Cornplanter Tract


The Cornplanter Tract or Cornplanter Indian Reservation was a plot of land in Elk Township, Warren County, Pennsylvania that was administered by the Seneca tribe. The tract consisted of along the Allegheny River.
The tract comprised the only native reserved lands within the state of Pennsylvania during its existence. It was originally established in 1796 as a grant to John "Cornplanter" Abeel, the Seneca diplomat, for his personal use, with the right to pass the plot down through his descendants forever. Cornplanter promptly opened up his plot to native settlement, and within two years, 400 Seneca were living on the tract. In 1918, most of Cornplanter's descendants were killed in the 1918 flu pandemic, and Jesse Cornplanter, the last male heir, died in 1957 without having children, leaving the plot without ownership. The plot was already largely abandoned as a residence by the time of Jesse's death, and a 1941 map shows only scattered buildings on the tract.
In the early 1960s, construction of the Kinzua Dam created the Allegheny Reservoir, which submerged the vast majority of the tract. Graves located in a cemetery on the tract were exhumed and their bodies, including what is believed to be Cornplanter's, were reinterred in higher ground.