French Creek

Millcreek Township, PA · est. 1946

Long before highways, travelers crossed this high ground on the Presque Isle Portage, the carrying-path that linked Lake Erie to the headwaters flowing toward the Ohio. It formed part of the older Venango Trail worn by Native people through the forests of northwestern Pennsylvania. In 1753 the French widened an Indian path into their military French Road, and the modern highway still shadows and departs from that ancient route here.

Cochranton, PA · est. 1946

French Creek was known to the French as the Riviere aux Boeufs before a young George Washington gave it its English name during his 1753 mission to warn the French out of the Ohio Country. The waterway served as a vital corridor during the French and Indian War, linking Lake Erie to the Allegheny, and later carried settlers into northwestern Pennsylvania. Its banks saw the movement of armies, traders, and pioneers alike.

Irwin Township, PA · est. 1987

Long before wagon roads, an Indian path threaded the wooded ridges of western Pennsylvania, linking the Forks of the Ohio at present Pittsburgh to the native town of Venango near Franklin. It was along this route that a young George Washington rode north in 1753, carrying a British ultimatum to the French at Fort Le Boeuf on the eve of a continental war. Decades later the trail was broadened for troops and then for commerce, and the crossroads at Mayes Forks grew a busy hotel and stagecoach stop where travelers changed horses and collected the mail.

Waterford, PA · est. 1922

Here the French built Fort Le Boeuf in 1752 as one link in a chain of posts meant to seal their claim to the Ohio country. In 1753 a 21-year-old Major George Washington arrived carrying a letter from Virginia's governor demanding the French withdraw from lands Britain also claimed. The French politely refused, and the collision of empires that followed erupted into the French and Indian War.