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1957 Map of Bentley Creek

Name: 1957 Topographic Map of Bentley Creek
Creator: U.S. Geological Survey
Published: 1983
License: https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/

USGS Topo · Published 1983

About this map

Bentley Creek winds northward through a landscape of ridges and hollows along the Pennsylvania-New York border in this 1957 study. The settlement pattern follows the narrow valley floors, concentrated in small hamlets like Ridgebury and Middletown. Evidence of the area's rural social fabric is visible in the distribution of the Township Sch and Ridgebury Chapel, while family-named terrain features such as Hanion Hill and Burnham Mountain suggest deep-rooted land ownership in northern Bradford County.

The southern portion of the map reveals a shift toward conservation and recreation with State Game Lands No 123 and several water bodies including Lake Ondawa and Big Pond. An interesting technological artifact of the era, the Airway Beacon No 12, sits atop the high ground of Athens township. Detailed fence and field lines, updated in 1969, provide a precise view of mid-century agricultural boundaries before many small farms were consolidated or reclaimed by forest.