The almost 200-year old Spring Garden Mill, part of Tyler State Park, remains a landmark in the community, well-known to passersby who travel Newtown-Richboro Road on their way to and from the park. Formerly, a fully functioning grist mill, the Spring Garden Mill has been home to the Langhorne Players since 1976.  The Spring Garden Mill and the miller’s house were constructed in 1819, according to the website’s account of the mill’s history, “when five acres were sold to a mason who saw the opportunity to power his mill from the waters of Neshaminy Creek.” In 1867, the mill burned in a fire, …

A picturesque building by any definition, the Addisville Reformed Church in Richboro conjures up images of exactly what an old Bucks County country church should look like: beautiful, charming, welcoming. With its striking fieldstone exterior, stately white columns and tall steeple top, it commands attention from both passersby and drivers. In you’re anywhere within ear-shot, you’ll be charmed by the captivating Westminster chimes of the church bells, signaling the hour and playing soothing hymns at noon and 6 p.m. The interior of the building is just as captivating. It’s spacious yet not …

Right in your own backyard and neatly tucked away off Churchville Lane lies a treasure-trove of nature, education, preservation and environmental stewardship. A facility of the Bucks County Parks and Recreation, the Churchville Nature Center, which turns 47 this year, is overflowing with diversity. Whether for study, exploration or contemplation, the Churchville Nature Preserve, which spans 54 acres, is bursting with wildlife gardens, meadows, marshes, a pond, reservoir, two miles of trails through field and forest habitats, a Lenape Village, picnic areas and a visitor center, which houses …

It was immediately evident during my conversation with Betty Cornell Luff that she is one lovely lady bursting with of a wealth of historical knowledge when it comes to digging up the roots of Northampton Township. It’s no wonder: Luff has lived in the township most of her 86 years. With so much information stashed in her memory, it was difficult for her to pinpoint a few outstanding highlights. I was in awe as I listened to her speak of treasured remembrances—narrow dirt roads, horse and carriage transportation, a country store and the one-room Richboro schoolhouse.  Luff welcomed the …

Murder by any other name is still murder and it wasn’t any different back in 1893 when this heinous crime took place. Samuel and Lena Rightly were bludgeoned with an axe, as they lay sleeping in the first-floor bedroom of their home located on the lower road from Newtown to Richboro. The bedroom was set on fire as the murderer took flight with his stash of cash: a mere $12 to $15. According to the Newtown Enterprise clippings from Northampton Library’s archive room, the convicted murderer, half-breed Cherokee Indian Wallace Burt, is believed to be the last person in Bucks County to be hanged…

By the middle of the nineteenth century, the five growing villages of Northampton consisted mostly of large homes surrounded with rich farmland, but they weren’t known then by the names they bear now. Here’s a little background into how the villages of Northampton Township were originally named. Richboro gets the prize for the village having the most previous names. Addisville, named after Amos Addis, and Richboro, also known as Leedomville or The Black Bear, were really one village, lying less than one-half mile apart along the Richborough Turnpike (Second Street Pike), A History of …

Bustling about or riding through the streets of your neighborhood, now packed high with mounds of mushy, melting blackened snow, it’s hard to imagine the dirt roads of Northampton as they existed when English immigrants arrived along with William Penn in the late 1600s. Penn purchased a tract of land from the Lenni Lenape Indians, the book A History of Northampton Township tells us, which included land lying between the Pennepack and Neshaminy Creeks. Named Northamptonshire by these early English settlers, after a small village outside of London, the township was incorporated in 1722. …