A Trolley heads East of Stony Run in Stony Brook
Trolleys ran from the City of York to Wrightsville, passing through Stony Brook in Springettsbury Township. Trolley service in and near the City of York existed from August 18, 1892 to February 4, 1939. However the York to Wrightsville trolley was in service for a shorter time span, from May 21, 1904 to February 1, 1933.
This undated, eastward looking, photo from the collections of the York County Heritage Trust, shows a trolley passing over Stony Run where it crosses the Lincoln Highway in Stony Brook; i.e. just east of the Locust Grove Road intersection. The trolley is on the south side of the Lincoln Highway (East Market Street) and is about to travel across the highway and head north beside, and then on, what is now Pleasant Acres Road.
I’ve marked the path of the trolley on the following 1937 Penn Pilot aerial photo. The trolley photo would have been taken at a point in the extreme lower left corner of the aerial photo. The trolley would then travel the route of the green and white dashed lines to the upper right corner, on its way to Wrightsville. During the time of trolley travel, the humpback bridge on the Lincoln Highway did not exist, however a bridge did exist over the railroad tracks on what would become Pleasant Acres Road.
This “East of Stony Run in Stony Brook” region was pointed out as white-dashed-lines within a wider aerial view in the 1860 Buildings 21-30 in East Region of Springettsbury Township post last week. From that post, I pointed out that buildings existed on only two properties, in 1860, over the whole region encompassed by the above aerial photo:
- [e23] – 3697 East Market Street: residence along Market Street, located between Stony Run and Pleasant Acres Road
- [e24] – 3743 East Market Street: now houses Sky’s the Limit Salon; the barn at 3741 East Market Street also likely goes back to 1860, since barns and outbuildings were not shown separately on Shearer’s 1860 Map of York County.
By 1876, there is a third building in the region encompassed by this aerial photo; that building is the Mill located at 3755 East Market Street. The source for that statement is Beach Nichols 1876 Maps of York County. In 1876, Henry C. Hauser is the owner of the [e24] property and is likely the person that built the Mill that would eventually be called Stony Brook or Waser’s Mill; with the present address of 3755 East Market Street.
Henry C. Hauser acquired 105 acres on the south side of, what is now, East Market Street in October 1875 and most likely built what is now known as the Ettline House and Barn (3790 East Market Street) shortly thereafter, since the Ettline buildings are not on the 1876 Map. The Hauser Mill, built adjacent to his new house, has a present address of 3780 East Market Street; for many years, it was the Mill for the Kreutz Creek Valley Farmers Co-operative Association.
The Humpback Bridge over the railroad tracks in Stony Brook was built after the trolley stopped running in 1933, but before the 1937 aerial photo. I’m still trying to pinpoint exactly when the humpback bridge was built. Additional details on the Hauser properties, as background research on the Ettline properties, is included in the following The Humpback Bridge at Stony Brook series of posts:
- Part 1: Ettline’s Antiques
- Part 2: John and Sarah Hauser Family
- Part 3: John and Hannah Hauser Family
- Part 4: Henry and Nancy Hauser Family
- Part 5: The John H. Hauser 1850 Homestead
The oldest buildings, over the whole region encompassed by the above 1937 aerial photo, are most likely the house and barn at 3743 & 3741 East Market Street, respectively. The following is a westward looking view of that house, with the barn in the background.
Other older buildings appearing in the 1937 aerial photo include most of the buildings north of Stony Brook Road; they appear on a topographic map that was surveyed in 1908, therefore these buildings were built between 1876 and 1908. I suppose a cluster of buildings in that area makes sense, since that was the location of the Stony Brook train stop and by 1904, also the trolley stop. The buildings on the north side of East Market Street, between [e23] and [e24] were built sometime after 1908.
Today the same region, encompassed by the above 1937 aerial photo, is shown in the following 2014 Bing.com aerial photo. The big industrial building south of East Market Street was originally built by Bendix in 1952; for details, see this post: Dusman Airstrip and the arrival of the 1952 Bendix Plant at Stony Brook.
Related posts include:
- 1860 Buildings 21-30 in East Region of Springettsbury Township
- The Stonybrook Mill; Artwork of Cliff Satterthwaite
- Part 1: Ettline’s Antiques
- Part 2: John and Sarah Hauser Family
- Part 3: John and Hannah Hauser Family
- Part 4: Henry and Nancy Hauser Family
- Part 5: The John H. Hauser 1850 Homestead
- Dusman Airstrip and the arrival of the 1952 Bendix Plant at Stony Brook
- Does Amazon follow Bendix and Fincor in Stony Brook
