Population 12,574. In 1865 this location was chosen as the site for the Pennsylvania Steel Company plant and the first practical production of Bessemer steel in America was begun in 1867. Today one of the largest blast furnaces in the country-Bethlehem Steel Co. -and its accompanying mills occupy a site extending for more than three miles along the railroad to the north.

Freight gross revenue from this agency totaled $9,869,939 for the 12-month period ending August 31, 1957.

MIDDLETOWN, Pennsylvania

Was founded in 1755. Stubbs Furnace, formerly in the southwestern end of town, is credited with being one of the first steel producers in the United States. The town's position at the confluence of Swatara Creek and the Susquehanna River gave it early importance in river activities. During the Revolutionary War it was a boatbuilding center. Later the Pennsylvania Canal and the Union Canal had their junction here and the settlement grew rapidly in size and importance.

Its 1950 census population was 9,184 and today it is a busy industrial community. The Middletown Air Depot, a U. S. military installation, occupies a 416-acre site at the western end of the town, is used primarily as a repair base, and for the storage of aeronautical equipment and related supplies.

LANCASTER, Pennsylvania

County seat of Lancaster County and is the trading and financial hub of the most fertile agricultural region in the state with a population of 63,774. Lancaster County leads all U. S. counties in the production of tobacco (about 50,000,000 pounds annually), and ranks second in the country in value of farm products.

Although the first settler of record was an Englishman, who in 1721 kept an inn and operated a brewery near what is now Penn Square, it is believed that Palatine [German) squatters had occupied the site as early as 1709. The present town was laid out by James Hamilton in 1730, incorporated as a borough in 1742, and became a city in 1818.