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Couple donating log home to Mingo Creek County Park

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A log home that is more than 200 years old will be taken apart and reassembled in the Scout area of Mingo Creek County Park.

The Isaac Sumney house in Nottingham Township now stands on property owned by Philip and Kathy Long, who could not be reached immediately for comment.

According to the book, “Preserving Our Past, Landmark Architecture of Washington County, Pennsylvania,” the Sumneys built the home in two separate sections connected by a sort of breezeway known as a “dogtrot,” which is now enclosed.

Information in the book goes on to state Sumney was an early manufacturer of earthenware pottery, who may have used one section of the house as a workshop. Records for 1820 show Sumney employed three helpers, and a descendant, David Sumney, was still operating a pottery kiln in the late 1860s.

Lisa Cessna, director of Washington County Planning Commission, which oversees county parks, reported on the log house at the board of commissioners’ agenda-setting session Wednesday morning. She said, “It’s a big house. It actually is in very good shape.” The aim is for Scouts to be able to use the house for activities or as a place to stay during inclement weather.

The Longs had hoped to donate the log home to Nottingham Township, but “with the township, everything sort of collapsed,” said Sandy Mansmann, coordinator of Washington County History and Landmarks Foundation. Neither did efforts to sell the home to private purchasers prove fruitful.

Dismantling the home log by log, according to bids the foundation obtained two years ago, would cost about $9,000, Mansmann said. The county is willing to store the logs until the foundation can find funding for the reassembly.

The participants are interested in finding someone – perhaps a Scout – who would mark the pieces of the log home as a guide to its reconstruction.The Longs would like to have the log home removed from their property this summer. The county hopes the home will be rebuilt by summer 2018.

The Sumney House would be the second historic home at the park. The Henry House, a stone structure, was there when the county acquired the land. The doors and windows of the Henry House are boarded up, and the structure is not open to the public.

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