FRANKLIN COUNTY – Almost every new town had two things in common during the early years of colonial life in America. First, they were generally founded by farmers looking for good land in which to plant crops. Second, the first building constructed in every new town was generally a church. As more and more families settled in the area, congregations grew and needed a place to worship.
This was true of Franklin County. In fact, most of the first churches built were erected before the county was created and the boroughs incorporated. This was the case with one of Franklin County’s oldest churches, The Presbyterian Church of Falling Springs located in Chambersburg. The congregation for this church started before a building was even erected. Col. Benjamin Chambers, founder of the city, held services at Fort Chambers not long after arriving in the area in 1730.
Around 1739, a log schoolhouse was built and services would be moved there. Then in 1767, a larger wooden building was built, and Chambers deeded the land and church to his congregation for the cost of a single rose to him and his wife every year. This tradition was continued with every one of his descendants to this day. Around 1803, the church was renovated, and the wood was replaced by limestone and two towers were added in 1856.
Greencastle-Antrim’s first church was founded in 1737 on the path at the head of Moss Spring where the East Conococheague Congregation would build its first meeting house. In 1838, the house was renamed the “Red Meeting House,” but it would still remain the initial house of worship for local families.
In 1898, the official church was constructed on the corner of W. Baltimore and Jefferson Streets where it still remains today and is simply known as the Greencastle Presbyterian Church. It was from the roots of this church that the Rev. Dr. Matthew Anderson (1848-1928) would begin as a family member of the congregation and then move on to help build a church and secondary congregation called the African Methodist Episcopal after graduating from the Princeton Seminary in 1877.
As Scottish-Irish immigrants settled in the area that would become Mercersburg around 1730, they quickly assembled a congregation called the Presbyterian Church of the upper West Cononcocheague. A log church was constructed and was overseen by the Rev. John Steel (1715-1779), who got the nickname, “Fighting Parson” due to his efforts to ward off frequent Native American attacks.
The log church would be abandoned over safety concerns, and it was torn down in 1856. In 1794, a new church was built on W. Seminary Street to accommodate over 100 families who regularly attended services. In 1831, the Rev. Thomas Creigh, oversaw the church for 49 years, which included the years during the American Civil War. The church would be renovated several times over the years dating all the way up to the 1950’s.
The oldest church in Waynesboro was built in 1846 by members of the German Reformed Church of Waynesboro, and it was called the Harbaugh Church. Prior to the building of the church itself, the congregation would meet at the Waterloo Schoolhouse.
The church was named after George Harbaugh, a local farmer who donated land to the group. The original church was replaced in 1892 by a late Gothic Revival style building and has an adjoining cemetery that was founded in 1845. In 1957, the Harbaugh congregation merged with the congregation of the St. Paul Reformed Church and created the Church of the Apostles, and a new church was built 10 years later. The Harbaugh Church was acquired by the Waynesboro Historical Society in 1983, and its members have been working hard to maintain and restore it to its original form.
