×

Digging into the history of Dugall

There was once a Warren County community named for the construction method of the road it grew up along.

A dugway is a road that is excavated, or, more specifically, a road along a hill that is built by digging out material, letting it fall, and using that material as fill for the road.

According to Place Names In Warren County, Pennsylvania, by Ernie Miller, Dugway was located about halfway from Pittsfield to Wrightsville (presumably off of what is now Route 6).

According to J.S. Schenk’s History of Pittsfield Township, the community was called the Dugway “for an obvious reason.”

Eventually, according to Miller, saying Dugway was just too hard.

“Originally the vicinity was know as the Dugway as most of the houses were located along a dug road,” Miller said. “Gradually, the name was slurred and abbreviated and became Dugall.”

Dugall had a post office as of Schenk’s publication in 1887, one of three in Pittsfield Township. The others were in Pittsfield proper and in Garland.

Oscar Erickson, who was a store owner in the town, was the original postmaster, according to Schenk.

Miller said the Dugall Post Office ran from 1886 to 1903. Schenk had it first established in “about 1855.”

Dugall could not be found on Warren County maps from 1838, 1878, nor 1911. An 1882 map shows a tract owned by C.J. Errickson Brooks at about the right location, but does not show Dugall, nor indicate the presence of a post office between Pittsfield and Wrightsville.

Newsletter

Today's breaking news and more in your inbox

I'm interested in (please check all that apply)
Are you a paying subscriber to the newspaper? *
   

Starting at $4.62/week.

Subscribe Today