INDUSTRY · HISTORICAL MARKER
Historic Downtown Annville
Annville, Pennsylvania
· Furniture Manufactory & Warerooms of Peter Forney
Industry
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At this corner in Annville, Peter Forney established the Peter Forney Furniture Mannufactory and Warehouse in 1843. In Peter's store, his mother, known as Granny, ran a Beer and Cake Shop, and the Washington Band was organized there in 1858. Granny lived with Peter's family in their log, weather-boarded home between the factory and a log home belonging to Peter Graybill. By 1860, Peter was a master cabinetmaker, and in 1880 he built a new home at 443 East Main Street. The store property was sold in the 1880s to Sheffy and Weltner Furniture Store, which burned in 1882. The nearby Graybill home was owned by Peter Bachman in 1839, and Henry Bachman was living there in 1840. In 1901, Harvey Sheffy, a funeral director and businessman, owned this building. The Grand Army of the Republic occupied the Sheffy Building's second floor, and in 1922 fifty veterans from the American Legion met there. At 7 East Main Street, "Hot Dog" Frank rented the property in 1928, with a restaurant downstairs and his residence upstairs. The corner property later became the site of Jacob Ensminger's shop, H.H. Gruber Fish and Vegetables Market in 1908, and Johns B. Fry Green Grocery, Tobacco and Oysters in 1916. In October 1904, Samuel Lutz and Daniel Spangler built a butcher shop in a second building in from the corner, and in 1909 the Lutz Meat Market was operated by Lutz' son-in-law William Rohland. Around 1931, a Purol gas station was placed on the corner where the two buildings had stood, and within six months it became A.R. Shearer Mobil Gas. In 1980, the property was Shirk's Car Sales, and later a pizza shop was established there.
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