Clearfield County was officially formed in 1804; however, pioneers and pioneering families began establishing homes and settling the area a number of years previous to that.
James Woodside, Captain Edward Rickerts, Arthur Bell, Abram Goss, Benjamin Fenton, Paul Clover, William Bloom, Thomas McClure and many others have their place in the county history, but it seems Daniel Ogden is the most well-known.
Ogden came to Clearfield by canoe on the West Branch of the Susquehanna River with three of his sons in 1797. They were New York residents, relocating because their property had been destroyed in the Cherry Valley massacre.
While on the Susquehanna, Ogden met Arthur Bell and they traveled upriver together. Bell helped Daniel Ogden build his home above where Ogden Avenue now intersects Second Street, and then travelled further upriver above what is now Curwensville to build his own.
Arthur Bell’s son, Grier, was the first child born among the new settlers in the territory that was to become Clearfield County. Bell became Justice of the Peace in 1802 and was to become known locally as Squire Bell, evidencing social standing.
Daniel Ogden was a man of great ability and innovation. Rather than transport his harvest the many miles to the closest grist mill in Lock Haven, Ogden improvised his own mill with a jointer–planer turned upside down over which to draw ears of corn.
His son, Matthew, eventually built a grist mill with abundant material but only one piece of iron, a spike used for a spindle. It was said to have been quite the novelty.
The Ogden mill provided grist for neighboring settlers for many years before a second mill was eventually built on Anderson Creek by Robert Maxwell.
Ogden had other talents as well. He could sew, build a loom or spinning wheel, repair a gun, made the millstone for his son’s gristmill, pull teeth, and be a doctor – all things that greatly benefited the growing community.
Daniel Ogden died in 1819 and many of his descendants still live in the area, as do those of most of the pioneering settlers of Clearfield County.
