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Moon Township. Oh, yes! That's the rapidly growing community in western Allegheny County. But didn't someone say that there was a Moon Township in Beaver County, too?
Yes, that is correct. Or was. Almost. You see, it's a long story. It all started back when there wasn't any Beaver County. Moon Township was then a vast wilderness that stretched along the south shore of the Ohio from below Pittsburgh to the Ohio State line.
When the new County of Beaver was formed in 1800, it encompassed parts of several early townships formerly in Allegheny County. Parts of Beaver Township and Sewickley Township were included in that part of the new county north of the Ohio River, while Beaver County, south of the Ohio, was formed from part of Moon Township and a long narrow wedge of Washington County along the Virginia state line.
The latter section retained the name of Hanover Township, of which it had been a part in Washington County. The larger part of the southside, formerly Moon Township, was divided into two townships separated by Raccoon Creek. For lack of imagination or whatever, the new townships were named First Moon and Second Moon. (First Moon Township was east of Raccoon Creek and Second Moon, west).
All of the present day Southside of Beaver County was thus comprised of three odd-shaped townships. And two of them were named Moon.
This lasted only 14 years, however, when an unusual change was made. Bausman tells us that the residents complained of having to travel too far to vote, but in any case, common sense eventually prevailed. The three townships were reorganized into four, each roughly rectangular, but in every case more regular in shape.
Several new names appeared on the map in this year of 1814. The name of Hanover Township was retained although the community was given a new shape. First Moon and Second Moon vanished, and just plain Moon Township once again occupied the northeast corner of the Southside.
The new township in the northwest corner was named for General Nathaniel Greene, and this name will be found on the map today. The fourth of the reconstructed townships, in the southeast corner along the river, is believed to have been named for an early Presbyterian congregation. The name persists in our Hopewell Township of today, but the church is long forgotten, except for an all-but-abandoned graveyard in nearby Allegheny County.
Now that we have finally reestablished Moon Township in Beaver County, we will now watch it disappear. In 1833, the court approved the formation of Raccoon Township, named for Raccoon Creek. Both Moon and Greene Townships lost sizeable pieces of land in the birth of their new neighbor.
A few years later, in 1840, the citizens of the largest village in Moon Township decided to incorporate and become a borough. They adopted the name of Phillipsburg in recognition of boat-builder Stephen Phillips (who had founded the community some years earlier, then sold it to the New Philadelphia Society in 1833).
Moon Township then relaxed for nearly three-quarters of a century, when dissent among its residents led to the formation of two new townships. 1912 saw the creation of Potter Township, named for a prominent early family in the area and formed from parts of Moon and Raccoon Townships.
Then in 1914, Moon Township split in two. The more sparsely populated rural part of the community became Center Township (the center of Beaver County), while the smaller land area but larger population of the suburban area in the northern part of Moon Township retained the old name.
By this time, Beaver County's Moon Township had almost disappeared. It took only one more court decision to make it invisible. The borough of Monaca had changed its name from Phillipsburgh in 1892, and borrowed part of the name of the Iroquois chieftain, Monacatootha, for its new identity.
Then, in 1932, it decided to grow, and the arc of the Ohio River's westward curve directed that growth south into the tiny remnant of Moon Township. This community was annexed by the expanding borough and became the fourth and fifth wards of Monaca. Nothing remains today to remind us of the vanished name except the small stream which flows along the present boundary between Monaca and Center Township - Moon Run!