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Duncan township was formed from the townships of Delmar, Charleston and Morris, by a decree of the Court of Common Pleas held in and for Tioga County, at the December Term, in the year 1873, and Thomas Gaffney and E. H. Tremain were authorized to hold the first township election, February 17, 1874. At an election held pursuant to the above decree, Thomas Gaffney and E. H. Treman were chosen supervisors; Isaac S. Marshall and J. Shumway justices of the peace; W. W. Lownsberry constable; William E. Butts assessor; and for school directors, David Cooper was elected for six years; A. Lake, six years; Dr. E. George, four years; W. P. Thomas, two years; Joseph Murray, two years; John Hinman was elected treasurer, and Thomas Farrer, auditor for one year; George W.Rice for two years and Chas. G. Hinman for three years; Wm. W. Forrest, town clerk; Jerry Austin, judge of election and Chas. Prothero, D. D. Holleday, inspectors of election; thus was the official machinery of the township put in motion. A Coal Company and the largest portion of its population is centered in the mining town of Antrim. The mean elevation of the township is about 1700 feet above sea level. It is situated in the southern central portion of Tioga county, about seven miles north of the Tioga and Lycoming county lines. Antrim the center of population of the township is a mining village containing about two thousand inhabitants, and the southern terminus of the Corning, Cowanesque and Antrim railroad. The streets are many of them graded the village laid out in a systematic manner. Nearly all the dwellings are painted and everything kept as clean and neat as it is possible in a mining town, in fact it is the model mining town of Pennsylvania.
Antrim Hall, erected in 1879.
James Pollock is the mining engineer.
Antrim Lyceum organized December, 1879.
David Cooper was the first master carpenter.
John Hinman was the first store agent and cashier.
The Antrim graded school dedicated in July, 1880.
Methodist Episcopal class organized in April, 1874.
William Howell, Jr., is now manager at the mines.
Samuel Heron is the chief book keeper and paymaster.
The managers and paymasters office was erected in 1873.
The Antrim Fall Brook Coal Company store erected in 1874.
Workingmen’s Benevolent Association, organized June, 1876.
A Baptist Church was organized at Antrim, February 20th, 1873.
The capacity of the Antrim coal mines is about 1,800 tons per day.
Charles Hoff was the first weighmaster. John Forrest was a weighmaster for many years.
Thomas Gaffney was the first mining boss at Antrim, and held the position at his death in 1884.
Thomas Farrer held the position of manager of the mines from their opening in 1867, to 1883.
James Ketchum was the first overseer of lumbering and outside work. He still retains the position.
L. J. Stothoff the first station agent at Antrim, was killed by the cars at Antrim, February 15, 1877.
Ella Cooper, Mary Hinman, Theodore P. Whiting, Frances Whiting in the order named were the first teachers at Antrim.
In December, 1867, Titus Drainsfield moved his family into a shanty at Antrim which had formerly been used as a camp by the explorers.
October 28th, 1872, first locomotive over the Corning, Cowanesque and Antrim Railroad entered Antrim. Joseph Boyle, engineer. John Wilson, conductor.
Welsh Congregational Church, organized in 1876. Church completed in 1878, cost $1,104.46 of which the Fall Brook Coal Company donated half the amount.
Explorations for coal were made by Thomas Farrer and John Smith employees of the Fall Brook Coal Company, in the year 1866 at Antrim. It was then a wilderness.
Duncan Lodge, I.O.O.F., organized December 20th, 1879, Thomas Gaffney, Noble Grand; Isaac Cook, Vice Grand; George Makin, Recording Secretary; David Nichol, Assistant Secretary; William Young, Treasurer.
In 1868 Duncan S. Magee christened the place Antrim. Hon. Daniel E. Howell of Bath, Gen. George J. Magee, John Lang and Charles Crawford of Watkins, N.Y., Hon. Charles C. B. Walker and A. H. Gorton of Corning, John Magee, Jr. of Watkins, N.Y., S. S. Ellsworth, of Penn Yan, N.Y., Anton Hardt, John Smith, Thomas Farrer, R. F. Cummings, James Hoffman, of Fall Brook were present.
Trinity Church organized by Dr. Charles Breck, of Wellsboro, at Antrim July 24th, 1872. Through the munificent bequest of John Magee, Jr., the Trinity Church edifice was erected and completed in the year 1881. It is built of cut stone and cost about $13,000. He provided in his will for the erection of five Episcopal Churches, who total cost should not exceed $50,000. He died very suddenly of pneumonia, at Watkins, N.Y., April 26th, 1873, aged about 29 years.
Thomas McMahon, a. J. Pollock, John Curran, David J. Davis, James Maloy, Andrew K. Fletcher, W. W. Forrest, Samuel Heron, William Howell, Jr., Simon Keating, Thomas Burton, James Gaffney, Charles Prothero, James Ketcham, James Pollock, Joseph Lodge, Charles Burgess, William B. James, D. M. Edwards, Thomas Gaffney, William Buckley, John Forrest, James Ketcham, Titus Drainsfield, Michael Keating, Sr., James Gardiner and Samuel Strong are old employees, some of them having been employed continuously by the Fall Brook Coal Company, for the past twenty years or more.
