The Saga of Greystone

The author, Bob Maynes, was an advisor to the camping program at Camp Lavigne. He lived in the old frame house and was responsible for overseeing building projects and repairs, and to train camp personnel. Bob personally lived and worked with the Greystone building from December, 1981, until it was razed in 1990.

The Preliminaries This section tells the early history of the area.

			The original picture is hanging on the wall at the Columbia County Historical & Genealogical Society in Bloomsburg.
	The Greystone at Coles Creek		Picture courtesy of Brad Cole, Annapolis, MD.
	(the back of the building)

	The "Kettle" Club of Bloomsburg purchased Greystone in the early 1920s, after the cabin they owned near Jamison City burned. A picture of Greystone during the time it was being renovated by the Columbia-Montour Council of the Boy Scouts of America.

	The Greystone building stood on the site shown by the arrow below
			The small settlement on this site was originally known as Sugarloaf, then Cole Town or Coles Creek. It had its own post office and members of the Cole family served as postmaster until local delivery was discontinued.		Greystone was the homestead of Ezekiel Cole. The building fell into disrepair and was torn down in the 1980s. Traces remain of the mill pond and the mill race, and some of the stone foundation.
	Coles Creek, Pennsylvania. Site of former Coles Mill and Greystone		Map courtesy of Brad Cole

Cole's Greystone Mill

The History of Greystone. A group of men settled what is now Coles Creek in 1791. Ezekiel Cole claimed land and settled in the area where Coles Creek joined Fishing Creek. In that same year a daughter was born to Mr. and Mrs. Cole, the first child born in the area north of Orangeville. In 1794, Ezekiel had built a dam and by 1802 had established a grist mill on Fishing Creek. This was the first successful mill north of Bloomsburg. In 1806 the building we know as Greystone was built. It was to be the home of some member of the Cole family until 1916. This portion of this section describes that building.