Early Delco Parks and their history

This picture is of Baltimore Pike looking east toward Smedley Park. The church in the center is still standing.  The bridge was to honor WW1 veterans from Delaware County who died in service.. You are basically standing where the Blue Route crosses Baltimore Pike. On the inside of this bridge were 2 bronze plaques with the names of the veterans. When the ridge was removed in 1957 when Baltimore Pike was widened to 4 lanes. The bronze plaques were placed in storage. About 10 years ago they were brought out of Storage and placed at the entrance to Smedley Park where they are today.

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and a great 2024

DELAWARE COUNTY PARKS AND THEIR
HISTORICAL BACKGROUND

         The Delaware County Parks, together with a number of community parks owned and supported by individual boroughs and townships, are a guarantee that, in the future, the people of this rapidly growing residential area will not lack open spaces for leisure time activities.  Moreover, the practice of placing parks in creek valleys protects wooded areas, thus conserving water in the soil and preventing erosion.  Dedicating land for use as public parks also makes possible the preservation of historic landmarks ad natural scenery which otherwise might be destroyed.

         At present, the county park system consists of Glen Providence, Kent, Shrigley, and Smedley Parks.  All of these sites originally belonged to pioneer settlers who came to Pennsylvania with William Penn and took an active part in building the colony.

         Glen Providence, the first of the county parks to be established, contains more than 30 acres, lying partly in Media Borough, partly in Upper Providence Township.  It occupies a deep glen surrounded by wooded hills and drained by Broomall’s Run, a stream which is dammed farther up the valley to a form Broomall’s Lake on the property of the Media Swimming and Rowing Club.  From this lake the water tumbles over a rocky precipice just below Kirk’s Lane and enters the upper end of the park.  Below the dam it spreads out into a placid stream which flows through marshy land to Mirror Lake, and finally reaches Ridley Creek just above Baltimore Pike bridge.

         From the main entrance on State Street, the land falls away in a wide, grassy slope, with a concrete platform on the east side, which is used for band concerts and community celebrations.  At the foot of the slope is a small pavilion for the use of picnickers, but the park lacks space for play areas because it is too hilly and covered too densely with woods and thickets.  However, these conditions make it an ideal spot for an arboretum and bird sanctuary, the main purposes which are being developed at present.  The native trees and flowers are being supplemented by the planting of other varieties, nature trails have been laid out, and bird boxes and plant labels have been provided by school children.  Because the birds are protected, they are not afraid of people, hence it is possible for a lover of birds to find many varieties at home here.  Water birds are numerous, especially ducks, which are always to be seen there except in the breeding season, when they go to some more secluded haunt to nest and hatch their young, which they bring back to the park later.

         This park was originally part of a tract of 700 acres, granted by William Penn to Peter and William Taylor, brothers, who came from Cheshire in 1682 to settle on the land they had purchased at 10 ½ cents an acre.  They landed of Chester and pushed into the wilderness to select their land in the township of Providence.  William and his wife died soon after taking up their land, but Peter married Sarah, the daughter of his neighbor, John Houlston, and raised a family of sons and daughters, from whom many county residents trace their descent.  One of Peter’s descendants was Zachery Taylor, twelfth President of the United States.

         The land eventually became the property of John M. Broomall, distinguished lawyer, judge, and legislator, whose residence was at West and State Streets in Media, at the southern end of his large estate.  West of the present line of Lemon Street, was a large lake stretching from Third to Sixth Street.  Ice was cut on the lake every winter and stored in the icehouse which stood on 3^rd and West Streets.  In 1905 Mr. George Butler acquired the property.  In 1935 he deeded about 30 acres to the county.  Small adjacent tracts were donated by James Skelly and the Media Swimming and Rowing Club, rounding out the property which became in 1935, Delaware County’s first park.

         Kent and Shrigley Parks are both small, the former covering 10 ½ acres, the latter 7 ½ acres, but they serve as community playgrounds I built-up areas.  Shrigley Park is in Lansdowne, on land which once belonged to Richard Bonsall, a pioneer settler in 1684.  It was developed from an abandoned quarry by the late Arthur Shrigley and given to the county in 1938.

