[3] Richard W. Leopold and Arthur S. Link (eds.), Problems in American History (Englewood Cliffs, N. J., 1957), p. 22. The entire first problem in this excellent text deals with the question of authority in American government.
[4] This Fair Play system was certainly not unique, for other frontier societies employed the same technique, even down to the ruling tribunal of three members. See Solon and Elizabeth Buck, The Planting of Civilization in Western Pennsylvania (Pittsburgh, 1939), pp. 431, 451. However, it must be pointed out that the Bucks' "Fair Play" reference is based on Smith, Laws, II, 195, which Samuel P. Bates used in "a general application of the practice to W. Pa. areas after 1768," in his History of Greene County, Pennsylvania (Chicago, 1888). This was the interpretation given in a letter from Dr. Alfred P. James to the author, July 17, 1963. Dr. James also says that "It is possible that there are evidences of Fair Play Men titles in the court records of Washington and Greene Counties."
[5] This designation was often employed to classify those settlers who took up lands beyond the limits of the Treaty of Fort Stanwix in 1768, that is to say, west of Lycoming Creek on the north side of the West Branch of the Susquehanna.
[6] Russell, "Signers of the Pine Creek Declaration of Independence," p. 5. Mrs. Russell, whose historical accuracy can be verified through her indicated sources, refers to old borough minutes of Jersey Shore as her source for the names of the tribunal of 1776, namely, Bartram Caldwell, John Walker, and James Brandon. Upon discussing the matter with her, I learned that a clipping from an old Jersey Shore paper, now lost, which described the minutes, was her actual source. However, adequate documentation and meticulous research characterize her work. Furthermore, Bratton Caldwell (he signed his name Bartram) is also labeled a Fair Play official by Linn, "Indian Land and Its Fair Play Settlers, 1773-1785," p. 422. Linn's identification comes in the case of Greer vs. Tharpe, Greer's case being a pre-emption claim on the basis of military service.
[7] "Eleanor Coldren's Deposition," Now and Then, XII (1959), 220-222. The deposition reads "That in the Spring of 1775, Henry Antes and Cookson Long, two of the Fair-Play Men, with others, were at the deponent's house...."
[8] Oscar T. Barck, Jr. and Hugh T. Lefler, Colonial America (New York, 1958), pp. 258-260. Although Barck and Lefler indicate in this section on "The Colonial Franchise" that universal suffrage did not prevail in the colonies, they do note the significance of "free land," of which Fair Play territory was an excellent example.
[9] Ibid, p. 260.
[10] William Cooke to James Tilghman, Pennsylvania Archives, First Series, XII, 286-287.
[11] Pennsylvania Archives, Fourth Series, III, 545-546.
[12] Report of the Commission to Locate the Site of the Frontier Forts of Pennsylvania (Harrisburg, 1896), I, 390, 392, 394-418.