Milestones (no, really, milestones!)

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Not the kind “in your life,” the kind along the side of the road. Anyone live near one? I was walking to the Haverford Train Station on Sunday and saw a weathered one sticking up near the sidewalk, reading, “8 M to Phila.” Some online research turned up the following, from 1884:

“The Haverford road is probably the oldest in the township, having been laid out in 1703 as a public highway from near Haverford Meeting-house to Philadelphia . . . This road is noted for having on the east side of its course the Penn milestones . . . They appear to be soapstone, and are generally above the ground about three and a half feet, bearing on the front merely the figures denoting the distance in miles from Philadelphia . . . It is remarkable that these should have been only placed along this road. When and by whom placed and who bore the expense are matters for conjecture.”

A book on the Main Line I have says they are probably from the 1790s. Cool! Anyone else have any old milestones nearby?

2

Dammit Eve! Do you know how hard the rest of us have to work to get cool things? And then you come along and (almost literally) just stumble across them.

3

There’s one across the street from where I turn into the parking lot at work (Butler and Skippack, near Ambler, for locals) – and two others along Bethlehem Pike in Flourtown/Erdenheim, all pointing to Philadelphia.

4

This can’t be correct. As anyone who has ever driven north the Philly knows, all roads lead to Conshohocken. Not Philly. :wink:

(end dry wit, or something).

We have the coolest things in the Northeast. It’s so very different from where I grew up.

5

Of course, they’re all laughing at us in Europe, where they have milestones from the 1790s B.C.

(Though I’d be suspicious of one actually dated “1790 B.C.”)

6

but how about boundry stones? Several of them still survive at the city/county line here in the old hometown.

7

Quite. Milestones are cool, but their makers were not psychics…

There a few old milestones still around in upstate New York. Many of them have been knocked over by runaway trucks and the like, but a few still exist around the Albany area. I’ll have to check my roadgeek sites to see if I can find pictures.