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History · Norvelt

Norvelt’s post office opened in 1937, and 30% of its homes were built before 1940

Below: 3 old photos and papers and maps from 1935 on.

1937first post office
0on the National Register
30%homes built before 1940
3old photos & papers
Add an old photoShare a memory
From Norvelt’s archive · credits on each photo
Quick answers

How Norvelt began

When was Norvelt founded?

1937

The Norvelt post office opened in 1937, the earliest record of the town by name.

2020 census: 84689 years
Founding year: the first Norvelt post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0).The full story ↓

What stands out about Norvelt’s past

Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.

A history waiting to be writtenOnly 3 old photos are in the public archives. The rest are in attics and albums.
★ What stands out · Help out

Start Norvelt’s collection

The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Norvelt’s history is told.

Decades since 1900 with photos
00s10s20s30s40s50s60s70s80s90s
1 of 10 decades. The empty ones are waiting for someone’s album.
Date a photo1 archive item has no date. Guess the decade.+2Retake an old viewView of Westmoreland Homesteads Septemb…: stand where they stood+15Share a family photoSign in to add one+10
The story

How Norvelt came to be

From Wikipedia’s history of Norvelt.

Read it all →

As part of the sweeping National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933 (NIRA), Congress allocated $25 million for the creation of "subsistence homesteads" for dislocated industrial workers. Over the course of the program's eleven-year history, the federal government seeded nearly 100 planned, cooperative communities. Norvelt, in southwestern Pennsylvania, was the fourth. The idea for the program was a throwback to the Jeffersonian ideal of a back-to-the-land movement, popularized by Americans who promoted small-scale subsistence farming as an antidote to economic exploitation and the alienation of modern life. The idea gained strength in the 1920s among a wide variety of progressive organizations, including church-related groups such as the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) which was the social services arm of the Quakers. During the 1920s, the AFSC had become deeply concerned with th…

ChaptersBackgroundBuilding NorveltEleanor Roosevelt's visit and legacy

Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

By decade

Norvelt, decade by decade

One decade in the archive so far: the 1930s. Scroll each row; tap a photo for its story.

1930s2 items
View of Westmoreland Homesteads September 19361936View of Westmoreland Homesteads September 1936Westmoreland Homesteads September 19361936Westmoreland Homesteads September 1936
1940s–1990snothing yet
Nothing in the archives for these yearsWeddings on Main Street, storms, parades, school pictures, the old store. If it’s in your family album, it belongs here.
Add from your album
Date unknown1 to date
Town of NorveltDate?Town of Norvelt
Today2 recent
Norvelt2026NorveltNorvelt Pa 20112011Norvelt Pa 2011
On the map

Norvelt on the map, 1935 to 1993

Every edition of the U.S. Geological Survey’s map of Norvelt. Tap a year, or press play to watch the town change.

Norvelt on the 1935 USGS mapNorvelt on the 1967 USGS mapNorvelt on the 1973 USGS mapNorvelt on the 1993 USGS map1935Donegal sheet · 1:62,500

U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (public domain), via Esri’s collection of the scans. The red ring marks the center of Norvelt.

Then & now

Stand where they stood

No then-and-now pairs yet. Take a photo from the same spot as an old one and they appear here side by side.

View of Westmoreland Homesteads September 1936
Retake this viewView of Westmoreland Homesteads September 1936, 1936

Find the spot, match the angle, and add your photo. It becomes the first then-and-now pair on Norvelt’s page.

Retake this view · +15
Famous people

Famous people close to Norvelt

Nobody well known was born in Norvelt itself, so here are the best known from just nearby.

See all →
Fred RogersAmerican television personality · b. 1928
Arnold PalmerAmerican golfer · b. 1929
Bruce WeberAmerican photographer · b. 1946
S
Sheila KelleyAmerican actress · b. 1961
Slide HamptonAmerican trombonist · b. 1932
Vic MignognaAmerican voice actor · b. 1962
Stories next door

History across the town line

Each neighbor’s History grade, on the same three inputs.

Calumet1 historic placenot graded: under 1,000 residents or part of its town

Questions about Norvelt’s history

What year was Norvelt founded?

The Norvelt post office opened in 1937, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).

Memory lane

What the archives can’t tell you, neighbors can.

Town Square →
Start a conversation
Sources

Where this page comes from

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 (4), the Library of Congress (1), Wikipedia and U.S. Geological Survey historical maps. Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.