Schellsburg Historic District

Schellsburg is a crossroads village in central-western Bedford County whose historic core lies along Pitt Street (U.S. 30) and Market Street. The village was founded by John Schell, who laid out the town in 1808 along the Bedford-Stoystown Turnpike. Its brick and stone buildings, many in the Federal style, cluster along three blocks of Pitt Street and date largely from the early nineteenth century, including the Schell-Colvin Building of about 1810 and the Clarke House of 1810. Mixed residential and commercial buildings, churches, a Odd Fellows lodge built in 1876, and modest vernacular houses fill the surrounding streets. The village served travelers on the turnpike and, after 1913, the Lincoln Highway, supporting inns, garages and shops. Its commercial role continued after the railroad bypassed it in the 1850s. The district is valued for how completely its early buildings and small-town commercial pattern have survived.