James's grandfather Jacob Rickenbach (1757-1831) died as the construction of the Philadelphia and Reading railroad through his property began, and traffic on the Schuylkill Navigation Canal was quite active (the rail line would actually bisect the existing family cemetery where he was buried). Jacob's estate records included a map, shown below, of how his estate was divided by his family. The bulk of Jacob's estate was left to his oldest son Solomon (parcel labeled "A"), while a narrow strip of land reserved for his youngest son Benjamin (two parcels labeled "B").

According to the memoir, in 1832 Benjamin built a log and frame house along the road and canal on his new property, within the small portion (labeled "B") on the west side of the canal (to avoid the strip of his land between canal and river subject to flood).

An old, small frame house still exists there, and I believe that this could be his original house (the light blue house pictured to the left). Later in the memoir, Becky stated that Benjamin's son James built his house close to his father's house on the edge of the property. In fact the house pictured here is adjacent to James' house.

By the 1870s, after James began his drydock enterprise and employed many workers there, he built "three five room houses under one roof close to Grandfather's (Benjamin) house" to house these workers and their families. These houses still exist and are shown below. Note Benjamin's small original house to the left.

You can see a detail of the front portion of the middle house in the photograph on the left. Check out this map to see where these houses are located relative to other sites mentioned in the memoir.

Photographs by Tom Rickenbach