Potter County Pennsylvania News Items From the Past
Times Herald (Olean, New York)
December 14 1937
Shinglehouse Woman, 92, Recalls Lincoln’s Election
Mrs. Alice Harder, Native of Annin Creek, is Daughter of Pioneer Pennsylvania Settlers
Shinglehouse
Preparing to celebrate her ninety-second birthday at the home of her brother, C. H. Holcomb on Pearl Street, Wednesday, Mrs. Alice Harder has only one complaint against life, that her pictures are beginning to look old.
Born at Annin Creek in McKean County, she was one of the nine children of John and Abbie Holcomb, pioneer settlers in Pennsylvania.
Her memories of childhood days are undimmed by the years, and fascinating to old and young are her stories of the Indians that prowled about and demanded butter and meat as the price of peace. She recalls clearly the excitement that ran high at the time of the election of President Lincoln and states that never in current years has interest in presidential elections reached so high a pitch. Her hearing and eyesight are good and she reads two chapters in her Bible daily. Her wit and ready humor are a source of delight to her many friends, to whom she is familiarly known as “Aunt Alice.”
Parts of her life have been spent in Franklinville, Eldred, Bolivar and Port Allegany. A victim of asthma in her youth, she resorted to smoking as a remedy and still continues the habit. Her only birthday request was an order for six clay pipes, which to her friends is encouraging evidence of faith in her tenure of life.
She was first married when seventeen years old to James Wood who fought in the Civil War and was wounded in the battle of the Shenandoah Valley. After his death she was again married to Parker Harder, also a Civil War veteran. She has one son, Frank Wood of Eldred; one granddaughter, Miss Frances Wood, a dental nurse in the Otto Township Schools, and a large number of nieces, nephews, grandnieces and grandnephews in New York and Pennsylvania.