The Edward Morgan Log House is a historic house built c. 1770. It is located at 850 Weikel Rd. in Towamencin Township,

Montgomery County, Pennsylvania Montgomery County, colloquially referred to as Montco, is a county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. As of the 2020 census, the population of the county was 856,553, making it the third-most populous county in Pennsylvania after Philadel ...

and was listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

in 1973.

History

Six-hundred acres, including the house site, was granted by the Commissioners of

William Penn William Penn ( – ) was an English writer, religious thinker, and influential Quakers, Quaker who founded the Province of Pennsylvania during the British colonization of the Americas, British colonial era. An advocate of democracy and religi ...

to Griffith Jones, a merchant, on February 12, 1702. Edward Morgan bought 309 acres of that land on February 26, 1708. An unspecified "dwelling house" was part of the purchase, though Morgan appears to have been the first settler to live on the property. Morgan came to Pennsylvania in 1698 and settled north of the area's main Welsh settlement in

Gwynedd Gwynedd () is a county in the north-west of Wales. It borders Anglesey across the Menai Strait to the north, Conwy, Denbighshire, and Powys to the east, Ceredigion over the Dyfi estuary to the south, and the Irish Sea to the west. The ci ...

. In 1720 his daughter Sarah married Squire Boone, and ten years later, the couple moved to

Berks County Berks County (Pennsylvania Dutch: ''Barricks Kaundi'') is a county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. As of the 2020 census, the county's population was 428,849. The county seat is Reading, the fourth-most populous city in the state. The ...

, where Daniel Boone was born in 1734. Other descendants of Edward Morgan include

Daniel Morgan Daniel Morgan (c. 1736 – July 6, 1802) was an American pioneer, soldier, and politician from Virginia. One of the most respected battlefield tacticians of the American Revolutionary War of 1775–1783, he later commanded troops during the sup ...

Lowell Thomas Lowell Jackson Thomas (April 6, 1892 – August 29, 1981) was an American writer, Television presenter, broadcaster, and documentary filmmaker. He authored more than fifty non-fiction books, mostly travel narratives and popular biographies of ex ...

, and

Walter L. Morgan Walter L. Morgan (July 23, 1898 – September 2, 1998) was the founder of the Wellington Fund, the first balanced mutual fund in the United States and one of the oldest surviving mutual funds. Morgan was born in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, where h ...

. In 1723, Edward Morgan deeded 104 acres, including the house, to his son John Morgan, who sold the property to Evan David in 1741. John Yeakel, a

Schwenkfelder The Schwenkfelder Church () is a small American Christian body rooted in the 16th-century Protestant Reformation teachings of Caspar Schwenkfeld von Ossig (1489–1561). They originated in southern Germany and were among the first to bring saf ...

, bought the property in 1770 and then sold 82 acres to Yellis Cassel, a

Mennonite Mennonites are a group of Anabaptism, Anabaptist Christianity, Christian communities tracing their roots to the epoch of the Radical Reformation. The name ''Mennonites'' is derived from the cleric Menno Simons (1496–1561) of Friesland, part of ...

, in 1774. The property stayed in the Cassel family for 99 years until Frederick Bower bought the house along with 62 acres. After several other owners, William Nash bought the house and 17 acres in 1965, and planned to develop and subdivide the land. The house was condemned in 1967, but was recognized as a historic structure the same year and an organization was formed to save it from demolition. Towamencin Township bought the house along with 1.7 acres in 1970. The Welsh Valley Preservation Society now operates tours of the Morgan Log House.

Architecture

The house has two-and-a-half stories, with a center chimney. It was constructed of white oak logs with notched corners and chinked with diagonally placed stones. A pent roof runs around three sides of the house, and the gable ends were covered in vertical sheathing. The original interior is well preserved, including original hand wrought hardware and a large central fireplace.Mary E. Butler, 1973, NRHP Nomination Form for Edward Morgan Log HouseEnter "public" for ID and "public" for password to access the site. By 1976, the floor plan was restored to three rooms on the first floor, with a spring room in the partial basement, three rooms on the second floor, and an undivided attic.Morgan Log House History
, accessed November 12, 2011.

References

External links

Morgan Log House
– Welsh Valley Preservation Society {{DEFAULTSORT:Morgan, Edward, Log House Houses on the National Register of Historic Places in Pennsylvania Houses completed in 1700 Houses in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania Museums in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania Historic house museums in Pennsylvania National Register of Historic Places in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania Log buildings and structures on the National Register of Historic Places in Pennsylvania 1700 establishments in Pennsylvania