Samuel Lightfoot
Ownership of the original 500-acre tract that The Mill at Anselma sits on was originally owned by William Penn beginning in 1683. In 1705 Penn sold it to Joseph Pike, an acquaintance and influential Quaker.
Twenty years later, Samuel Lightfoot purchased the tract from Pike. Through this purchase, Lightfoot became Pikeland Township’s largest landowner.
By this time Chester County was already gaining a reputation as the “breadbasket” of the colonies, and there was great need among local farmers for a gristmill. Lightfoot, a surveyor by trade, recognized the opportunity to harness waterpower from his land, and around 1747 he built a small, water-powered mill along the banks of the Pickering Creek. During the period of 1763-1767, he also maintained field records for Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon as they worked to establish the boundary between Pennsylvania and Maryland (now known as the Mason-Dixon line). The Mill and Lightfoot’s work as a surveyor made him the wealthiest man and the largest taxpayer in the township, as well as a leader in political life.
In 1767 Lightfoot divided his property between his sons Thomas and William, giving older son Thomas 250 acres and a sawmill and youngest son William 250 acres and the grist mill. The Mill prospered for a time under William’s ownership but began to decline during his old age. A year after William’s death in 1797, the Mill was listed as being in a “bad state” by the tax assessor. William’s son, Samuel, continued to operate the Mill until 1812, when he sold it to Lewis Rees and James Benson of Berks County and moved to Concord, Ohio.
During Rees and Benson’s eight-year ownership the construction of the Conestoga Turnpike (present-day Route 401) kick-started commercial development of the Mill and its community. The Conestoga Turnpike, named after the covered wagons that provided most of its traffic, contributed in large part to the westward expansion of the 1820s.
In 1820, Rees and Benson conveyed the Mill property to Rees Sheneman.
