e-ReferenceDesk's College and 50 State Learning Resource Guide

Find Online Colleges

Find Campus Colleges

Pennsylvania State...

Pennsylvania

Choose a County

Adams, Allegheny, Armstrong, Beaver, Bedford, Berks, Blair, Bradford, Bucks, Butler, Cambria, Cameron, Carbon, Centre, Chester, Clarion, Clearfield, Clinton, Columbia, Crawford, Cumberland, Dauphin, Delaware, Elk, Erie, Fayette, Forest, Franklin, Fulton, Greene, Huntingdon, Indiana, Jefferson, Juniata, Lackawanna, Lancaster, Lawrence, Lebanon, Lehigh, Luzerne, Lycoming, McKean, Mercer, Mifflin, Monroe, Montgomery, Montour, Northampton, Northumberland, Perry, Philadelphia, Pike, Potter, Schuylkill, Snyder, Somerset, Sullivan, Susquehanna, Tioga, Union, Venango, Warren, Washington, Wayne, Westmoreland, Wyoming, York

Pennsylvania Counties

Click Image to Enlarge

Pennsylvania Counties

There are sixty-seven counties of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania in the United States of America. The city of Philadelphia is coterminous with Philadelphia County, and governmental functions have been consolidated since 1854.

Venango County, Pennsylvania

Venango County History, Geography, Demographics, Cities and Towns, and Education

County Seat: Franklin
Year Organized: 1800
Square Miles: 675

Court House:

1174 Elk Street
County Courthouse
Franklin, PA 16323-1277

Etymology - Origin of County Name

Its name comes from the Indian name for French Creek.

Demographics:

County QuickFacts: Census Bureau Quick Facts

County History

Created on March 12, 1800 from parts of Allegheny and Lycoming Counties. Its name comes from the Indian name for French Creek. It was attached to Crawford County until April 1, 1805. Franklin, the county seat, was laid out in 1795 at Fort Franklin, which had been built in 1787 by United States troops. Both were named for Benjamin Franklin. Franklin was incorporated as a borough on April 14, 1828 and as a city on April 4, 1868.

What is now Franklin was the site of a French fort (1754–1759), a British Army fort (1760–1763), and the U S. Army's Fort Franklin (1787). The area was purchased from Indians at Ft Stanwix in 1784 (the "Last Purchase"). The land west of the Allegheny River was Donation Land intended for Revolutionary army veterans. The Holland Land Company's titles were disputed by "actual settlers," and these cases dissuaded many from moving in to establish farms. Before the 1859 oil boom, pig iron was main the main export product. When Colonel Drake struck oil, boomtowns arose overnight. Oil City is one that survived, but Pithole City and others did not. Oil City's oil exchange was a major national economic player, but it closed in 1909. Refineries and oil equipment manufacture continued to flourish, and railroads rushed to the oil areas. Bad floods occurred in 1865, 1883, 1892, 1913, 1926, 1936, 1981, and 1982. A dam that collapsed above Titusville wiped out much of Oil City in 1892, but it was rebuilt. Peak population was achieved in 1950: 65,328. Today the refineries are gone, though some oil well tools are still made. The energy crises of the 1980s brought renewed attempts to produce more oil, although major amounts were not forthcoming. Venango is a minor bituminous producer. Farms cover 15 percent of the county.

Geography

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of 683 square miles (1,769 km²), of which, 675 square miles (1,748 km²) of it is land and 8 square miles (21 km²) of it (1.17%) is water.

Neighboring Counties:

Crawford County (north)
Warren County (north)
Forest County (northeast)
Clarion County (east)
Butler County (south)
Mercer County (west)

Cities and Towns:

- Canal	township
- Cherrytree	township
- Clintonville	borough	Incorporated Area
- Cooperstown	borough	Incorporated Area
- Cornplanter	township
- Cranberry	township
- Emlenton	borough	Incorporated Area
- Franklin (County Seat)	city	Incorporated Area
- Frenchcreek	township
- Mineral	township
- Oil City	city	Incorporated Area
- Oil Creek	township
- Oilcreek	township
- Pinegrove	township
- Pleasantville	borough	Incorporated Area
- Polk	borough	Incorporated Area
- President	township
- Rouseville	borough	Incorporated Area
- Sandycreek	township
- Scrubgrass	township
- Sugarcreek	borough	Incorporated Area
- Utica	borough	Incorporated Area
- Victory	township

County Resources:

Enter County Resources and Information Here

County Resources

The history of our nation was a prolonged struggle to define the relative roles and powers of our governments: federal, state, and local. And the names given the counties, our most locally based jurisdictions, reflects the "characteristic features of this country!"

But age, size and colorful names of our counties isn't the only reason to explore counties' role in American history, or the history of county government itself. In fact, the story of county government reflects the larger meanings of American history.

Today's counties are the most flexible, locally responsive and creative governments in the US. They are the most diverse, varying in size, population, geography, and governmental structure. In their politics and policies, they express a 1990's political slogan "Think globally, act locally."