Sewickley Valley Historical Society celebrates 50th anniversary

Joe Zemba stepped inside the Sewickley Valley Historical Society to research a property he’d purchased in the neighborhood along Beaver Street in 1996.

His interest in the home led to him being invited to join, which he did the following year.

“I love Sewickley, and I love this organization,” said Zemba, who is now board president. “I became a member, and the rest is history.”

Yes, it is history, a rich history, one that was celebrated March 2 for its 50 years of preserving the history of the Sewickley Valley – the 11 boroughs and townships that make up the Quaker Valley School District.

Zemba, whose house was added to the national register of historic places in 2005, told 160 guests at a dinner honoring the work of the society that it’s the conscience of the community.

“I am speechless by this turnout,” Zemba said. “Wow, 50 years. It is hard to believe 50 years ago people had the foresight to think about what we have and to take action to preserve it.”

One of those was Phyllis Semple. She loved history.

A founding member of the Sewickley Valley Historical Society, in Semple’s obituary, instead of flowers, the family suggested donations to the historical society.

“My mother went to their first meeting in 1973,” said her daughter, Carol Semple Thompson during the celebration at the Allegheny Country Club in Sewickley Heights. “She was so fascinated by it, and she wanted to carry on the history of this area.”

Semple would drive around with Tom Walker so she could learn. The Walker family is known for playing a major role in the historic landscape of the Sewickley Valley. Through her pioneering work, Semple inspired her children to learn history. Her son, Harton Semple Jr., served as the society’s board president before Zemba and was executive director prior to that.

The country club was adorned with displays highlighting the postal history of the Sewickley Valley from the personal collections of Jay Brooks and Dan Telep. Postal history has deep ties to the Shields family, of which Brooks is a descendant. Newington, one of the earliest homes in the valley, was built by David Shields in 1823, and is the current home of Brooks.

Prints of the Old Sewickley Post Office and Old Sewickley Bridge created by local artist Shane Henderson were commissioned by the society’s architecture committee as a favor for guests. The committee awarded a $10,000 preservation grant to the Laughlin Children’s Center for work on the Hutchinson/Nettleton “Cottage” house that, built in 1855, is part of the Laughlin Children’s Center campus.

The evening included cocktails and hors d’oeuvres followed by poached pear salad, and filet, salmon or vegetarian for the main course, and crème brulee for dessert.

Pianist Donna Amato played classical music, including pieces by the Nevin brothers, Edgeworth natives.

Guest presenter C. Prentiss Orr of Regent Square discussed his book “The Surveyor and the Silversmith,” a historical narrative of the connection between Daniel Leet (the surveyor) and Thomas Shields (the silversmith). It was first evidenced in the purchase of five tracts of the Depreciation Lands, a bounty program offered by the Commonwealth to Revolutionary War veterans, Orr said.

The first lands available were surveyed by Leet and auctioned at the Old Coffee Shop in Philadelphia. Shields successfully bid on the five tracts on the riverfront from Sewickley to Leetsdale, which he sold through an intermediary to Leet. Their children, the aforementioned David Shields and Eliza Leet, were married by arrangement 18 years after the auction and helped settle the Sewickley and Edgeworth communities with school houses and churches.

Orr sorted through hundreds of original letters, actual ledgers dating back to 1765 in Sewickley and troves of digitized correspondence housed at the Pennsylvania Historical Society in Philadelphia. He searched family records kept by Brooks at Newington in Edgeworth and other collections throughout the region.

Through a slideshow, he shared a snippet of the story.

Orr began the research in December 2019, two months before the pandemic closed most every library and museum, and spent most of the next two years researching and writing. The book was published just before Christmas of 2022.

“It is easy to document what happened and when, but not always easy to find out why,” Orr said. “There are gaps in history, and there always will be. You can’t make up history. No one should.”

Listening to Orr’s presentation, guests Dr. Michael J. White and his partner Richard LeBeau of Bell Acres said they learned a lot.

“There is amazing history in this part of the country,” White said. “This is important work the historical society is doing.”

Gwen Cole Strickland is striving to keep the history that her mother, Bettie Cole, recorded alive by working on funds for a documentary based on her mother’s book “Their Story,” published in 2000, which tells the history of Blacks and African Americans in Sewickley and Edgeworth. Cole interviewed more than 100 people and accumulated more than 200 tapes and transcripts.

“She inspired my love of history,” Cole Strickland said.

The Sewickley Valley is a major corridor that led westward, according to the historical society’s website. The first settlers arrived to this area in the late 1790s. Most of the early residents were farmers. The railroad’s arrival 1851 transformed a rural community into a desirable Pittsburgh suburb.

Sewickley was incorporated in 1853.

“Everything we have in the Sewickley Valley is worth preserving and worth remembering,” said Zemba, who is serving a third term as board president. “We are here to celebrate and embark on the next 50 years.”