It was finally determined by comparison with the charters of New York, Massachusetts and Connecticut just what was the western limit of New York. This was found to be twenty miles east of Presqu’ Isle. On June 6, 1788, the Board of Treasury was induced to make a contract for the sale of this tract described as bounded “on the east by New York, on the south by Pennsylvania and on the north and west by Lake Erie.” On September 4 it was resolved by Congress “that the United States do relinquish and transfer to Pennsylvania all their right, title and claim to the Government and jurisdiction of the said land forever, and it is declared and made known that the laws and public acts of Pennsylvania shall extend over every part of said tract as if the said tract had originally been within the charter bounds of the State.” By an act of October 2, 1788, the sum of £1200 was appropriated to purchase the Indian title to the tract, in fulfillment of the contract to sell it to Pennsylvania. At the treaty of Fort McIntosh, January 9, 1789, Chief Cornplanter and other chiefs of the Six Nations signed a deed in consideration of the sum of £1200, ceding the Presqu’ Isle lands to the United States. It was then, by a deed dated March 3, 1792, ceded by the United States to Pennsylvania. This deed is signed by George Washington, President, and Thomas Jefferson, Secretary of State. In 1790 Surveyor-General Andrew Ellicott made a survey of the triangle and found it to contain 202,287 acres. The purchase-money paid to the United States, at seventy-five cents an acre, was $151,640.25. This purchase having been completed before the passage of the act of April 3, 1792, the lands within it except the reservations were sold under the provisions of this act. The first settlements in Erie County were made under the provisions of that law, and many instances of personal violence occurred between the contending claimants. The squatters would league together to prevent the legal claimants from depriving them of their improvements. The settlement of the lands northwest of the Allegheny River, and especially the Presqu’ Isle lands, was never cordially acquiesced in by the Six Nations, and Cornplanter became very unpopular among his own people. It was charged upon him that he and Little Billy had received the purchase price both at Fort McIntosh and Philadelphia. Cornplanter himself protested to the United States at Buffalo Creek in June, 1794, against the garrison established by General Anthony Wayne at Presqu’ Isle, when he went out against the Miami Indians. ---------- Reading Railroad Incorporated by Act Passed April 4, 1833 The Philadelphia and Reading Railway Company was incorporated by special act of the Legislature of Pennsylvania, approved April 4, 1833.