Stoltz, Stiver Bring History Alive at the Library

Randy Stoltz is the author of “Civil War and Morrison’s Cove” which takes a look at the Morrison’s Cove area and the impact it had on the Civil War.

He said he took an interest in the Civil War when he was 12 years old, and through friends, he began reenacting and the love affair began.

Stoltz said the reenactments then turned to spreadsheets of cemeteries,

“It started from there,” he said.

Stoltz first got into the history of the start of the Civil War – President Abraham Lincoln winning, South Carolina seceding from the Union, Jefferson Davis being appointed as the provisional Confederate President, and the beginning of the war at Fort Sumter.

He said President Lincoln asked for volunteers for 90 days, and within five days of asking for volunteers, the Wayne Guard militia out of Williamsburg answered the call at Camp Curtin named after the Governor.

Stoltz said there were an estimated 83 men in the Wayne Guard. Ten days later, 90 men from the Martinsburg Infantry joined them.

One of the more famous local men of the Civil War was Jacob Higgins – who was born in Williamsburg in 1826, and fought in the Mexican American War.

Higgins then went commissioned through the First Pennsylvania Cavalry and the 125 Pennsylvania Regiment.

“It had a lot of Williamsburg guys in it,” Stoltz said, which was estimated to be over 100.

Higgins went on to command and fight in the 22nd Pennsylvania Cavalry which had about 3,000 men in it.

Stoltz also talked about other prominent Blair County men in the Civil War - Dr. Samuel Royer, William Neff, William Roller, William Johnston, and Levi Roush. Stoltz showed the audience some of his Civil War memorabilia and pictures of the Gettysburg Cemetery which has many Williamsburg men listed. Stoltz volunteers his time reenacting, and giving tours and lessons in Gettysburg.

Kevin Stiver

When people think of a 16 year-old young man, they don’t always picture a history buff — but that is exactly what the crowd got during Kevin’s Stiver’s presentation last Thursday,

He is from Bellwood, and he began his research on Glen White, Pa., when he was just 14 years old — researching from August of 2022 until April 2023, when his book “The Town That Was Forgotten in the Allegheny Mountains” was published.

Stiver said the first Glen White residents were Brian and Mary Kelly.

Brian Kelly entered a raffle and won a white horse; however, Kelly sold the horse for twenty acres near the Horseshoe Curve which would become Glen White.

In that area, the coal rights were owned by a Mr. Glen and a Mr. White – the namesakes of the town.

Stiver said that Jacob H. Taylor of Baltimore, was a well known coal, coke and lumber dealer and a member of the firm Taylor and McCoy who led mining operations.

In Glen White, there was, according to Stiver, basically a working town – company houses, a school and a church.

In 1880, the “height” of Glen White was taking place. The coke ovens were to take the coal and get it ready to ship to Johnstown and Pittsburgh, stripping it of the carbon and elements.

However, in the early 1900s, Stiver said the company was struggling and by 1950, following a year of eviction from the city of Altoona, everything was gone.

Stiver said some of the houses were torn down and rebuilt heading up to Altoona Curve. What started out as a paper booklet, for him, became his first book.

“Nothing was going to happen with it, so I did something about it,” Stiver said on why he wrote the book.

He said trips with his grandfather investigating the grounds also piqued his interest.

Stiver is doing research on a second book, and will be spending his summer giving tours at Altoona’s Baker Mansion.