 | |
John
Test:
Owner of “The Skales” Tavern
at
Walnut and Front Streets
in Philadelphia
In 1692 John Test purchased the lot on the bank of the Delaware River at the southeast corner of Walnut and Front Street. This is the probable location of The Skales. He may have been operating the inn before the purchase was made. He is described in 1689 as an inn holder. He was rated for taxes there in 1693
at a value of £150. This is about $200,000 in 2014 dollars.
Examination of the tax records for Philadelphia shows that around 1690, there were five taverns, victualing houses or ordinaries in the town. The names of these taverns have been preserved in these records. They are:
It is said the first thing William Penn did when he disembarked from the Welcome in 1682 was to have a pint of ale at the Blue Anchor Tavern.
When Ben Franklin arrived in Philadelphia he had his first hot meal at the Crooked Billet Tavern.
The Penny Pot Tavern at Front and Vine Streets was so-named because the Duke of York decreed that the price of beer be a penny a pot (pint).
In colonial Philadelphia, taverns were more numerous than churches. It was at these "public houses" where our founding fathers gathered to eat, drink, and haggle over the details of the Declaration of Independence.
1) The Blue Anchor House, in the middle of Front Street just south of Walnut street;
2) The Pennypot House, on the bank of the Delaware River on the north end of town beyond Vine Street;
3) The Crooked Billet, on the bank of the Delaware River between High and Chestnut Street;
4) The Great House on Front Street;
5) The Skales, at the southeast corner of Walnut and Front Street
Source: Hannah Benner Roach, "Philadelphia Business Directory, 1690," in Pennsylvania Genealogical Magazine 22, no. 1 (1961) 3-41 reprinted in Hannah Benner Roach, Colonial Philadelphians (Hanover, Pa: Genealogical Society of Pennsylvania, 1999).
Google Preview
See Rich Wagner: Our Landmark Taverns.
We have evidence that John Test was an inn-holder in four deed registration entries:
Beer and Ale in Colonial Days
The importance of beer in colonial times should not be underestimated.
See this story on the role and the art of brewing in colonial America
See Also Samuel Child's 1794 phamplet Every Man His Own Brewer
1. 1689, 18th day, 8th month. In a land transaction recorded in New Jersey, John Test of Philadelphia is described as an inn holder.
2. 1689-90, Jan 17. In a land transaction recorded in New Jersey, John Test of Philadelphia is described as an inn holder.
3. 1693, June 3. In a land transaction recorded in New Jersey, John Test of Philadelphia is described as an inn holder.
4. 1697 April 24. In a land transaction recorded in New Jersey, John Test is described as an inn holder.
Nelson, William, ed. Patents and Deeds and Other Early Records of New Jersey, 1664-1703. (Baltimore, MD: Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc., 1982.). Originally published as: Calendar of Records in the Office of the Secretary of State, 1664-1703 [Documents relating to the Colonial History of the State of New Jersey a.k.a. New Jersey Archives, First Series, Volume XXI]. (Paterson: 1899)., pp. 657, 661, and 676.
5. In the Records of the Court at Burlington, West Jersey, we find this record:
Peter Lespine and Nicholas Martineo [were] supenaed for the Defendants Attested ... that Augustus Sonne told him that Mr. Dubrois said that if hee would stand by him the said Mr. Dubrois hee should goe shares with him in the profitts hee could make at Cape May, further saith that one day being at John Tests [Inn] in Philadelphia Mr. Dubrois told him hee had a minde to send the Sloope to Boston and goe in her along Captain Eberad....
Documenting John Test’s Ownership of
The Skales
There is actually very little evidence showing us that John Test’s inn or tavern had the name The Scales or The Skales. As noted above, John Test was called an inn holder several years prior to purchasing the land where The Skales was probably located.
