Existing comment:
The Lemon House
1819:
Around 1819, the Samuel Lemons had built a two-story log structure east of the mountain summit, along the Huntingdon, Cambria, and Indiana Turnpike (now traced by US 22). Here, they operated a "wagon tavern" which was said to have "provided feed and lodging for the horses and teamsters of as many as fifty wagons, in one night!"
Samuel Lemon & Jean Moore Lemon
After the first four years of operation, his tavern had doubled in value. It continued to thrive; hosting a regular flow of passengers for more than ten years. But Lemon's financial success was not related only to the tavern. He mined and shipped coal from the "Lemon Seam" to the engine houses on the railroad. He quarried stone for rail ties; and rented teams of houses and leased his land for government railroad buildings. By 1848, tax records showed him to be one of the wealthiest persons in Cambria County.
1840:
Soon after the surveyors had located Plane No. 6 of the Allegheny Portage Railroad in 1831, Samuel Lemon built this stone house along the level track of this summit -- the perfect spot for what one guest observed as "a spacious and handsome tavern." |