The Fair Play Settlers of the West Branch Valley, 1769-1784 | Page 2

of the Division of History: Mr. Harold L. Myers, Associate Historian and Chief of the Editorial Section, who readied the manuscript for publication; Mrs. Gail M. Gibson, Associate Historian, who prepared the index; and Mr. George R. Beyer, Assistant Historian.
My sincerest thanks are also extended to Mrs. Mary B. Bower, who typed the entire manuscript and offered useful suggestions with regard to style.
Finally, for providing almost ideal conditions for carrying on this work and for sustaining me throughout, my wife, Margaret, is deserving of a gratitude which cannot be fully expressed.
GEORGE D. WOLF

Introduction
Between 1769 and 1784, in an area some twenty-five miles long and about two miles wide, located on the north side of the West Branch of the Susquehanna River and extending from Lycoming Creek (at the present Williamsport) to the Great Island (just east of the present Lock Haven), some 100 to 150 families settled. They established a community and a political organization called the Fair Play system. This study is about these people and their system.
The author of a recent case study of democracy in a frontier county commented on the need for this kind of investigation.[1] Cognizant of the fact that a number of valuable histories of American communities have been written, he noted that few of them deal explicitly with the actual relation of frontier experience to democracy:
No one seems to have studied microscopically a given area that experienced transition from wilderness to settled community with the purpose of determining how much democracy, in Turner's sense, existed initially in the first phase of settlement, during the process itself, and in the period that immediately followed.
This research encompasses the first two stages of that development and includes tangential references to the third stage.
The geography of the Fair Play territory has been confused for almost two centuries. The conclusions of this analysis will not prove too satisfying to those who unquestioningly accept and revere the old local legends. However, it will be noted that these conclusions are based upon the accounts of journalists and diarists rather than hearsay. This should put the controversial "question of the Tiadaghton" to rest.
A statistical analysis has been made as a significant part of the demography of the Fair Play settlers. However, limitations in data may raise some questions regarding the validity of the conclusions. Nevertheless, the national and ethnic origins of these settlers, their American sources of emigration, the periods of immigration, the reasons for migration, and population stability and mobility have all been investigated. The result offers some surprises when compared with the trends of the time--in the Province and throughout the colonies.
The politics of Fair Play is the principal concern of this entire study--appropriately, it was from their political system that these frontiersmen derived their unusual name. This was not the only group to use the name, however. Another "fair play system" existed in southwestern Pennsylvania during the same period, and perhaps a similar study can be made of those pioneers and their life. As for the Fair Play community of the West Branch, we know about its political structure through the cases subsequently reviewed by established courts of the Commonwealth. From these cases, we have reconstructed a "code" of operation which demonstrates certain democratic tendencies.
In addition to studying the political system, an effort has been made to validate the story of the locally-famed Pine Creek Declaration of Independence. Although some evidence for such a declaration was found, it seems inconclusive.
The West Branch Valley was part of what Turner called the second frontier, the Allegheny, and so this agrarian frontier community has been examined for evidence of the democratic traits which Turner characterized as particularly American. This analysis is not meant to portray a typical situation, but it does provide support for Turner's evaluation. As this was a farmer's frontier, and as transportation and communication facilities were extremely limited, a generally self-sufficient and naturally self-reliant community developed as a matter of survival. The characteristics which this frontier nurtured, and the non-English--even anti-English--composition of its population make understandable the sentiment in this region for independence from Great Britain. This, of course, is supremely demonstrated in the separate declaration of independence drawn, according to the report, by the settlers of the Fair Play frontier.
Fair Play society is, perhaps, the second-most-important facet of this ethnographic analysis. An understanding of it necessitated an inquiry into the social relationships, the religious institutions, the educational and cultural opportunities, and the values of this frontier community. The results, again, lend credence to Turner's hypothesis. Admittedly, Turner's bold assertion that "the growth of nationalism and the evolution of American political institutions were dependent on the advance of the frontier" is somewhat contradicted by the nature of this Pennsylvania frontier. Western lands in Pennsylvania were either Provincial, Commonwealth, or Indian lands, but never national lands. As a result,