Founding year: the first Terre Hill post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0). Wikidata: 1900.The full story ↓
History grade
What drives Terre Hill’s History grade
On its age, its old homes and the National Register, Terre Hill is more historic than 52% of U.S. towns. Its share of homes from before 1940 holds the grade up; its National Register listings pull it down.
B−
HistoryA character grade: shown, never part of Terre Hill’s overall grade.
Pennsylvania towns list about as much on the Register as the country (a typical Pennsylvania town has 2.1 per 10,000 residents, the U.S. 2.4), so Terre Hill’s 0.0 sits below most of its state (25% of Pennsylvania towns have fewer) while its 0 listings outnumber those of 23% of U.S. towns.
How sure. Graded on any two of the three inputs instead, the letter would range from C− to B+. The pre-1940 share is a Census survey estimate (±15.1 points). The founding year is the first post office, not a stated founding date; Wikidata gives 1900.
Founding year: the first post office (other dates in Quick answers). Homes: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register: National Park Service, May 2026 list; each listing counted once (boundary changes and added documentation belong to their listing), and a historic district counts its contributing buildings. How TownRatings grades history →
What stands out about Terre Hill’s past
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
Terre Hill was formerly known as "Fairville". It was incorporated as a borough in 1907 after a successful court battle to separate from East Earl Township.
The borough was once considered to be the hub of cigar-making in Lancaster County. One of its most recognizable landmarks is the 19th-century clock at the borough hall.
Terre Hill has the second fewest residents of any incorporated borough in Lancaster County, with the exception of Christiana. Terre Hill has no traffic lights.
Passages that mention Terre Hill, cut from the printed page as they were published.
History of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania1883Read the page →
Read the text
each other. One leads from the Blue Ball through the village of Bowmansville, since 1833 known as the State road ; the other leads from the present village of Fairville (Terre Hill P. O.), past the Dry Tavern (Muddy Creek P. O.), to Adanistown. Both these ancient roads are crossed — the former at Bowmansville and the latter at the Dry Tavern — by another old thoroughfare leading from the Plow Tavern to
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.
Timeline
Terre Hill, 1850 to 1906
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
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.
Between 812 and 1,357 people in every census since 1890.
13 censuses, 1890–2020.
U.S. Census Bureau decennial counts, from the census table on Terre Hill’s Wikipedia page.
Places that used to be
Places now gone and burying grounds
Terre Hill’s post office has been open since 1850.
Gone or out of use
Fairville Post Officepost office
1cemetery inside Terre Hill
Terre Hill
US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock, CC0). Places and cemeteries from the USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
Questions about Terre Hill’s history
What year was Terre Hill founded?
The Terre Hill post office opened in 1850, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records). Wikidata gives 1900.
How does Terre Hill rank for history?
Terre Hill is more historic than 52% of U.S. towns. The History grade combines the town’s founding era, the share of homes built before 1940 and its National Register listings. It’s a character grade, so it isn’t part of the overall grade. How it works.
How old are the homes in Terre Hill?
37% of Terre Hill’s homes were built before 1940 (Census estimate, ±15.1 points), against a typical 18% for a Pennsylvania town; the median home was built in 1956.
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).
From Wikimedia Commons (6), Wikipedia, Wikidata and Wikipedia for famous people, 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.
1894
2025
2025
2016