Friday Find: Christian Hoover’s Farm

Thanks to the sleuthing of some family members on the ground in Pennsylvania, I believe we finally know where Christian Hoover’s farm was located.

If you remember from my previous post—Where Did My Christian Hoover Live?—I’d  determined that his farm was originally part of the Dodge Lands, tract #5404. A map that I located seemed to indicate that this would have placed his farm near Twelvemile Run. Not too far from the stream, a road named “Hoover road” (previously Driftwood Pike) bears north off the Quehanna Highway toward Driftwood. I’ve been thinking that his farm was somewhere in this area off Hoover road.

However, my relatives discovered the Hoover Farm Wildlife Viewing area (seen in Google Map below).

Looking at it on the map. It’s just to the south of the Hoover road turnoff and near Twelvemile Run. It looks like I wasn’t too far off on my estimated location.

The farm is apparently now part of Pennsylvania’s Quehanna Wildlife Area. There is a viewing blind on the property, where visitors can watch wildlife feeding in the farm’s fields and feeding plots.

Christian L. Hoover died on 1 October 1887. His heirs—adult children Reuben, Samuel, Simon, George, and minor child Eva, and widow Mary Ann (Conaway) Hoover—sold his property to George Boak, in trust for the Wildwood Company, in 1889.¹ It eventually became part of the Curtiss-Wright property by the 1920s or 30s.² The state purchased the land from Curtiss-Wright in 1967.³

I obviously never knew my 3x great grandfather. But since his descendants have such a keen appreciation for the outdoors, I think he’d appreciate the use the state has found for what was once his land.

Now if I could only find his family in the 1870 and 1880 census!

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Photo Credit:
Photo 1: “Quehanna Hoover Road Trail” by Ruhrfisch (talk) – photographed it myself. Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons.

Photo 2: “Quehanna Hoover Farm Blind” by Ruhrfisch (talk) – photographed, stitched, and cropped it myself, originally two horizontal photos.This panoramic image was created with Autostitch. Stitched images may differ from reality. Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons.

• Category: Research
• Tag: Family Research, Friday Finds, Paternal Line