Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
Below: 6 old photos and papers from 1905 on and the census since 1890.
South Bethlehem dates its founding to 1854 (Wikidata). The census first counted it in 1890.
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
From Wikipedia’s history of South Bethlehem.
South Bethlehem appears on the 1876 Atlas of Armstrong County, Pennsylvania. It was founded by William R. Hamilton on land he purchased from Lewis Daubenspecht. The land was part of a tract of 280,990 acres, conveyed to Willem Willink, who was an investor in the Holland Land Company, on warrant 2896 on September 6, 1802.
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Passages that mention South Bethlehem, cut from the printed page as they were published.
conveyed 54 acres and 124 perches, including onehalf an acre formerly sold, to William R. Hamilton, January 22, 1874, for $7,500, on a part of which he laid out the town of South Bethlehem. As indicating the value of real estate in this new town a few years since and up to the present time, the following conveyances are here given : Wm.
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.
In the archiveChemLabLehighUniv1907
In the archivePanorama of the Bethlehem Steel Works, South Bethlehem, Pa2 decades in the archive, from the 1900s to the 1910s. Scroll each row; tap a photo for its story.
1905ChemLabLehighUniv1907Postcard
1907LehighUniversityLibraryPostcard1912Panorama of the Bethlehem Steel Works, South Bethlehe…Postcard
1912Panorama of the Bethlehem Steel Works, South Bethlehe…Postcard
1912Panorama of the Bethlehem Steel Works, South Bethlehe…Postcard
1912Panorama of the Bethlehem Steel Works, South Bethlehe…PostcardNo 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 South Bethlehem’s page.
Retake this view · +15Between 111 and 561 people in every census since 1890.
14 censuses, 1890–2020.
U.S. Census Bureau decennial counts, from the census table on South Bethlehem’s Wikipedia page.
Most archives stop around 1920. The photos from after that are in family albums, not libraries.
Each neighbor’s History grade, on the same three inputs.
In 1854, according to Wikidata. the census of 1890 counted 111 people here.
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 (6), Wikipedia, Wikidata and Wikipedia for famous people, U.S. Census counts (via Wikipedia), 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.
