Cassville borough, Cass township

Shirley's Knob Is Named For Him

Did you know? Africa's 1883 county history says the name of Shirley's Knob, "the elevation at the foot of which Cassville is located," came from William Shirley.

The same history admits that the date of the first settlement in Cass township could not be obtained. What it could say is that Shirley was married in 1773, and that in July 1774 he settled on a tract that by 1883 had been divided into two farms, owned by Martin Stever and Mrs. Sarah A. Heaton.

He did not stay. After the murder of the Breckenridges by Indians in Woodcock Valley, he moved his family to a place of greater safety, and afterwards settled on the east side of the Raystown Branch, in Penn township.

Some time before 1800 George Stever came from Bucks County to Trough Creek Valley and bought part of the tract Shirley had improved. The farms changed hands, but the knob kept Shirley's name.

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

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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Photographs from Cassville borough

Cassville Lutheran Church, from Seminary StreetMr. Matté, via Wikimedia Commons. Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 · CC BY-SA 4.0

Northbound Pennsylvania Route 829 entering Cassville from Cass township, Huntingdon County, PennsylvaniaPhotograph by the Wikimedia Commons contributor Mr. Matté, 20 August 2024. Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0; reused with credit · PA 829 nb entering Cassville, Aug. 2024.jpg

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