Cass township

Four Hundred Acres Of Wild Land

Did you know? Jacob Crotsley was born in New Jersey and came to Cass township in 1833, where he bought four hundred acres of wild land. He cleared part of it, improved it, put up buildings on it, and spent the rest of his life there. His son Ralph, born in New Jersey on August 26, 1823, came with him.

Cass was not yet a township of its own when the family arrived. Africa's 1883 county history says it was erected on January 21, 1843, from territory taken out of Union township. The same history remembers a Jacob Crotsley among the very early residents of Hare's Valley, and lists a Jacob Crotzley among the township's overseers in 1843 and 1844.

Jordan's history records that Jacob is buried in the family graveyard on the place. It also records, plainly, that he married twice and that the names of his wives are unknown.

Checked and confirmed. CONFIRMED 2026-10-30 against the sources listed: every factual sentence was tied to a verbatim passage and a script confirmed each passage is in its source. Where sources disagreed on a number, the number was left out.

Sources

John W. Jordan, ed., History of the Juniata Valley and Its People, vol. 3 (1913)
J. Simpson Africa, History of Huntingdon and Blair Counties, Pennsylvania (1883)

Checked 2026-10-30 · County histories and primary sources, read in full

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