Shrewsbury: York County's Finest Turnpike Streetscape
Near York, Pennsylvania
Baltzer Faust began laying out lots along Joppa Road here in seventeen ninety-seven, and the village that grew around his work became the commercial and social center for the surrounding township. When the Baltimore to York Turnpike cut through, Shrewsbury gained a through road that brought travelers, merchants, and a steady economy.
The first six decades of the nineteenth century were the town's most productive. Religious congregations established themselves here, a bank opened, merchants built along the main street, and craftsmen set up shops. Shrewsbury was incorporated as a borough in eighteen thirty-four. What survived that era of development is a well preserved mid-nineteenth-century streetscape. The historic district along Main Street preserves a nearly unbroken run of Federal and Greek Revival commercial buildings from that era. The population today is about four thousand.
