The day they blew up Spinnerstown's wonder

Milford Township in the far northwestern corner of Upper Bucks County is loaded with interesting sights and history. I’ve written about the township many times.

My first visit was to the home of a local hobbyist and Revolutionary War actor. He taught me how to fire a flint-lock musket and throw a tomahawk in a field in Spinnerstown. The settlement is one of six hamlets that make up the 28-square-mile township. The others are Milford Square, Gerysville, Finland, Trumbauersville and Steinsburg.

In Milford Square my daughter, granddaughter and I toured Tracy and Kerry Kramer’s 272-year-old grist mill converted into an upscale home on Unami Creek. Similarly, the whole family was on board for a bit of scenic hiking and rock climbing in the township’s rugged Finland, known in the 1930s as “the Poconos of Philadelphia.”

Through historical records, I’ve tapped in on stories of beloved characters. The wanderings of the township’s tinkerman whose bells on his horse-drawn cart sounded his approach. The Milford lady who carried all her possessions in a bucket. And the rag man who collected discarded cloth for reprocessing.

Out of all the unusual stories however, a few stand out in the realm of oddity.

For instance, streets in Milford had no names for who knows how long until calamity hit. The local fire company responded to reports of a blaze at one of the township’s half dozen creameries. Pumpers rushed to the scene, drivers confident they knew the way on unnamed roads. Turn left, go straight, make a right, follow the curve, pass a farmhouse, then a barn, keep going, make another right, then a left.

They arrived all right — at the wrong creamery. “We’ve got to do something about this!” came the refrain heard about town. So folks decided to name every street to clear up future confusion.

The top story to me, however, is the day E.I. Dupont Powder Co. of Wilmington, Delaware, blew up a nationally known tree on Erwin Shantz’s farm in Spinnerstown.

First, some background.

Eleuthere Irenee du Pont de Nemours was a French Huguenot Protestant who fled to the U.S. from France to escape religious persecution and the French Revolution. In 1802, E.I. founded Eleutherian Mills on Brandywine Creek outside Wilmington, where he produced gunpowder. He realized Americans were far behind European countries in terms of explosive technology. To take advantage, he imported gunpowder machinery from France and began production as E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Co. The firm became enormously prosperous as chief supplier to the U.S. military and the victorious Union Army in the Civil War.

In addition to various forms of gunpowder including a smokeless variety, DuPont produced dynamite and in the 20th century neoprene, nylon, Teflon, Mylar, Kevlar, Lycra, and Freon, plus plus pigments and paints.

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But it was the company’s experiments with dynamite invented by a Swedish chemist that brought DuPont to Spinnerstown.

It was the early 20th century and the town’s magnificent chestnut tree on Erwin’s farm was struggling to survive. It had ruled the forests and pastures for centuries. The U.S. Forestry Commission estimated the tree’s age at 400 years with a trunk more than 34 feet in circumference and 11 feet in diameter. Its age predated by two centuries William Penn’s arrival to found Pennsylvania. It had been a gathering place for Lenape Indians.

“The tree’s limbs spread so far that it permitted the entire tribe to sit under it during the mid-day sun, or so they say,” noted local author Roger Baldwin. Arborists concluded the only trees of any kind larger than the 60-foot-high Spinnerstown chestnut were Sequoia redwoods on the West Coast.

Unfortunately, Spinnerstown’s old tree had begun to weaken from age. Rot reportedly had set in despite the fact chestnuts in Europe were known to live more than 1,000 years. Farmer Erwin decided his tree had to go. At the same time, DuPont was looking for something to blow up to further test and demonstrate dynamite as a means to rid farmland of large trees and other obstacles. The giant chestnut seemed a likely target.

At Erwin’s invitation, the company planted 110 pounds of dynamite and 220 cartridges around the base of the tree in 1919. Neighboring farmers gathered to watch intently. The explosion was massive, lifting the entire tree 10 feet off the ground. The towering monarch crashed to the ground in a thud, her limbs shattered and scattered about a crater 10 feet deep. The demonstration was proof positive to DuPont dynamite was feasible for agriculture usage as described in the company’s handy booklet “Farming and Dynamite: A Few Hints for Farmers.”

In the end, Spinnerstown and its chestnut secured a unique niche in national history.

Sources include “Farming with Dynamite: A Few Hints for Farmers” published in 1910 by E.I. Dupont, and “Wandering Through Milford Township” by Roger Baldwin, Ph.D., published in 1984.

Carl LaVO can be reached at carllavo0@gmail.com