ir Play system of
government in lands beyond the Provincial limits must have a definable
locale. It is this writer's firm conviction that Fair Play territory
extended from Lycoming Creek, on the north side of the West Branch of
the Susquehanna, to the Great Island, some five miles west of Pine
Creek. The foundation for the establishment of Lycoming Creek as the
Tiadaghton, and consequently, as the eastern boundary of the Fair Play
territory is apparent once all the evidence is examined. Aside from the
comments of the Indians at the treaty negotiations and Smith's _Laws of
the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania_, there are only secondary accounts
with little documentation to sustain the Pine Creek argument.

On the other hand, the Lycoming Creek claim is buttressed by such
primary sources as the journals of Weiser, Bartram, Spangenberg,
Ettwein, and Fithian, three of which were written before the location of
the Tiadaghton became a subject of dispute. Since none of these men was
seeking lands, they can be considered impartial observers. Furthermore,
the cartographic efforts of Lewis Evans and John Adlum followed actual
visits to the region and say nothing to favor the Pine Creek view.

Perhaps the Indians were merely accepting an already accomplished fact
at the meeting in 1784. Dr. Paul A. W. Wallace says that this would have
been expected from the subservient, pacified Indian. Regardless, the
Provincial leadership made no effort to settle the lands in what some
called "the disputed territory" until after the later agreement at
Stanwix; in fact, they discouraged it.[37] The simple desire for
legitimacy gives us very little to go on in the light of more than
adequate documentation of the justice of the Lycoming view.

This evidence might suggest changing the name of the long-revered
"Tiadaghton Elm" to the "Pine Creek Elm" and bringing to a close the
vexatious question of the Tiadaghton. However let us strike a note of
caution, if not humility. Indian place names had a way of shifting,
doubling, and moving, since they served largely as descriptive terms and
not as true place names. It is not at all unusual to find the same name
applied to several places or to find names migrating. The Tiadaghton
could have been Lycoming Creek to some Indians at one time, and Pine
Creek to others at the same or another time. Consider, for example, that
there were three Miami rivers in present Ohio, which are now known as
the Miami, the Little