St. Thomas Township is a

township A township is a form of human settlement or administrative subdivision. Its exact definition varies among countries. Although the term is occasionally associated with an urban area, this tends to be an exception to the rule. In Australia, Canad ...

Franklin County, Pennsylvania Franklin County is a County (United States), county in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population was 155,932. Its county seat is Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, Cha ...

, United States. The population was 5,917 at the 2020 census. It is the birthplace of both

Baseball Hall of Fame The National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum is a history museum and hall of fame in Cooperstown, New York, operated by a private foundation. It serves as the central collection and gathering space for the history of baseball in the United S ...

member

Nellie Fox Jacob Nelson Fox (December 25, 1927 – December 1, 1975) was an American professional baseball player. Fox was one of the best second basemen of all time, and the third-most difficult hitter to strike out in Major League Baseball (MLB) history. ...

, and

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the primary Land warfare, land service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is designated as the Army of the United States in the United States Constitution.Article II, section 2, clause 1 of th ...

brigadier general and legislator, Charles Thomas Campbell.

History

The Franklin Furnace Historic District, Chambersburg and Bedford Turnpike Road Company Toll House, and

Woodland A woodland () is, in the broad sense, land covered with woody plants (trees and shrubs), or in a narrow sense, synonymous with wood (or in the U.S., the '' plurale tantum'' woods), a low-density forest forming open habitats with plenty of sunli ...

are listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

. The account of the township's formation was lost when the Confederates burned the county seat Chambersburg in 1864, but according to the recollection of older citizens the township was organized ca. 1818 on territory taken from Peters and Hamilton townships. The area was settled in the 1740s by, among others, Col. John Armstrong, John Campbell, and John Dixon. There were several Campbell families among the early settlers, and an eighteenth-century map labels the village simply "Campbells". It was later called "Campbelltown", a designation that prevailed for many years until, at the suggestion of William Archibald, it received the official designation "St. Thomas", purportedly still honoring Thomas Campbell, who had laid out the village. The name "Saint Thomas" was reportedly a joke concerning Thomas Campbell's tendency to swear. The organization of the town appears to have been concurrent with the organization of the St. Thomas or "Campbeltown"

Presbyterian Church Presbyterianism is a historically Reformed Christianity, Reformed Protestantism, Protestant tradition named for its form of ecclesiastical polity, church government by representative assemblies of Presbyterian polity#Elder, elders, known as ...

in 1818. Not long afterwards local

Evangelical Lutheran Lutheranism is a major branch of Protestantism that emerged under the work of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German friar and Protestant Reformers, reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practices of the Catholic Church launched ...

and

German Reformed The Evangelical and Reformed Church (E&R) was a Protestant Christian denomination in the United States. It was formed in 1934 by the merger of the Reformed Church in the United States (RCUS) with the Evangelical Synod of North America (ESNA). ...

congregations joined the Presbyterians in the erection of a church building, which the three congregations shared from 1829 until 1854.Bates, Samuel P., ''History of Franklin County, Pennsylvania'', Warner, Beers, 1887, p. 610.

Geography

The township is in west-central Franklin County, in the

Great Appalachian Valley The Great Appalachian Valley, also called The Great Valley or Great Valley Region, is one of the major landform features of eastern North America. It is a gigantic trough, including a chain of valley lowlands, and the central feature of the Appal ...

, but extending northwest to include the first four ridges of the

Ridge and Valley Province The Ridge-and-Valley Appalachians, also called the Ridge and Valley Province or the Valley and Ridge Appalachians, are a physiographic province of the larger Appalachian Highlands division. The physiographic province is divided into three sec ...

of the Appalachian Mountains: from east to west, Front Mountain, Broad Mountain, Little Mountain, and Blue Mountain.

Conodoguinet Creek Conodoguinet Creek is a tributary of the Susquehanna River in South central Pennsylvania in the United States.Gertler, Edward. ''Keystone Canoeing'', Seneca Press, 2004. The name is Native American, and means "A Long Way with Many Bends". Cono ...

, a tributary of the

Susquehanna River The Susquehanna River ( ; Unami language, Lenape: ) is a major river located in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic region of the United States, crossing three lower Northeastern United States, Northeast states (New York, Pennsylvani ...

, rises in the extreme western corner of the township, at the juncture of Little and Blue mountains. The rest of the township is drained by tributaries of

Conococheague Creek Conococheague Creek, a tributary of the Potomac River, is a free-flowing stream that originates in Pennsylvania and empties into the Potomac River near Williamsport, Maryland, Williamsport, Maryland. It is in length,U.S. Geological Survey. Natio ...

, part of the

Potomac River The Potomac River () is in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic region of the United States and flows from the Potomac Highlands in West Virginia to Chesapeake Bay in Maryland. It is long,U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography D ...

watershed.

U.S. Route 30 U.S. Route 30 or U.S. Highway 30 (US 30) is an east–west main route of the United States Numbered Highway System, with the highway traveling across the Northern U.S. With a length of , it is the third-longest U.S. Highway, afte ...

crosses the township, leading east to

Chambersburg Chambersburg is a borough in and the county seat of Franklin County, in the South Central region of Pennsylvania, United States. It is in the Cumberland Valley, which is part of the Great Appalachian Valley, and north of Maryland and the Ma ...

, the

county seat A county seat is an administrative center, seat of government, or capital city of a county or parish (administrative division), civil parish. The term is in use in five countries: Canada, China, Hungary, Romania, and the United States. An equiva ...

, and west to McConnellsburg. It passes through the unincorporated community of St. Thomas at the center of the township. The community of Williamson is at the southern corner of the township, where Back Creek joins Conococheague Creek. According to the

United States Census Bureau The United States Census Bureau, officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the Federal statistical system, U.S. federal statistical system, responsible for producing data about the American people and American economy, econ ...

, the township has a total area of , of which , or 0.06%, is water.

Neighboring townships

* Antrim Township (southeast) * Hamilton Township (mainly east) * Letterkenny Township (north) * Metal Township (northwest) * Peters Township (west)

Communities

* Carlton Heights * Edenville * Franklin Furnace * Saint Thomas * Stone Bridge * Williamson

Demographics

As of the

census A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given Statistical population, population, usually displayed in the form of stati ...

of 2000, there were 5,917 people, 2,141 households, and 1,665 families residing in the township. The population density was . There were 2,292 housing units at an average density of . The racial makeup of the township was 97.96%

White White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no chroma). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully (or almost fully) reflect and scatter all the visible wa ...

, 0.66%

African American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from an ...

, 0.26% Native American, 0.28% Asian, 0.24% from other races, and 0.61% from two or more races.

Hispanic The term Hispanic () are people, Spanish culture, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or broadly. In some contexts, Hispanic and Latino Americans, especially within the United States, "Hispanic" is used as an Ethnici ...

or Latino of any race were 0.74% of the population. There were 2,141 households, out of which 34.0% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 66.7% were

married couples Marriage, also called matrimony or wedlock, is a culturally and often legally recognised union between people called spouses. It establishes rights and obligations between them, as well as between them and their children (if any), and b ...

living together, 6.9% had a female householder with no husband present, and 22.2% were non-families. 17.8% of all households were made up of individuals, and 7.7% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.68 and the average family size was 3.03. In the township the population was spread out, with 25.4% under the age of 18, 8.1% from 18 to 24, 28.9% from 25 to 44, 25.6% from 45 to 64, and 12.1% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 37 years. For every 100 females, there were 102.3 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 101.3 males. The median income for a household in the township was $39,980, and the median income for a family was $43,245. Males had a median income of $30,426 versus $21,778 for females. The

per capita income Per capita income (PCI) or average income measures the average income earned per person in a given area (city, region, country, etc.) in a specified year. In many countries, per capita income is determined using regular population surveys, such ...

for the township was $17,615. About 5.7% of families and 6.7% of the population were below the

poverty line The poverty threshold, poverty limit, poverty line, or breadline is the minimum level of income deemed adequate in a particular country. The poverty line is usually calculated by estimating the total cost of one year's worth of necessities for ...

, including 5.5% of those under age 18 and 13.2% of those age 65 or over.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Saint Thomas Township, Pennsylvania Populated places established in 1731 Townships in Franklin County, Pennsylvania Townships in Pennsylvania