Site last updated: Saturday, March 28, 2026

Log In

Reset Password
MENU
Butler County's great daily newspaper

The history behind our great nation is a tapestry of stories about people who lived through landmark events, challenging times and amazing innovations.
America250: A Journey Through Time is a special publication designed to remember, celebrate and honor those pieces of our past as we prepare to mark the nation’s 250th birthday on July 4, 2026.
Each issue will include articles of national, state and county significance, profiles of people throughout the centuries and more.

The first 17 months will focus on slices of history and how events impacted the people who lived through those times. An added feature will show where readers can continue their own journeys through history at museums and historical attraction.
Starting in June 2024, America250: A Journey Through Time will examine the decades leading us back to the events that formed our nation. Data from the Census, which started in 1790, will assist in painting this portrait of America.

National Spotlight
By 1810, the American experiment was well underway. It was a time when the Founding Fathers were not just still alive, but actively involved in politics. The original 13 ...
March 10, 2026 America 250
From postwar optimism to economic panic, westward expansion and political mudslinging, this decade reshaped the United States.
February 10, 2026 America 250
By 1830, the United States had changed dramatically from what it had looked like in 1776, and the decade set the scene for the massive westward expansion that started in ...
January 13, 2026 America 250
One generation after the Declaration of Independence launched the democratic American experiment, the young nation appeared to be thriving in 1840. The United States popu...
December 09, 2025 America 250
Read More
Keystone Highlights
The War of 1812 was the closing fight of the American Revolution and the first war that declared a brand new nation, setting the United States on the path to a place on t...
March 10, 2026 America 250
Today, if it’s remembered at all, the Erie Canal is best known as the subject of a folk song, “Low Bridge Everybody Down” or “Fifteen Miles on the Erie Canal.” But, accor...
February 10, 2026 America 250
Nearly every great city has been impacted by a great fire. Rome had the 64 A.D. fire that the Emperor Nero would try to blame on early Christians. London had the 1666 con...
December 09, 2025 America 250
It’s impossible to know who the first person to discover oil on the banks of Oil Creek in Venango County was, because by the time settlers arrived, Native Americans had b...
November 11, 2025 America 250
Read More
County Times
The first newspapers of Butler County were very different from what people today would think of as a newspaper. According to “The Press and America” by Edwin Emery, early...
March 10, 2026 America 250
Starting in the summer of 1824, newspaper readers across the still young United States were gripped by nostalgia. Less than half a century earlier, names that continue to...
February 10, 2026 America 250
Frontier medicine in the early settlement of Butler County was as rough-hewn as the log cabins of the early pioneers. The first settlers of the county spent hard, laborio...
December 09, 2025 America 250
Clearfield Township’s name is a reminder that the first European colonists in the area were far from the first people to live here. In 1798, when the area that would even...
December 09, 2025 America 250
Butler County’s past lives on in more than historical markers and names on tombstones. Many institutions created over a century ago still exist in the county, if in alter...
November 11, 2025 America 250
Read More
Profiles of People
It may not be known by all, but one man was influential in the founding of the University of Pittsburgh as well as Pittsburgh’s daily newspaper. It’s been difficult to id...
March 10, 2026 America 250
Walter Lowrie was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, on Dec. 10, 1784, to John and Catherine (Cameron) Lowrie. He was the fourth of the couple’s six children. For many years, J...
February 10, 2026 America 250
One doesn’t think of Edgar Allan Poe as a Pennsylvanian, but the Boston, Massachusetts native did live in Philadelphia from 1838-1844. It was a time in which some observ...
December 09, 2025 America 250
Stephen Collins Foster was born on the Fourth of July 1826 — the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence — in what’s now the Lawrenceville neighborhood of Pit...
November 11, 2025 America 250
Army Sgt. John Preston Donaldson of Butler, a Commissary Sergeant during the Civil War, was at the Village of Appomattox Court House on April 9, 1865, when Confederate Ge...
October 14, 2025 America 250
Read More
Experience History
Spam Museum Address: 101 3rd Ave. NE, Austin, Minn. Phone: 507-434-6401 Website: www.spam.com Open: 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., Monday-Saturday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Sunday Of Note: ...
August 12, 2025 America 250
Hershey’s Chocolate World Address: 101 Chocolate World Way, Hershey, PA 17033 Phone: 717-534-4900 Website: www.chocolateworld.com Open: Monday-Thursd...
July 08, 2025 America 250
No. 9 Coal Mine and Museum Address: 9 Dock St., Lansford, Pa. Phone: 570-645-7074 Open: 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Wednesday through Sunday Of Note: Visitors ...
June 10, 2025 America 250
Gathered here are suggestions where history can be experienced. Information included was gathered from the museums’ websites. The Western Pennsylvania Sports Museum ...
May 13, 2025 America 250
Radio and Television Museum Address: 2608 Mitchelville Road, Bowie, Md. Phone:301-390-1020 Open: 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Friday, 1 to 5 p.m. Saturday and Sunda...
April 08, 2025 America 250
Read More
Where To Go
Gathered here are suggestions where history can be experienced. Information included was gathered from the museums’ websites. Heinz History Center Address: 1212 Small...
July 11, 2023 America 250
Gathered here are places where history can be experienced. Information included was gathered from the museums’ websites. Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania Address...
May 09, 2023 America 250
Gathered here are suggestions where history can be experienced. Information included was gathered from the musuems’ websites Heinz History Center Address: 1212 Small...
April 11, 2023 America 250
Gathered here are suggestions where history can be experienced. Information included was gathered from the museums’ websites. Soldiers & Sailors Memorial Hall and Museum ...
March 14, 2023 America 250
Cruiser Olympia Address: Independence Seaport Museum, 211 S. Christopher Columbus Blvd., Philadelphia Phone: 215-413-8655 Open: 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily except...
February 14, 2023 America 250
Read More
TODAY'S PHOTOS