Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
Its Register listing is the Cherry Springs Picnic Pavilion. Below: maps from 1947 on and the census since 2000.
The West Branch Township post office opened in 1876, the earliest record of the town by name. Three smaller post offices, Cherry Spring (1873), West Branch (1876) and Corbett (1898), 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 West Branch 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).
From Wikipedia’s history of West Branch Township.
The Cherry Springs Picnic Pavilion was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1987.
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
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 SurveyEvery edition of the U.S. Geological Survey’s map of West Branch 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 West Branch Township.
The 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 392 and 399 people in every census since 2000.
3 censuses, 2000–2020.
U.S. Census Bureau decennial counts, from the census table on West Branch Township’s Wikipedia page.
Nobody well known was born in West Branch Township itself, so here are the best known from just nearby.
Each neighbor’s History grade, on the same three inputs.
The West Branch Township post office opened in 1876, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
One place: the Cherry Springs Picnic Pavilion (listed 1987).
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 (3), 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) and the USGS Geographic Names Information System. Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
2011
2010
2008
