A Preston County community
Aurora’s history includes early settlement, Wolf Creek, turnpike travel, hotels and resorts, and the landscape that now includes Cathedral State Park and the Brookside Historic District. The timeline follows those stories from eighteenth-century settlement through preservation and twentieth-century local life.
This overview draws on the connected timeline entries and the checked National Archives postal index. Follow the links below for sources and research qualifications.Community timeline
1761
According to an account first published by historian Alexander Scott Withers in 1831, Fort Pitt soldiers William Childers, Joseph Linsey—also spelled Lindsey—and brothers John and Samuel Pringle deserted in 1761. They traveled…
Open event and sources1787
Preston County Economic Development Authority history traces Aurora's first Euro-American settlement to the Reverend John Stough at the summit of Cheat Mountain in 1787. The community was later known as Salem and Mount Carmel…
Open event and sources1790
Oren F. Morton's 1914 county history reports that the Reverend John Stough built a small mill on Wolf Creek in 1790. Water reached the wheel through a spout set beneath a waterfall, and the millstones could grind about three…
Open event and sourcesJuly 4, 1793
Leonard Deakins and a man identified in the historical account as Hogmire laid out Mount Carmel near the German Settlement. They marked a public square with four inscribed stones and reserved a site for a courthouse—an early…
Open event and sources1827
Henry Grimes built the stone structure near present-day Aurora as a residence in 1825–1827. Standing beside the corridor that became the Northwestern Turnpike, it was later converted into the Red Horse Tavern and remains one…
Open event and sources1841
The former Grimes residence was converted into a tavern in 1841 to serve traffic on the Northwestern Turnpike. Operated at different times by George Hauser, Hiram Hanshaw, and William H. Grimes, the Red Horse Tavern remained a…
Open event and sources1872
Oren F. Morton's county history identifies a large Aurora hotel built by James H. Shaffer in 1872. It was one of two large hotels that particularly accommodated the visitors drawn each summer by Aurora's mountain setting, cool…
Open event and sources1882
Wilmer P. Vale bought 329½ acres from William Stone in 1882 and added two adjoining parcels in 1884 and 1885. Named Brookside for nearby Rhine Creek, the property developed into Aurora's largest resort complex, with a large…
Open event and sources1886
John A. Lantz, who had moved to Aurora in 1870, erected a large hotel in 1886. Morton's biographical history described it as a famous country resort patronized during the summer by affluent visitors from larger cities.
Open event and sources1922
Branson Haas purchased more than 400 acres from the McBride estate in 1922. The property included Brookside Woods—the old-growth hemlock forest associated with the resort—as well as surrounding farmland, and Haas became a…
Open event and sources1929–1930
Geologist Frank Reeves purchased about 100 acres of old-growth hemlock and hardwood forest near the West Virginia–Maryland line in 1929. Beginning around 1930, he developed the Youghiogheny Forest Colony, an informal community…
Open event and sources1930s–1970s
Self-taught artist Lewis E. Stemple, born in Fairmont in 1910, lived and worked in Aurora for much of his life. He developed his art through his association with artists at the nearby Youghiogheny Forest Colony and spent…
Open event and sourcesJune 14, 1940
West Virginia's Public Service Commission issued Certificate F-279 to George Rodney Lipscomb, doing business as Mountain Top Garage at Aurora. The certificate authorized the transport of disabled and wrecked automobiles within…
Open event and sources1942
Branson Haas sold the 118.5-acre tract containing Brookside Woods to the State of West Virginia for $13,000. The State Conservation Commission established Cathedral State Park, and Haas remained there as caretaker until his…
Open event and sourcesNovember 16, 1951
On the evening of November 16, 1951, a U.S. Air Force Douglas RB-26C Invader returning from Pittsburgh to Langley Air Force Base on a routine training flight suffered an engine failure and struck a mountaintop near Eglon,…
Open event and sources1965
Cathedral State Park was designated a National Natural Landmark in recognition of its old-growth hemlock forest. The Preston County park preserves West Virginia’s only remaining stand of virgin hemlock forest.
Open event and sourcesJuly 2, 1973
Aurora artist Lewis E. Stemple prepared the March 1973 National Register nomination for Red Horse Tavern. The historic stone building was entered in the National Register of Historic Places on July 2, connecting Stemple's…
Open event and sources1977
Preston County reorganized several community high schools under three regional identities in 1977. Kingwood High School became Central Preston High School; Terra Alta and Aurora high schools consolidated as East Preston Senior…
Open event and sourcesMay 8, 2013
The 139-acre Brookside Historic District near Aurora was entered in the National Register of Historic Places. The district connects the surviving Brookside resort properties—including Gaymont, cottages, the farm, and Red Horse…
Open event and sourcesTen images from 1911 to 1946 document location forms, maps, and site-change papers. They identify roads, rail service, Wolf Creek, the Cheat River, and surrounding communities. A proposed move and a later new site are described in their source records.
Explore all 10 postal recordsRecord dates are not necessarily office opening or closing dates. Applications and proposed moves retain their original qualifications.
National Archives · M1126, roll 651 · NARA pages 344, 345, 346, 347, 348, 349, 350, 351, 352, 353. View the original collection.