Horse Sheds

The existing sheds for horses and equipage were probably built in the 1820s, but stables were there in the 1790s as mentioned in the Price diary. (p. 20)

As many worshippers must have arrived by carriage, it seems likely that horse sheds were built earlier.

The Merion Friends website tells us more about the horse sheds:

Prominent structures on the hill above Montgomery Avenue where Merion Friends Meetinghouse stands, the current horse sheds have probably been in place since the 1820s. Although there were stables at Merion Meeting in the 1790s at least, the current sheds represent the historical explosion of horses and carriages.

The carriage quickly became a status symbol of the rich, so for Quakers these mobile conveniences represented a potential challenge to their notions of simplicity (or Plainness). In the 1750s, carriages were in use in Philadelphia and Quakers were among those taking advantage of this mode of conveyance, but some, fearful of elite consumption, refused even to ride in one. Although the average assessment of wealth among Quakers was higher than among non-Quakers, some did not own a carriage at all.

Although the horse sheds nearest the General Wayne Inn may have been used for horses drawing stagecoaches, the others were built to provide cover to Merion Meeting worshippers' horses. It is hard to know exactly how Quakers parked in the carriage sheds. Based on the evidence of chew marks on the inside back wall and on partitions within the sheds, the owners probably unhitched the horses from the carriages and provided them with hay or oats.

More information can be found from The First 300: the Amazing and Rich History of Lower Merion. Published by the Lower Merion Historical Society in the year 2000, there is an account of the horse sheds at the Merion Friends Meeting House: