Coventryville Historic District

Coventryville is a village in northern Chester County, Pennsylvania, on high ground above French Creek, where an iron community grew up from 1717 onward. Samuel Nutt established Coventry Forge there, which the nomination describes as the first iron forge in Chester County and the second in the colony. Nutt's partners, William Branson and Mordecai Lincoln, helped develop Redding Furnace on Rock Run, where steel was first produced in 1732. Coventry House, built in stages from the 1740s to about 1803, contains notable Georgian woodwork and is tied by tradition to Franklin's fireplace stove experiments. George Chrisman's family built most of the village's stone houses from 1807 to the turn of the century, including modest workers' houses among larger dwellings. Later structures include a Methodist church of 1860 and a band wagon house of 1888. The district is listed for its concentration of original 18th- and 19th-century buildings and its role in iron-making history.