         Kent Park was once part of a tract belonging to William Garrett, another pioneer settler.  It was a joint gift from the Kent Manufacturing Co. and St. Charles Borromeo Church in Oak View.

         Both of these parks are on the left bank of Darby Creek, along a route supposed to have been used by hunters who had built the three ancient log cabins known as trappers’ cabins.  One of them stood in Mathews Hollow near Shrigley Park until it was destroyed by fire about 1906.  The other two are still standing, one on Dennison Avenue, not far from Kent Park, the other in Addingham.

         Smedley Park was named for the late Samuel L. Smedley, founder and first president of the Delaware County Park Board.  It is the largest and, in many ways, the most interesting of the four parks.  Its stand of magnificent virgin hemlocks, its many historical associations, and the beauty and variety of its natural scenery make it unique among public parks in the county.

         It consists of 92 acres of forest and meadowland, lying in the valley of Crum Creek, north of Baltimore Pike.  The southern end is on the west bank in Nether Providence.  On the east side of the creek above the big bend, the park ends in a 20-acre tract known as Crum Martin which was deeded for use as a park by the widow of Dr. Edward Martin, chiefly for the purpose of preserving the fine old trees growing there.  This section, which is in Springfield Township, is the site of the Delaware County Day Camp.  The northern end near Beatty Road is being developed as a site for overnight camping.

         The park as several athletic fields, a bridle path, numerous shelters, and a picnic grove, with fireplaces and tables.  One of its chief charms is the hemlock forest on the rocky slope high above the creek.  Here a pedestrian may follow narrow trails bordered with ferns and wild flowers and find a quiet retreat where no sound breaks the stillness except the songs of birds and the murmur of rippling water.

         All of Smedley Park west of Crum Creek was originally part of the land granted to Thomas Marshall by William Penn in 1681.  When he came to America in 1682, he chose for his homestead 305 acres extending from Providence Great Road eastward to Crum Creek.  Later, when Minshall moved to a larger plantation in Middletown, now part of Tyler Arboretum, his land in Nether Providence was divided into several tracts.  The acreage now included in Smedley Park became the property of two families named Lewis.  The park entrance and the houses and farm buildings on the hill above the picnic grove were all included in “Woodside Farm,” which belonged to Mordecai Lewis and his sons, who owned and operated Wallingford Mills, now called Victoria Plush Mill.

         The land north of this was owned by J. Howard Lewis.  It extended to the big loop in the creek where his house and papermill were located, and included land across the creek in Springfield Township, and on both sides of the creek above Beatty Road.

         Mr. Lewis lived in “Castle Dangerous,” the family mansion on the hill now called Pine Ridge, surrounded by an estate of a thousand acres.  An ardent huntsman, he was one of the organizers of the Rose Tree Hunt in 1859 and became its first president.  His home was headquarters for the club and here he kept a pack of hounds led through many seasons by Slasher.  When old Slasher died in 1865, his body was buried in a silver coffin, under the hemlocks on the hillside above Crum Creek, marked by a marble headstone inscribed in Latin.  Translated, it reads”.
Here lies Slasher, died on the first of February 1865, and a better hunting dog we never hope to see.”

         It is recorded that the club members mourned his death for three whole days.

         After the property passed from the possession of the Lewis family, the stone was removed and set up near the kennels at the Rose Tree Hunt Club.  The authority for this legend is Mr. Walter L. Rhodes, who has been connected with the club for 46 years, and who helped to rescue the stone.  For many years it was a landmark well known to people who enjoyed tramping along the Crum Creek trails, and those who missed it may be glad to know it is safe.

         Now, where once the baying of hounds and the winding of hunting horns could be heard, the shouts of ball players and the blare of loud speakers fill the air, as picnickers frolic under the ancient trees which once looked down on Indian hunters silently stalking their game, on hardy pioneers establishing their hommes and finally on their descendants who have found time to play.

         To the County Commissioners and the Park Board, the citizens of Delaware County owe a vote of thanks for their vision inn acquiring and developing the park site and to the efficient staff, words of praise for first class maintenance