Hannah Benner Roach in her 1963 Pennslvania Genealogical Magazine article writes that in 1692 John Test “purchased the lot on the bank [of the Delaware River] at the southeast corner of Walnut and Front Street, the probable location of the tavern called The Skales. He was rated here in 1693 on an estate assessed at £150.”
We know that John Test owned a block of land, that he owned an inn or tavern, and that since this block of land is the probable location of The Skales, we infer that John Test owned The Skales.
This is all.
So, is it spelled ‘The Skales’ or ‘The Scales’? In the tax records it's ‘The Skales’ and in Peter Cooper's painting, we get ‘The Scales’. So, who knows? Take your pick. Spelling varied greatly in this era: for example, the other taverns listed above were spelled (in at least one record) as ‘The Blew Anker’, ‘The Crokked billitt’, and ‘The Pennepott Hows’.
What about the meaning of the word ‘skales’? Does it mean ‘scales’ - the pattern of the scales on a fish or sometimes the pattern of the roofing on a building or the metaphorical scales of justice? John Test had been the sheriff of Chester and the first sheriff of Philadelphia. A search of the internet reveals that there was a tavern in London in the 1730s named the Skales, one in Berlin at the present time, and one in a popular computer game.
There were four classes of public houses: inns, taverns, ordinaries, and coffee houses. The inn was a modest hotel that supplied lodgings, food, and drink, the beverages consisting mostly of ale, port, Jamaica rum, and Madeira wine. The tavern, though accommodating guests with bed and board, was more of a drinking place than a lodging house. The ordinary combined the characteristics of a restaurant and a boarding house. The coffee house was a pretentious tavern, dispensing, in most cases, intoxicating drinks as well as coffee.
References:
John L. Cotter, Daniel G. Robertson, The buried past: an archaeological history of Philadelphia.
Elise Lathrop, Early American Inns and Taverns
Horace Mather Lippincott, Early Philadelphia: its people, life and progress
Sharon V. Salinger, Taverns and Drinking in Early American.
Peter Thompson, Rum punch & revolution: taverngoing & public life in eighteenth century.
Russell Frank Weigley, Nicholas B. Wainwright, Edwin Wolf, Philadelphia: a 300 year history .
Taverns and Beer in Philadelphia's History
by John FischerWhen William Penn arrived in Pennsylvania in 1682 there were already taverns in what was soon to become his new "green country town" - Philadelphia. Lacking buildings some taverns were dug into the caves that lined the Delaware River. History records that Penn's boat anchored right next to The Blue Anchor, a transplanted Irish pub that had been reassembled on the dock. It's easy to conclude that Philadelphia's earliest settlers were hearty drinkers, but there was a reason for this madness. Water, for the most part, was undrinkable.
By the time of the War for Independence it is said that Philadelphia had a tavern for every 25 men and along with Boston, more taverns than anywhere in the English speaking world. Old City Tavern which was originally built in 1773 and reconstructed in 1976 sits in Independence National Park and is filled with history. It was the "unofficial" meeting place for the First Continental Congress in 1774, a place of celebration for delegates to Congress on the first anniversary of the Declaration of Independence and hosted a dinner in honor of General Washington at the conclusion of the Constitutional Convention in September of 1787.
Contact: Robert Test
Click Here
Send Me A Message – A Comment – Or A Correction
robert at testfamilygenealogy.netDescendants of John Test are eligible for membership in The Flagon and Trencher Society" Descendants of Colonial Tavern Keepers.
The sign for The Skales Tavern can be found at http://signsneversleep.typepad.com/signs_never_sleep/walkers-colonial-american-sign-company-painted-signs/. I erased the text on that sign and added 'The Skales Tavern' to it using the a mayflower font.The Devroye font was designed by apostrophiclabs at apostrophiclab.pedroreina.net/
The text for Was John Test a Corrupt Sheriff? is a Fell Type Font designed by Igino Marini at http://iginomarini.com/fell/.
Posted 1/17/2010 First document to attempt use of online font files.
