Ancestors of Nikki Heffner

Photos of Joseph Guiseppe Ventimiglia (left) and William Heffner (right)

On March 21, 1805, by an Act of Assembly, a company was incorporated to make an artificial road by way of the nearest and best route from Reading to Sunbury. This marked the origin of the Centre Turnpike; it ran through what later became the Borough of Ashland. Construction of the road took from 1807 until 1812 to complete but it was open to full passage in October 1808. The turnpike was a toll road.

History tells us, the first man to inhabit the land where the town now stands was one Jacob Rodenberger; he built a crude log cabin that became a stopping off tavern for travelers on the Centre Turnpike. Established to be here in 1820, the site was what is currently Seventh and Middle Streets. The lower part of the county was already a bustling beehive of activity. Industry was on the move, new arrivals were swelling the population almost daily and slowly coal was becoming king. The only sign of human life, to disturb the wilderness that surrounded Rodenberger, were occasional timbermen, whose only interest were the virgin forest and its price on the open market.

Local history has not deemed it necessary to commemorate his memory, but Burd S. Patterson of Pottsville, is the "Father" of the town. He rode the Centre Turnpike on many occasions. In 1845 he induced John Penn Brock of Philadelphia and James Hart to go into partnership with him in the purchase of two tracts of land. They bought the land around Rodenberger from the Bank of Pennsylvania, 400 acres at a uniform price of $30 each and the same amount of land from Judge Gordon of Reading for $11 per acre. The entire area was then part of Barry Township. Some time later, Patterson sold his interests to a Samuel Grant.

Patterson, Brock and Hart named the land the Ashland Estates, in honor of Henry Clay's home in Kentucky, near Lexington. Clay was a strong advocate of the high tariff on imports of coal, halting its import. Local owners who struck the mineral in this area stood to profit greatly from Clay's efforts.

In the fall of 1846, they hired an experienced miner named Patrick Devine, and a force of men to explore the coal veins crossing the tract. In 1847 the task of clearing the land was started. The site was surveyed by Samuel Lewis and the town was laid out by Peter W. Sheafer of Pottsville. The area is now known as Butler Township. Streets were named after those in Philadelphia; the proposed main street was called Middle, this followed the Centre Turnpike. Several years later Ashland's business establishments began to grow on the street behind Middle and the old arrangement was changed. Sheafer completed the map in 1853 and the new main street was named Centre Street, after the turnpike.

The village had grown to 500 buildings with a population of 3,500. On February 13, 1857, Ashland was incorporated as a borough.

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