Tip Top Farm
- Yen Ho
- 2 days ago
- 3 min read
The Tip Top Farm was one of the estates that represents the wealth and status of the residents who lived in the Gwynedd Valley area. It is the only place where we know the lives of the King family when they first moved to Penllyn.
Irvin King
Irvin King (1875-1939) was born on August 29 in Baltimore where he attended the William S. Marston's University for Boys. He was trained at the Freight Traffic Department of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Company, and was eventually put into different positions within the company like a contracting agent, and in charge of solicitation of the canned goods trade of Baltimore. He was then promoted to be a traveling freight agent, and had a headquarters in Philadelphia serving under Andrew Stevenson.
Irvin went on to be a traffic manager for the cotton companies in Houston, Boston, and New York City while working in Philadelphia. He headed those companies until 1925. He then went into the stock brokerage business, and opened an office in Philadelphia for Munds, Winslow & Potter, and the New York Cotton Exchange. He represented them until his retirement in 1938.
In 1910, Irvin purchased an old farm on the John Saunders property in Gwynedd Valley in hopes to find a better home to stay at during the summer.
Memories from Polly King Miller
The only member of the King family who was able to share her memories and times spent at the Tip Top Farm was Irvin's daughter Elizabeth "Polly" King Miller. She was only a little girl when she and her family moved into the farm. Despite the family having a lack of experience in farming and not knowing many people in their neighborhood, they were able to easily adjust to their environment.
"Father didn't know anything about farming, but it was something he wanted to learn, which he did with the help of a pretty good farmer that he hired... We really didn't know anybody, and this was a very 'choosey' neighborhood. They didn't accept you, unless they really liked you. After a while, however, we did start to meet the other families of the neighborhood, and eventually we made many, many good friends."
- Polly King, 1990 interview
She mentioned in her interview that the people who lived in the area were "lovely people with very good, conservative ideas about how people should live in the country, or anywhere." They were the people who set the tone in the neighborhood.
Polly got her first real horse from the Ingersoll family and named it Skytook. In the neighborhood they lived at, it was considered a "very horsey" neighborhood where they can freely ride their horses. And also they live near the Penllyn Club where most of her life was spent.
In her personal life, she married James Rumrill Miller, II.
Bibliography
Baltimore and Ohio Magazine 25 (1939): 40.
"IRVIN KING." Ambler Gazette. September 7, 1939. Page 7. https://digitalarchives.powerlibrary.org/papd/islandora/object/papd%3Awivp-gazett_23170.
Mueller, A. H. Atlas of the North Penn Section of Montgomery County, Pa., Plate 29, 1916.
Ruth, Phil Johnson. Fair Land Gwynedd: A Pictorial History of Southeastern Pennsylvania's Lower Gwynedd Township, Upper Gwynedd Township, and North Wales Borough. (Souderton: Merck Sharp & Dohme, 1991): 115-116, 153-154.
Smith, J. L. Montgomery County 1893, Upper and Lower Gwynedd Townships, Lansdale, North Wales, Spring House, Ambler Right, 1893.
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