Corry and Clymer

What a productive day of meeting dead people with wonderful help from a couple of the living! The morning was dark and misty, but that did not deter us from getting out early. First we found the home of Eugene and Sarah Amidon at 126 E. South St. in Corry, and it is in fine shape. Eugene was the master mechanic at the tannery and, as we later found out, directed the construction of all  tannery buildings other than the original. Unfortunately, much of those were lost in a huge fire in the 1940s - our B&B hostess showed us pictures.

Since the library and historical museum were not open, we then headed to Corry's Pine Grove Cemetery. The woman at the office was able to point us in the correct directions with her 3 x 5 card database (no MacPro here). Most of the Corry Amidons are buried here, not only Eugene and Sarah, but also Eugene's parents and Mary's grandparents, David and Melissa (familiar names?). Here is there stone after we did a little cleaning.

Although the Corry Historical Museum is open only on weekends, Loretta Morton responded to our phone call and opened up just for us. She handed us a treasure trove of newspaper clippings about all Amidons and Walkers in the area, so we quickly moved over to the photocopier. The clippings included not only weddings and obits, but also things like Grandpa Amidon's Eagle Scout trip to England and Eugene's near brush with a freight train. She also handed us a letter from a Karen Page looking for information about the Amidons. It turns out she is a descendant of David Amidon's sister Gertrude and, what's more, lives in Winston-Salem. Small world. Of course, we will look her up after we get home.

People were just as nice in Clymer, six miles to the north in New York. Clymer was the home of Leonard Amidon, father of John Smith Amidon and grandfather of Eugene. Unlike depressed Corry, Clymer seems to be rebounding as a farming village thanks to an influx of Amish over the past 36 years. They have bought the farms, cleaned them up and have opened other businesses like woodworking. Once again, the historical museum opened up just for us. Sue Rhenberger gave us all the plot information for the Clymer Cemetery, and showed us a pen and ink drawing of birds and  done by George Jacob Amidon. He was a brother of John Smith Amidon of Corry, and became a Professor of Penmanship. Then Sue drove us out to the site of the Amidon farm at the south end of town. We returned to town to explore the cemetery finding many more Amidon graves including those of Leonard and his first wife Esther. Here is Leonard's Methodist Church, dating from the 1820s.

Tomorrow, we head for Warren County next door to find Walkers and Curtises from Mary Melissa's side of the family.