Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
Photo: Nyttend · Public domainIts Register listing is the Bridge in French Creek Township. Below: 1 old photo or paper, maps from 1911 on, and the census since 2000.
The French Creek Township post office opened in 1837, the earliest record of the town by name. Three smaller post offices, French Creek (1837), Deer Creek (1839) and Milledgeville (1852), opened inside today’s town and later closed.
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
The first neighbors to add old photos shape how French Creek Township’s history is told.
Three other post offices opened and closed inside today’s town.
US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock, CC0). Places and cemeteries from the USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
Every edition of the U.S. Geological Survey’s map of French Creek Township. Tap a year, or press play to watch the town change.
U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (public domain), via Esri’s collection of the scans. The red ring marks the center of French Creek Township.
From Wikipedia’s history of French Creek Township.
The Bridge in French Creek Township was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1988.
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Passages that mention French Creek Township, cut from the printed page as they were published.
French Creek Township was formed in 1805, the first mention of it on the court records being under date of August, of that year, when the survey was returned and approved. It was originally much larger than at present, its territory having been very much diminished November 19, 1849, by the formation of Mill Ci'eek Township. The surface of the township is very much broken.
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
The old township of Sandy Creek, with its gigantic area of fifty square miles, was erected in 1804. It extended from the line of Crawford County on the north to the old township of Cool Spring on the south, and was bounded on the east by French Creek Township and on the west by Salem. It existed in this shape until the year 1850. On December 18, of that j«ear, a number of petitions, asking for a division of the old organization into four new ones, was presented in court. Francis Beatty, James A. Leech and Joseph Kerr were appointed commissioners. They reported a division, which, being confirmed June 23,
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.Scans and text from the Internet Archive. Books published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
On the mapFirst mapped by the U.S. Geological Survey
In the archiveBridge in French Creek TownshipOne decade in the archive so far: the 1980s. Scroll each row; tap a photo for its story.
2024US 322 wb entering Wayne Twp., Crawford Co., PA, June…
2024US 322 eb entering Canal Twp., PA, June 2024
2019Farmstead with pond, Carter Road
2019Deer Creek Methodist Church, FC Township
2019Course of Powdermill Run (French Creek tributary)
2019Course of Mill Creek (French Creek tributary)
2019Carter south of Karwash, French Creek Township
2010US Route 322 - Pennsylvania
2010US Route 322 - PennsylvaniaNo then-and-now pairs yet. Take a photo from the same spot as an old one and they appear here side by side.
Find the spot, match the angle, and add your photo. It becomes the first then-and-now pair on French Creek Township’s page.
Retake this view · +15The country’s official list of buildings and places worth saving.
National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places. Photos from Wikimedia Commons, credited on each place’s page.
Between 709 and 771 people in every census since 2000.
3 censuses, 2000–2020.
U.S. Census Bureau decennial counts, from the census table on French Creek Township’s Wikipedia page.
Nobody well known was born in French Creek Township itself, so here are the best known from just nearby.
Each neighbor’s History grade, on the same three inputs.
The French Creek Township post office opened in 1837, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
One place: the Bridge in French Creek Township (listed 1988).
What the archives can’t tell you, neighbors can.
Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021). How TownRatings grades history →
From Wikimedia Commons (10), the National Register of Historic Places (1), Wikipedia, U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, U.S. Census counts (via Wikipedia), the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock), the USGS Geographic Names Information System and old county and town histories (Internet Archive). Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
