Linton

1807 · 453107 — Chester County Pennsylvania 1807. Very Good. An extensive collection of Joshua Linton’s professional papers consisting of approximately 130 hand-drawn and handwritten “draught†surveys of “plantations†and roads several of which include supporting documents; together with associated estate documents. The draft survey sheets date from 1807 through the mid-1830s and are housed in about 130 file folders. Most range in size from small quarto to folio including a few larger folded sheets. Several of the file folders also contain accompanying sheets with descriptive notes and calculations by Linton. The associated state documents consist of nine file folders and approximately eight loose bundles of property descriptions deeds wills receipts etc. dating from the same period and up through the mid-1840s. Several of the folded and bundled documents have been retained in their original paper wrappers.<br /> <br /> The draft surveys were made by Linton to document property boundaries of private tracts of land and adjoining roads in Oxford township and three or four adjoining townships in southern Chester County lying due west of Longwood Gardens and Kennett Square. They have been filed under the property owner’s name and/or road names and follow where indicated Linton’s chronological numbering of several but not all of his surveys. Most of the loose estate documents have not been organized and are retained in nine file folders and as originally folded in bundles. Some intermittent light toning and staining a few survey sheets are partly damaged with some tearing and small loss of paper at the folds some of which have been neatly mended with Japanese paper else overall the collection is well-preserved in very good condition.<br /> <br /> The birthplace of Bayard Taylor and Andrew Wyeth Chester County is one of the three Pennsylvania counties established by William Penn in 1682. The Quaker influence distinguished the county as welcoming to free African-Americans whose presence especially in southern Chester County has long been historically significant. Oxford township was home to Linton and John Miller Dickey founder of the Ashmun Institute America’s first degree-granting black university renamed Lincoln University after the assassination of President Lincoln. Parts of Dickey’s 200-acre farm at Oxford may be included in some of Linton’s surveys of tracts owned by James and Benjamin Dickey. Linton himself was a Quaker and was elected auditor of Chester County in 1824. In addition to the land surveys the collection also documents Linton’s associated work as an executor and administrator of estates and wills for the county and prominent landowners in Oxford Fallowfield Nottingham Londonderry and adjoining areas.<br /> <br /> An important collection of early American primary research materials. unknown