Springfield

Two miles west of State Route 475 in southern Springfield Township, a township road numbered 313 crosses Sideling Hill Creek on a steel bridge the county carries on its books as Huntingdon County Bridge Number 1. It is a single span of 120 feet, a pin-connected Pratt through truss with a timber deck 13.75 feet wide, resting on its original gravity-type concrete abutments and wing walls.

The nomination does not say who built it or when. It says the Huntingdon County bridge office had no information on the bridge's history, and that a search of the bridge contracts in the County Commissioners' office turned up nothing on its construction. Among the sources it lists are the county's bridge file, a PennDOT printout of county and township bridges dated August 1, 1988, and an interview with County Commissioner Martin Brown on December 9, 1988. The builder is entered as unknown, and the text says the bridge was likely built in the late 1800s.

The case for listing it rests on its type. The nomination says the Frehn Bridge is one of fewer than ten pin-connected Pratt through truss bridges still standing in the county, and that it had been well maintained and kept its material, its design and its rural setting. It was nominated for engineering at the local level under the Industrial Resources of Huntingdon County multiple property listing, on a form prepared in September 1989 by Deborah L. Suciu of the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission. The text draws on a 1988 report for the Historic American Engineering Record by Nancy Shedd, then president of the Huntingdon County Historical Society. The nomination reached the National Park Service on February 7, 1990. The listed property is a rectangle 130 feet by 40 feet, its corners set at the outside corners of the wing walls.

Shedd's county inventory of historic engineering and industrial sites, published by the National Park Service in 1991, repeats the history in nearly the same words, offers its own estimate of the construction date, and adds one thing the nomination does not: although the Frehn bridge stood on a remote dirt road with little traffic, it was high on the list of county bridges scheduled for replacement.

The Huntingdon County bridge office has no information on the history of the Frehn bridge in Springfield Township, and a search of bridge contracts in the County Commissioners office did not reveal any information on its construction.National Register of Historic Places nomination, Frehn Bridge (reference 90000391), section 8, p. 5 · character 4,566 of the scanned text

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Pennsylvania Route 475, called Church Street here, looking north at Walnut Grove Church Road in Springfield township. Photographed in October 2021.

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Did you know? Meadow Gap took its name from the gap in the mountain and the large meadow at the mouth of the gap.

Nobody is certain who settled there first. Some say Thomas Stains, and others, with equal authority, say Jesse Coates. Robert and John Madden built the grist and saw mills there in 1834, William Madden opened the first store soon after, and Jacob Baker was the first postmaster. John Shore, the pioneer miller, was still living at eighty five when the county history came out in 1883.

The early settlers in that country worked their cabins and clearings by day and went back at night to Fort Littleton, four to ten miles away.

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From the county histories, on Springfield township. The passage below is printed exactly as it appears in 1913, including the spelling of the day and the errors the scanner made. It has not been rewritten, summarised or added to.

A small log house was built, but was abandoned in a few years, the members going to strengthen another congregation on Licking creek, near the old forge. An Old School Baptist congregation was organized in Springfield township, Huntingdon county, in 1800, but little can be learned of its history. A number of Welsh Baptists organized a church at an early date near the present borough of Dudley, but it has long been extinct. The church at Birmingham was organized in 1822 by Rev, Richard Proudfoot, who had been holding meetings in that section for some time before that date. About 1826 a church was erected and it prospered for a number of years. After the completion of the railroad the business that formerly came to Birmingham was diverted to other places, and as the town declined the church went down until it was finally abandoned in 1862. Rev. Samuel Lane, a Baptist minister "of more than ordinary energ>- and public spirit," established a church at Saltillo early in the nineteenth century, but it appears that no record of the congregation has been preserved, either as to the date of its organization or its abandonment. The Shaver's Creek Baptist church was organized in 1833, with fourteen members, as a result of the labors of Rev. Richard Proudfoot, who was the first pastor.John W. Jordan, ed., History of the Juniata Valley and Its People (New York: Lewis Historical Publishing, 1913) · character 894,573 of the scanned text

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From the county histories, on Springfield township. The passage below is printed exactly as it appears in 1883, including the spelling of the day and the errors the scanner made. It has not been rewritten, summarised or added to.

Owing to its distance from public improvements, and consequent isolation from the outer world, this township has never been favored with manufacturing establishments, that it otherwise would have been with all its natural advantages. Probably the pioneer settler of what is now Springfield township was a Revolutionary soldier by the name of John Bailey, who wandered along down the Little Aughwick till near what is now Maddensville, where he selected a spot, cut away the trees, and built his mansion. He was not long "alone in his glory," for soon came along a few more hardy pioneers in search of future homes, among whom we find William Ward, John Robertson, and William Jones, who located along the banks of the Aughwick. These pioneers were soon reinforced by others, among whom were the Cutshalls and Stains, Browns and Lanes, the Wibles, the Ramseys and Maddens. The Wibles were of German descent, while the two latter descended from Erin's green isle. All these pioneers located along the Aughwick Valley, while Hugh Orlton, who descended from the Scottish highlands, thought there was no place like the hills, and became pioneer of the hill country, out of reach of the next flood. He took up a large tract by warrant or patent, and subsequently sold to Richard Lane. Mr. Orlton had the pleasure and honor of owning the pioneer "7" shingle-roof" house in the township.J. Simpson Africa, History of Huntingdon and Blair Counties, Pennsylvania (Philadelphia: Louis H. Everts, 1883) · character 2,338,483 of the scanned text

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