I Love This Place

I Love this Place

MAPLETOWN, PA

by Colleen Nelson

Taking Greene County back to the frontier days is an adventure in itself, as layers of time are peeled back to reveal that the “one street town” of Mapletown and surrounding areas has an impressive number of “firsts” to brag about.

That flashing light on State Route 88 six miles south of its intersection with Route 21 is a touch of modern bling, but don’t be fooled. The county’s frontier history begins right here, when Col. John Minor, (1744- 1833) “the father of Greene County” arrived in 1764, three years before the Mason Dixon Line was cut to separate the colonies of Virginia from Penn’s Woods. Turn left and you’ll be in historic Greensboro on the Monongahela River. Turn right and you’ll be in equally historic Mapletown, perched half a mile above Whiteley Creek, where this story begins. Col. Minor crossed the Blue Ridge Mountains from London County, Virginia, passed through Redstone Fort (now Brownsville) then came here to make a “tomahawk improvement” on hundreds of acres of wilderness that was still considered Virginia. His claim stretched around Whiteley Creek and while he was there he made a separate claim for his brother William and another for good friend Zachery Gapen. His companion Jeremiah Glassgow explored the lands around Dunkard Creek and made a claim for himself near Mt. Morris that he had to fight an “interloper” for when he returned the next year to settle his tomahawk improvement.

The covered bridge in Mapletown spanned the Whiteley Creek.

According to historian LK Evans, Col. Minor built a “snug cabin” on Whiteley Creek, then, like Glassgow, went back to Virginia to fetch his bride and first son Otho, William and Zachary and their families, along with mill equipment to build the “first flouring mill west of the Monongahela River.” Indigenous fighters burned it during “Lord Dunmore’s War.” Undeterred, Minor built another of stone across from his cabin and added a sawmill, both powered by the waters of Whiteley Creek contained in a millpond and channeled to the wheel through a millrace. His sons and grandsons would continue milling for generations, first with water and later, with steam.

No part of the mill or the homestead remains, except for an old photograph from the 1880s. A later photo shows the covered bridge that spanned the creek in the early 20th century. It too is gone. Now, when you leave Mapletown and drive to the edge of the creek you can watch the coal train rumble by, taking coal from Cumberland Mine to Alicia on the Monongahela River.

The remains of the covered bridge.

But in those early days of frontier hostilities between England, France and the native people who were being displaced by these first settlers, Minor, with his “Colonel’s commission from the Governor of Virginia, was recognized by all the settlers as commander in chief of all the militia in the territory.” Evans, a native of Monongahela Township was a reporter for the Waynesburg Republican during the Civil War and wrote a series of articles for the paper in 1875 - 1877 that are considered “the most authentic and interesting account of pioneer history in Greene County.” His admiration for Col. Minor is understandable – the man was a force to be reckoned with, in charge of building forts in every settlement and leading “flying brigades” of men who would engage those who would “ambush by day and surprise by night”, pursuing them across hills and valleys, driving them back across the Ohio River to the unsettled territories. His cabin doubled as a fort and he had a conch shell, which “did signal service when alarming the neighborhood of dangers both real and imaginary.” After the Revolutionary War, his reputation as a community builder and defender continued to grow as the land in this south corner of Washington County developed its own body politic. Minor became Justice of the Peace of Cumberland Township in 1781 and became political when he and his neighbors began agitating to become their own county. He ran and was elected to the state legislature on that platform in 1791 and fought for six years to make it happen. So yes, he is the father of Greene County!

Meanwhile, on the hill above Minor’s Mill, Mapletown, like Greene County had yet to be born. In the History of Mapletown, Malinda Minor notes that George Debolt patented “White Oak Flats” in 1786, paying seven pounds, eleven shillings and six pence for the land.” When Stephen Mapel and his young family came to the area from Middlesex County NJ in 1788, he did more than give his name to the town that was beginning to spring up above Whiteley Creek. His son Robert would someday purchase land on nearby Dunkard Creek that would be known as Bob’s Town, then later Bobtown. Robert built a flourmill, carding mill and general store and, according to Malinda Minor is credited with being the first to discover oil in the county.

