Christmas in the Park

This Sunday December 8th at 630 the McClure Christmas tree in Station Park will light up the center of the park come and watch it happen.

McClure Kettle Drop

The first ever McClure Kettle Drop ~ New Year's Eve Celebration at the McClure Fire Hall on W. Specht street will take place on December 31st from 9:30 to 12:30.  Come out and win some prizes!

McClue Borough Newsletter

The 2nd Quarter McClure Borough Newsletter is now available at the link below.
https://sites.google.com/site/mcclure1867/borough-news/mcclure-borough-newsletters

McClure Memorial Day Service - 2012

On Sunday, May 27th at 2:00pm - McClure Memorial Day Service will be held at the McClure American Legion Post# 942 rain or shine inside.  The event is sponsored by the McClure Legion, Legion Auxillary, Sons of the American Legion and the McClure Veterans Memorial Pool. 

Brief Borough History …

McClure owes its origin to the building of the Sunbury-Lewistown Railroad; that at one time ran through the center of town.  The first house was built in 1840; owned by Mr. & Mrs. George Stuck. 

The town was founded in 1867 and the Borough of McClure was founded on January 1, 1967, when the residents of the village decided to incorporate. 

In July, 1871, Mr. George Stuck deeded a lot containing one acre and 129 perches to the Railroad Company on the site where the station was located, just off the West side of Brown Street, and midway between Walker and Railroad Streets. Soon after this, Mr. Stuck sold his farm to Galen F. Holshue of Shamokin for $10,000, who in August of 1871 employed A. K. Gift to lay out a town plot. The name Stuckton was dropped and the name McClure was accepted according to the story below and 209 lots were laid out.

Mrs. Carrie Wert, a daughter of Abraham Holshue, and was one of the oldest women in McClure at the time, often heard her father tell why the name was changed. 

Before the turn of the century, when Abraham Holshue was working as telegraph operator for the Railroad, Colonel Alexander Kelly McClure, who had an interest in the railroad from the very beginning, arrived in Stuckton and asked: “What is the name of this town?” “Stuckton” he was told. “That’s not a very nice name” he said, “Call it McClure and I’ll send all the residents my paper for a year.” Mr. Holshue spoke to others in the town who agreed that McClure would be a nice name, and thus the name was changed. In addition, some of the residents received the paper as promised. 

 

Alexander Kelly McClure -  McClure was seen as a loyal Republican by President Lincoln, and was commissioned as an assistant adjutant general under Lincoln himself to help provide seventeen Pennsylvania regiments to Union armies. McClure’s elections to state office gained him much notoriety, but the Republican National Convention in 1860 propelled him onto the national political scene. McClure came into direct contact with the war while the Confederacy occupied the town of Chambersburg during this time. In fact in 1863, McClure personally met with General Lee during the second of the Confederacy’s occupations of the town.   In 1873 McClure was elected to the Pennsylvania Senate. In 1874, he ran for mayor of Philadelphia and lost by only 900 votes.  He returned to newspaper editing by founding The Philadelphia Times in 1875.

McClure during the early 1900's