Matson Insurance is partnering with Jefferson County History Center to offer exploreJeffersonpa.com readers a look into Jefferson County’s past. Today, Jefferson County Town Names are being highlighted.
[Pictured above: This postcard street scene of Reynoldsville was taken about 1910. (Courtesy Reynoldsville Historical Society)]
(Submitted by Carole Briggs, Jefferson County Historical Society.)
WHAT’S IN A NAME?
Reading a map can be as fascinating as reading a good short story. An interesting one appears in McKnight’s two-volume history. Drawn in 1908 and revised in 1916, the mapmaker included roads, streams, railroads, and streetcar lines, and highlighted the towns and villages with black squares. With the help of a good lens, their names can be identified.
It’s fun and not difficult to figure out how Big Run, Brookville, and Falls Creek got their names. The forests and topography of Beechtree, Coolspring, Lakes Hill, Sandy Valley, and Sugar Hill are clues, too. And do you suppose the family living on the bend in the road determined the name of Shoffner’s Corner?
Sawmills and gristmills were the very first industries in the county, so we have places named Allens Mills, Lanes Mills, Rockdale Mills, and Sprankle Mills. Railroad cars once stopped at Fuller Station along the Sandy Lick, and when McKnight’s mapmaker, a fellow named John Gourley, marked Coal Glen on his map, mining was a vibrant industry.
Brockway or Brockwayville as it was originally named, Emerickville, Heathville, Langville, Reynoldsville, Richardsville, and Sykesville are all family names with the French suffix for “village” added. Summers Baldwin added “ville” to his first name for that Clover Township municipality. Oliveburg and Frostburg folks added the German word for town. Ramseytown used English!
Stanton’s post office was named in 1862, presumably after Edwin Stanton, Lincoln’s Secretary of War. Winslow and Winslow Township took the name of a county judge, as did Knoxdale, and the town and township of Porter honor Pennsylvania’s governor 1839―1845; while the town and township of Warsaw recognize the Polish city. Ringgold took its name from a major killed in 1846 at the Battle of Palo Alto. Nobler aspirations led to the naming of Corsica by John J. Y. Thompson, who was enthralled by Napoleon’s birthplace; and even nobler still was Emory Bartlett, who named Pekin for “one of the chief cities of the celestial empire.”
In 1850 when Judah Haggerty laid out the streets of the place called Lumberville. he renamed it Haggerty and then, after the Civil War, it was renamed Sigel. Franz Sigel had emigrated from Prussia in 1852. As a Union general he led his soldiers at Wilson’s Creek, Bull Run, and New Market, but never put a toe near Sigel!
While some Pennsylvania counties abound with Indian names, Jefferson County has but one―Punxsutawney―and almost everyone knows the translation is “sand fly place.” Grange is self-explanatory, and the villages of Desire and Panic might lead to interesting speculations, but how did places named Conifer, Hazen, Iowa, Munderf, North Freedom, Ohio, Pueblo, Rathmel, Wishaw, and Worthville get their names? Perhaps a reader or two knows.
Throwback Thursday is brought to you by Matson Insurance in Brookville.
Copyright@Jefferson County Historical Society, Inc.
Submitted by the Jefferson County History Center.
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