How the Calhoon Family Came to Hosensack, Lehigh County in the "Good Old Days" (page 2 of 2)
including Some of Our Remembrances of Harry S. Treichler of Hereford, Berks County, Pennsylvania
Harry Treichler was first and foremost a lumberman. He took off timber from many local farms. Some of these farms he had bought at sheriff's sale; others he paid the owner for the timber removed. He did a good business in mine props. At the time we came to know Harry, he had amassed quite a few of these sheriffed properties. This didn't give him a good reputation locally, and people came to view him as the Simon Legree of the area. The Depression days were bad times, and it certainly 'was heartbreaking for a family to lose their home at a sheriff's sale. That Harry had the money to buy up these propert¬ies was resented by the locals. Had he not bought them, someone else would have. He was an astute businessman, but not a hard-hearted one. There was one family in the Hosensack area that had large landholdings, but found them¬selves unable to pay their taxes due to the bad economic times. They approached Harry and asked for help. Harry could have waited for the inevitable tax sale and bought their properties, but instead he advanced them the money which enabled them to hold onto their land, and which they paid back when times improved. Harry Treichler was no skinflint no matter what the locals thought of him.
Another family we knew well in the Hosensack area were vehement in denounc¬ing Harry as dishonest. It seems that they bought a farm from him, and as it was done in those days, the deed description read so many acres more or less. A subsequent survey of the property proved that there were less, not more acres, and this family considered this dirty dealing. Would these people have raised a fuss if the survey had shown more, and not less? I think not. We found Harry Treichler to be scrupulously honest in his dealings with us, and no one can ask more than that. He was a self-made man who worked hard all his life. By his own admission, he went to only the 6th grade in school. It was his native intelligence and hard work that made him a well-to-do man for those times.
Harry Treichler liked to hunt, and did so on his many landholdings. He had various friends he would invite to hunt on his land, and we were invited to do so also, the only proviso being that we asked him first. This was certainly fair enough, but woe betides those who wantonly hunted on his well posted land. He had an old Ford Model A phaeton with no top, and he used this to tour his properties during hunting season to apprehend trespassers. He would actually chase them down with this old jalopy, take their hunting license numbers, and haul the miscreants before a justice of the peace to be fined. He told us of one such trespasser who rather than let Harry app¬rehend him, tried to run. Harry stopped his car, let off both barrels of his shotgun, sending a load of birdshot into the derriere of the unfortunate trespasser. Well, this city fellow hauled Harry before a judge for atrocious assault. The judge asked this man what proof he had of his charge, where¬upon the man held up a pair of polka dot drawers having quite a few perfor¬ations in them. Both the judge and jury broke up laughing, and Harry went free. In those days, one could protect one's property without fear of the law, even as Harry did! He certainly relished telling this tale. I have previously described Harry as a lumberman. We understood that he had lumbered off the dead native chestnut trees after the blight wiped them out from our farm many years before we acquired it. There were still extant some old logging trails on the farm, and Harry had left his old portable steam engine on the place when we took over. While at this late date, I cannot be sure, but the one left on our farm looks very similar to that pict¬ured on page 368 of the recently published photographic history, "Early Times in Hereford Township." When World War II arrived and scrap prices were high, Harry hauled the old engine off to its destiny, but not before I retrieved the steam whistle, which I still have, as a memento of Harry Treichler and his logging days. We bought slab wood from Harry - three foot lengths for the fireplace, and stove lengths for our kitchen wood range. This latter I would have to split and stack in the woodshed. Oh, how that old stove ate up wood!
While I was in the Army overseas during the war, my father asked Harry to cut two maple side-rails for my bed at home which I had outgrown. This was an old spool bed originally made to accommodate the shorter people of yesteryear, but now inadequate for me. Harry delivered the new side rails so that my father could lengthen my bed before I came home from the war. He would take no money due to the fact that I was fighting overseas in Europe. This was his gift to me - never forgotten.
When I did come home happily unscathed from the war in 1946, my father set me to work digging as he figured that I must have had a lot of experience digging foxholes (I had). He had certain projects lined up, one being to dig a hole for a septic tank. It was well past time for retiring the out¬house, so I fell to with a will. I didn't get very far down when I struck hard red shale. Despite working together on the hole, we were making little progress. Perhaps once again we could rely on Harry Treichler's experience, so off we went to see him. Nothing to it, he said, he would come over with a little dynamite to break up that shale for us. Harry’s direct action again. Wait, my father said. That hole is too close to the house, and the blast might crack the walls, or at least break the windows. There's nothing to it, Harry said, we'll just throw an old mattress over the charge, and let ‘er go.. Caution took over, and this time my father -declined Harry's proffered help. It was back to the pick, sledgehammer and shovel for both of us before we got the hole deep enough to accommodate the tank which was shipped to us via the Reading Railroad to Palm Station. We were finally going to have indoor conveniences.
I always enjoyed going with my father to see Harry for some of his good advice. His business office was a room adjacent to the living area of his house in Hereford, and contained a large safe with his name in gold leaf across from his roll top desk. On this were two loaded revolvers, one on each side within easy reach. Harry took no nonsense from anyone. He had a stuffed wildcat in the office, supposedly the last one shot in the area. Outside, he kept a. monkey in a cage. Residing with Harry was Stella, then his housekeeper, later to become his wife. Along with Harry's advice usually came a story told with great pleasure. One such that I remember concerned many old property deeds in his possession that some government agency tried to pressure him out of.