When Stephen Mapel’s son Benjamin sold some of the family farm to trustees for a church in 1797, the family’s surname was well affixed to the village that, in its hey day after the Civil War would have a hattery, a thriving assortment of stores, an inn and a post office, along with “a copper, stock dealers, carpenters and gunsmiths.”

The inn is still standing, its two log cabins hidden from the outside by wooden siding. Known as the James A. Minor House, it was the first private residence in Greene County to be placed on the Pennsylvania Inventory of Historic Places. Its pedigree was well researched by James and Carol Minor after they purchased it in 1971 and the land has been traced back to George DeBolt and the first part of the building to 1803. By 1812 it was a tavern and legend has it that a Confederate deserter was murdered in the inn.

More certifiable, the rolling hills around the town were cleared for cattle and sheep and then like now, some farms had their lanes opening right onto the one road through town. In time, Mapel Town morphed to Mapletown and by 1924 a yellow brick high school was built on that one main street for the students in the southeastern corner of the county. Once nearly every farm had a place where the family dug coal out of the hills as another cash crop, later, when the big coal mines opened the boom times brought jobs and prosperity to local convenience stores. As the mines began closing in the latter part of the 20th century, Mapletown businesses downsized and the town eventually lost its last store in 2016 when owner Bobby Watson died. But the land here is beautiful, well suited for cattle and remains a cozy collection of families held together by school pride, a love of family history and weekly get-togethers at Mapletown United Methodist Church on Main Street just as it begins to dip down to Whiteley Creek.

Jack Keener holds a photo of what his houses used to look like when it was a two room schoolhouse.

When I got my invitation to explore Mapletown with Lorraine - Lori Beth - Adams, whose paternal Barb family has lived there “for the last 200 years!” I was on my way to an adventure into the past that is still visible from a four-wheeler on a muddy Sunday afternoon after church.

Charles Barb's service station and Ford dealership.

Lori Beth’s recollections of growing up helping out on Grandpap Ewing Minor Barb’s family farm on Mapletown Road give a glimpse of early to middle and late 20th century small town living, complete with family photos of great grandfather Charles A. Barb’s service station and Ford dealership across the road from his dairy farm where the family now runs cattle. Another photo shows the old general store that once sat at the corner of the farm lane. As a freshman at Waynesburg College in 2006, Lori Beth did an historical essay on her hometown that earned her a high grade and preserved day-to-day details of growing up here and knowing all your neighbors.

An unnamed general store sat on the corner of the lane leading to the Barb farm.

I got to talk to her grandmother Constance – Connie - Barb and enjoy the view from her front porch, overlooking the barnyard across Mapletown Road to the hills above, where Lori Beth says “people pause as they are walking or riding their bikes just to say “hi”. Grandma’s swing is a place to sit and watch the sun dance in the shadows and across the cows as they graze, where you can hear the football announcer on Friday night even if you don’t go to the game. You know when there are fireworks because the superintendent - whose dad worked in the hayfields with Grandpap as a teenager - lets you know so you can make sure your animals are okay being so close to where the fireworks are set off.”

I almost stayed late enough to see those shadows. After hill climbing with Lori Beth and her mom Minda Adams to see where Route 88 once ran across their pasture to come out beside the high school driveway, wheeling across muddy creek beds to see where clay was once dug to make Greensboro pottery then climbing to a stunning view on

Rt. 88 used to run right through the Barb farm.

the top of the hill that makes Mapletown look like a town under a Christmas tree than back again for pizza with Grandma Connie and more family tales, I headed home with the setting sun, filled with the down-home energy of Mapletown just the way it is today – a living family history told with a generous smile on the banks of Whiteley Creek.