Manayunk’s historic Ezekiel Shur House for sale

By Amy Z. Quinn
For PlanPhilly

We know this: Ezekiel Shur, 19th century farmer and veteran of the War of 1812, is buried around here somewhere.

That’s his tombstone, marked 1794-1863, in the backyard of Bob Kershaw’s house at 145 Shurs Lane. It’s hard to tell where the actual grave was located, as a contractor found the marker broken in half, way in the back, in the 1990s. More on that in a minute.

Thanks to city records and genealogy data available online, we also know this: Shur, the son of a Revolutionary war veteran, married well. In 1817 he wed Margaret Levering, an ancestor of Manayunk-Roxborough founder Wigard Levering. And in about 1835, around the same time Ezekiel and Margaret’s eighth child was born, they built a house, decorating it with fine touches like pocket doors, wide plank floors, tall windows, intricate moldings and woodwork. More »

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