area contained the sawmill, planning mill, horse stables, blacksmith shop, Lutheran Church, Patriotic Sons of American Hall, and a number of company homes. The Downtown area was home to the stave mill, drying sheds, train station, general store, post office, hotel and several homes. Years after the boom was over, this area was purchased by the PA Game Commission and became public land.
I had the good fortune of spending an early spring day with local historian and author Peter Tomasak who gracefully showed me several remnants of the “ghost town.” His book entitled In Command of Time Elapsed, The Life and Times of Robert Bruce Ricketts is an extensive and authoritative piece on the subject.
We first examined what remains of the Patriotic Sons of American Hall and a few other foundations on Church Row. The POSA was a nationwide fraternal organization formed in 1847 to uphold and keep alive patriotism and religious values. Chapters of the POSA still exist today and the organization has their own web site. Next we walked along what was once Whipple Street and the foundation of the Sullivan County Schoolhouse, still very much intact. A number of apple trees in this area remind us that this was once where the homes of mill workers stood. These trees still produce a valuable food source for deer and other animals. Closer to the mill pond we entered the blacksmith shop. The remaining cement walls of one section still remain (without a roof) and rusted iron debris can still be found in the leaf litter around the structure. Further along, we examine the base of the water tower that holds pure spring water. The tower once provided water for the underground steam boilers that serviced the massive engines that powered the mill saws. The engine and saw foundations are located in an especially wet area behind the breast of the old mill dam. Peter shows me a few pieces of saw blade amongst the grass and muck. We slosh our way past the planning mill and follow a rail bed heading “downtown.”
I asked Peter about the location of the Town Hall. He explained that he searched for the foundation a number of times in previous years and has been unable to find its exact location. I admitted that I looked the previous fall and was also unable to locate any remnants. Before parting ways, I told him I would give it another try.
The town hall was the social center of Ricketts. It was here that many church services, meetings, and Saturday night dances were held. It was even the venue for boxing matches. The winner of the bouts at Ricketts would sometimes travel to Lopez to take on the winner of contests there. The Saturday night dances were lively affairs that usually included a fiddle player. Folks could unwind and shed the pressures of work at the lumber camps or at the mills. Also shown in the town hall were “ magic-lantern shows”, an early version of a movie theater production. These shows have been described as a combination of color images, live drama, live music, hilarious comedy and boisterous audience participation. As the town grew, the activities of the original town hall were moved to the larger POSA building.
The most curious point about the original town hall was it’s unusual location. It was the only structure near downtown Ricketts that was on the east side of the creek and was only a few feet above normal creek level. A Douglas photo dated December 10, 1907 shows the town hall with the muddy waters of the Mehoopany Creek about four feet up the sides of the building. No doubt this was also a factor in moving activities to higher ground.
I find myself gingerly stepping around a Northern water snake. It is coiled and resting on a deer trail leading away from the creek, soaking up the afternoon sun. I will soon learn that this area is a favorite sunning location for these large reptiles known for their impressive size and aggressive bite. While admitting no abject fear, I do sense a primal sense of unease whenever walking amongst them and remember an old historical precautionary warning; “Don’t Tread on Me.”
The photographs of the town hall that I previously studied were taken from almost the same identical location. They were shot from only a slight angle off the footbridge looking across the creek, making the structure appear closer to the bridge than it actually was. On this day, the photo I am currently using for reference was taken at almost a ninety degree angle to the bridge and instantly gives me a better appreciation of the distance that the building was away from the creek. The town hall is barely visible in the picture on the far right. Two young ladies dressed in woolen coats stand near the tracks on the far left. I had been looking in the wrong location!
The outline of a row of moss-covered rocks rises before me just above the forest floor. It is partially hidden by blueberry bushes and fallen logs. The structure appears too straight not to be manmade. A carpeting of moss peels easily away from the rocks with only a slight pull, revealing flat stones that were placed there with some precision. The line of rocks comes to a corner and makes a ninety-degree turn back towards the creek. This must be the back of the foundation. A subsequent detailed search around the immediate area produces two sections of stove-pile flashing and a corroded axe head. The most significant items I find are the most numerous and scattered under the leaf litter. Around the perimeter of the foundation are several cut nails dating back nearly 100 years. I am standing in the center of the Ricketts Town Hall.
The shutter of the camera released with an audible “click.” I look up the embankment toward the railroad bed to an image of three figures standing by the tracks. I give the photographer and two young ladies a smile and a nod. They part ways.
William M. Williams
Land Manager
PA Game Commission
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