Jacobs Creek, Pennsylvania

Jacobs Creek, Pennsylvania
Unincorporated community
Jacobs Creek is located in Pennsylvania
Jacobs Creek
Jacobs Creek
Coordinates: 40°07′45″N 79°44′30″W / 40.12917°N 79.74167°W / 40.12917; -79.74167
CountryUnited States
StatePennsylvania
CountyWestmoreland
Elevation
787 ft (240 m)
Time zoneUTC-5 (Eastern (EST))
 • Summer (DST)UTC-4 (EDT)
ZIP code
15448
Area code(s)724, 878
GNIS feature ID1177958[1]

Jacobs Creek is an unincorporated community in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, United States.[1] The community is located at the mouth of Jacobs Creek on the Youghiogheny River, 1.5 miles (2.4 km) south of Smithton. Jacobs Creek has a post office with ZIP code 15448, which opened on December 14, 1865.[2][3]

History

The community was named after Jacobs Creek, a tributary of the Youghiogheny River, which in turn was named after Captain Jacobs, a local Lenape chief who lived along the creek in the mid 1700s,[4] and was killed in 1756 by Colonel John Armstrong's Expedition which wiped out the Native American village of Kittanning.[5][6]

The area was opened to settlers in 1768 following the signing of the Treaty of Fort Stanwix.[7]

One of the first buildings in the Jacobs Creek settlement was the old log Jacobs Creek Methodist Episcopal Church, built in 1817.[8][9]

In December 1907, an explosion at the Darr Mine killed 239 men and boys from Jacobs Creek and the nearby settlement of Van Meter.[10][11]

References

  1. ^ a b "Jacobs Creek". Geographic Names Information System. United States Geological Survey, United States Department of the Interior.
  2. ^ United States Postal Service. "USPS - Look Up a ZIP Code". Retrieved May 28, 2017.
  3. ^ "Postmaster Finder - Post Offices by ZIP Code". United States Postal Service. Archived from the original on October 17, 2020. Retrieved May 28, 2017.
  4. ^ Albert, George Dallas (1882). History of the County of Westmoreland, Pennsylvania. Vol. 1. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: L. H. Everts & Company. p. 436. OCLC 228302731.
  5. ^ Albert 1882, p. 177
  6. ^ Fisher, John S. (1927). "Colonel John Armstrong's Expedition against Kittanning". The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography. 51 (1). Historical Society of Pennsylvania: 1–14, pages 11–12. JSTOR 20086627.
  7. ^ Vivian, Cassandra (2014). Hidden History of the Laurel Highlands. Charleston, South Carolina: Arcadia Publishing. p. 53. ISBN 978-1-62585-222-9.
  8. ^ Albert 1882, p. 681
  9. ^ Jacobs Creek Methodist Episcopal Church (1938). One hundred twenty-first anniversary. Scottdale, Pennsylvania. p. 3. OCLC 81088506.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  10. ^ Vivian 2014, p. 30
  11. ^ "Mine Explosion Entombs 250 Men" (PDF). The New York Times. December 20, 1907. pp. 1, 2. Retrieved December 19, 2022.