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Fort Cherry grads form nonprofit to mark 250th anniversary of Cherry’s Fort

By Jill Thurston 5 min read
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Historic Fort Cherry Association co-founder Bradley Cowden, volunteer Austin Curtis and co-founder Vinny Curtis display research at the Whiskey Rebellion Festival in July.
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Historic Fort Cherry displays research and period attire.

In an effort that would make any high school history teacher proud, two longtime friends and Fort Cherry High School graduates have formed the Historic Fort Cherry Association to commemorate the 250th anniversary of the construction of Cherry’s Fort.

Vinny Curtis and Bradley Cowden, 2014 Fort Cherry graduates, are co-founders and co-directors of the effort, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit and Heinz History Center Affiliate organization.

“The main goal for the formation of the association is to, No. 1, compile local history sources from the area into one spot and make it available to the community,” said Curtis. Future plans include roadside historical markers, online resources and public events.

Cherry’s Fort was built in 1774 as a frontier fort for protection against hostility in what is today Mt. Pleasant Township. According to their research, it consisted of at least three buildings made of logs, situated in a triangle. Local points of interest, including the school district, today bear the name of Cherry.

“In our school, we learned a little bit of local history,” said Cowden. “The original settler was named Thomas Cherry, so the school actually had a celebration called ‘Tom Cherry Day.’ And we never really knew a whole lot about him. We just knew there was a fort and that was his name. So we dived into that first to try to get some information.”

Both Cowden and Curtis chose career paths outside of history, but they both have an enthusiasm for local history, including their own genealogy. They began using Ancestry.com around Christmas last year to research their family history.

“Neither of us are descendants of the Cherry family, but we are both descended from families that lived near Cherry’s Fort in the 18th century,” said Cowden.

The two began the Historic Fort Cherry Association in January and in April filed their paperwork with the state of Pennsylvania for nonprofit status and interviewed for affiliate status with the Heinz History Center.

The men then created the association’s website www.historicfortcherry.org and launched it just days prior to the Whiskey Rebellion celebration in Washington, where they made their first public appearance at the July 12-13 event with a pop-up display. They deemed it a success.

“For a brand-new organization, we spoke with over 300 people. We had a line outside of the tent for most of the day. Of the people we spoke to, there were only about five or six from the actual Fort Cherry area. Most were from outside the area, Washington, the South Hills, some from Chicago and New York,” said Curtis.

The website contains research articles and blog posts written by the founders and information gathered from local sources highlighting the history of the area.

The land passed from the hands of the Cherry family in 1890 and today all traces of the fort are gone. The family farmhouse still stands and is a private residence, according to Cowden and Curtis.

An effort was made as early as 1932 to commemorate the site of Cherry’s Fort, said Cowden. Known as the Fort Cherry Association, It was formed by descendants of the Cherry Family, but did not seem to continue through the 1940s, according to Cowden and Curtis on their website. They hope to revitalize the effort.

They are also researching the 1784 meeting George Washington had with 13 families squatting on land he owned not far from Cherry’s Fort, at the home of David Reed. Their hope is to have an event to commemorate the 250th anniversary of that meeting in 2034.

“We have 10 years to build up to the 250th anniversary. I’m hopeful it can be a wider reaching event. It was Washington’s last trip west,” said Curtis.

Eventually they would like to see full-scale recreations of Cherry’s Fort and the David Reed House.

“As a long-term goal, we would like to rebuild this house as well as Cherry’s Fort together on the same site as a museum and education center. We think it would be a good opportunity to showcase the local history of the frontier at the time while tying it into a bigger picture of the George Washington story, which is not only a local historic interest but also one on a national scale,” said Cowden.

“He came to this tract of land in 1784 and had dinner with 13 families who were squatting on his land and the house that hosted the dinner party stood until 1940,” Curtis said. “He spent the next two years filing paperwork and documents in order to sue and evict them, mainly because however this case turned out it would set a precedent on how land in the west would be handled in the new country.”

Cowden found he has a family connection. “I grew up on a farm that was part of Washington’s land that he visited in 1784. The grandson of the squatter, David Reed, who hosted George Washington, married into the Cowden family.”

Historic Fort Cherry displayed its exhibit at Mt. Pleasant’s Fire and Food Trucks event sponsored by the Mt. Pleasant Township Volunteer Fire Company on Aug. 4.

Their next display is planned for Oct. 5, at the Hickory Apple Festival.

Curtis said they are developing an educator resource section for the website to provide lesson plans and activities that can be used by home-school families, teachers and Scout groups, and have been in conversation with Fort Cherry School District.

“We’ve had a great response in the community,” Curtis said.

Historic Fort Cherry can be found on FaceBook and Instagram as well as its website.

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