The history of Lemont’s Spring Creek Presbyterian Church begins well before April 18, 1847. On that date, however, a tragic event occurred that led to the construction of the Greek Revival-style stone church we know today.
Located at one of the most picturesque locations in Lemont, the current Spring Creek Presbyterian Church building was built from 1870 to 1872. Twenty-three years prior, the church was located along Branch Road. A fire would send the congregation looking for a new building to worship in. Boalsburg was many parishioners’ top choice for the new church building, but a gift from Lemont luminary Moses Thompson provided the space for a new one.
The gift was a 150-foot by 200-foot lot at the corner of Mary Street and Irvin Street (now Mulberry Lane). It is the oldest church in College Township, and it shares a rich history with the surrounding area and many of Lemont’s earliest citizens.
The church’s origin story starts in 1775 many miles from Lemont in Penns Valley, according to a flier produced by Spring Creek Presbyterian Church. Scotch-Irish settlers arrived and needed a place of worship. The Donegal Presbytery in Carlisle received the call for ministers, and soon, Rev. Philip Fithian was holding services in the home of General James Potter in the town of Old Fort near Centre Hall.
The history of the Lemont’s early congregations is rooted among two churches. The first church was built out of logs in 1785. It seated 200 people and was located east of Spring Mills. It was known as East Penns Valley or Sinking Creek church.
The second church was built with logs on land given by David Whitehill shortly after he settled in Lemont in 1789. The church was built and burial grounds were laid out in 1794 on the Slab Cabin branch of Spring Creek, according to the flier. Familiar names attended this church, including General James Potter, Robert Moore, David Boal, John Irvin, Whitehill and others.
Then on April 18, 1847, a fire destroyed the Slab Cabin church.
Boalsburg’s German Reformed Church offered worship space while a new one was built. The Slab Cabin congregation split services between the Boalsburg church and the Branch school house. In the meantime, some of the congregants pushed to have the church moved to Boalsburg. Two churches were to be built. One on the original site and one in Boalsburg – neither happened.
A campaign to raise money for a new church at the Branch location in 1847 fizzled. Proposals for a stone church at that spot were listed in newspapers like the “Bellefonte National” as late as 1868.
Construction did begin, and nearly two thirds of the building was built. However, that project was scrapped and, according to an April 1870 “Centre Hall Reporter,” the church location was moved to Lemont proper to “satisfy a few Grant Christians, because they own farms near the new town at the end of Nittany Mountain.”
The Spring Creek Cemetery is all that remains. Over the years it has garnered several names including Slab Cabin Cemetery and Branch Cemetery.
The cost to build the church was $10,339 – or $234,251.75 in today’s dollars,
Some of Lemont’s earliest settlers are buried at this cemetery, including Robert Moore, possibly Lemont’s earliest settler, and his wife Esther. Moses Thompson and his wife Mary Irvin Thompson, as well as many Boals, Dales and Glenns.
This is where the picturesque stone church we know and love comes in.
A new committee formed in 1870, and it included Lemont luminaries like Thomas Dale and John I. and Moses Thompson, among others. With the gift from Moses, the group marked the lot at the church’s current location. The cost to build the church was $10,339 – or $234,251.75 in today’s dollars, according to officialdata.org.
At 10 a.m. on January 1, 1872, members of the Spring Creek Presbyterian Church met for the first time in the present building. This was right around the time the village’s named changed from “End of the Mountain” to Lemont.
Through the mid-1900s, many of the church’s pastors split time with other churches leading monthly sermons in Pine Grove Mills and Centre Hall, according to “College Township: Before and After 1875.” State College didn’t have a church until around 1887. The book “History of the Pennsylvania State College” says residents would attend services at nearby villages like Lemont, Centre Furnace and Boalsburg.
At the turn of the century, the current church started to receive many 20th Century amenities and upgrades. Electricity was added in 1914. Major repairs happened in the mid-1900s, including a new roof, new social space and significant landscaping. Due to the growing Sunday school, space was added to the right of the church building in 1960 for educational and meeting purposes.
This article will also be published in the Fall 2022 Lemont Village Newsletter.
