What's in a Name: White Hill

White Hill is a village designation along the northern edge of Lower Allen Township, centered at the intersection of Hummel Avenue and 18th Street. Villages lack municipal boundaries, but the general area of White Hill would be considered as west of the end of the residential development in the Borough of Lemoyne on Hummel Avenue and extending westerly along the railroad track approximately one mile to the intersection of Carlisle Road and State Road. White Hill has also been used to designate the first stone house to be erected in Camp Hill, then known as Lowther Manor (Whitehill's); a railroad village started in the late 1830s; two railroad stations on two separate rail lines; and the end of the line on the streetcar run.

The name comes from Robert Whitehill (1735-1813), who was born and raised in Pequea, Lancaster County, when he purchased two of the original twenty-eight tracts of Lowther Manor which has been laid out four years earlier. On this property he built the first stone house to be erected in the Manor located at 1903 Market Street, Camp Hill. Whitehill represented Cumberland County in many capacities for over thirty years. He was a member of the Convention in which the Constitution was approved for Pennsylvania. He was a member of the first State Assembly and later served in the Senate. His dwelling was reportedly known far and wide as "Whitehill's" long before the development of the railroads which would split his name into two words.

In 1835 the Cumberland Valley Railroad development was started. Presumably in support of the railroad construction, dwellings began to concentrate in the White Hill area. In 1846, it was reported that there were seven dwellers. White Hill was considered as the top of the hill in the long upgrade for the railroads heading west out of Harrisburg. Early schedules for the Cumberland Valley Railroad all indicate a station at White Hill.

State Street in Lemoyne used to extend in a westerly direction and cross the railroad track at level grade in the vicinity of 17th Street and continued behind the present homes within White Hill known as Gorgason Village. These initial dwellings were squeezed on a thin strip of land on the north side of State Street and south of the railroad tracks.

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