The original area which became Forest County was the dream of and settled by Cyrus Blood.   The founder of Marienville, Cyrus Blood bought the land located in Jefferson County in 1833 from one of the land companies operating in western Pennsylvania.  Blood petitioned the state legislature to detach two hundred square miles from Jefferson County to form a new county with the town of Marien, formerly Blood’s Settlement, as the county seat.  The resolution was approved in 1848.

In 1856, the state legislature enlarged Forest County by incorporating five townships from Venango County: Tionesta, Green, Kingsley, Hickory, and Harmony, doubling the area of the county and quadrupling the population.  The legislative act that enlarged the county also changed the county seat from Marien to Tionesta.  The story is still told that…some of the good citizens of Tionesta, with an ox team, went to Marien in the dead of night, loaded the courthouse and brought it to Tionesta.  That dastardly deed is still commemorated by the Marienville Lions Club, on a pin depicting the stealing of the courthouse.

The legality of the moving of the county seat was challenged before the Pennsylvania Supreme Court who upheld the Enlargement Act.  The first courthouse in Forest County, built in 1857, was located in Marienville.  The moving of the court and the county records to Tionesta necessitated finding a new home for them.  One of the county’s first temporary quarters in Tionesta was a building on the site of the present Edgar C. Small residence.

The first session of court held in Tionesta was February 25, 1867. The building of the present day courthouse was started in 1868 and completed in 1870. The courthouse walls were decorated about 1878 by Schlaug and Streif.  Mr. Schlaug was a scene and landscape painter from Heidelberg, Germany.  Mural depictions of Justice and Liberty were painted on each side of

All the information contained in this article is derived from the History of Forest County, 1867 to1967 by Ronald Childs.

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Hear Ye! Hear Ye! 

Watch for the publication of the FCHS calendar for 2007 featuring points of interest throughout the county.  The calendar should be available for purchase during the Tionesta Indian Festival and various Marienville Festivals.  Cost of the calendar will be $15.  Advance orders are available from:

Forest County Historical Society
P.O. Box 546, 206 Elm Street
Tionesta, PA 16353

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History Notes from Forest County

Barnett Township in the eastern part of the county juts out to the border of Jefferson County between Elk and Clarion Counties.  Its principal population centers are Clarington, Cooksburg and Redclyffe.  The first recorded birth in the township is that of Eveline Armstrong, daughter of Will Armstrong, the founder of Armstrong Mills (Clarington).  Early recorded marriages are Thomas Maze to Martha Hall, March 1836; Rober Hulings to Polly Maze, March 1837; William Maze to Sophia Herron, 1838.