13 Most Welcoming Towns In Pennsylvania's Countryside
The corn festival that takes over Shippensburg every August is run start to finish by volunteers. Kutztown has been throwing open its fairgrounds since 1915. In Kennett Square, the money raised at the town's big September street fair goes straight back to local nonprofits. Pennsylvania's country towns still put on their best events for each other, and a stranger gets waved in like a regular. That habit is what ties these 13 towns together.
Kutztown
Bring a jacket to Kutztown in July. Crystal Cave holds a steady 54 degrees Fahrenheit year-round, and the tour drops visitors 125 feet underground past formations first mapped in 1871. Back at the surface, the property serves ice cream and runs a minigolf course. It is the kind of one-two punch that keeps a family busy for an afternoon.
This German settlement in the East Penn Valley was incorporated in 1815, and its gathering places have outlasted the generations that built them. The Kutztown Fair has anchored the local calendar since 1915, and the fairgrounds still fill for Oktoberfest and Christmas at the Fairgrounds. The town also keeps its Pennsylvania Dutch traditions front and center at the annual folk festival each summer.
Renninger's Antique and Farmers' Market is where the whole town turns up. The farmers' market and consignment shop open Fridays and Saturdays, and the antique and flea markets run on Saturdays. Locals come for the fresh produce and stay to dig through the stalls, and newcomers get pulled into the same routine.
New Hope
The marquee at the Bucks County Playhouse has lit up New Hope since the early 20th century, and the names that have headlined here would fill a Broadway program. The theater along the Delaware River stages full productions and runs classes and workshops for anyone who wants a turn behind the footlights. Settled in the early 1700s and incorporated in 1837, the town wears its long history lightly, with a busy arts scene and a main street built for browsing.
New Hope throws one of the region's biggest parties every year. Its Pride Parade launched in 2003 and now draws around 15,000 people, complete with floats, marching bands, and a 100-foot equality flag carried down the street. Ten minutes away, Peddler's Village adds more shopping and dining, plus its own Scarecrow Festival, gingerbread display, and apple festival.
Gettysburg
Everyone knows the battlefield. Fewer know that Gettysburg grew up as the meeting point of ten major roads after its 1786 founding, and that pull toward town still holds. The free Gettysburg Museum of History packs in artifacts from the Civil War, both World Wars, U.S. presidents, and pop culture, all a few blocks from the fighting grounds.
The Gettysburg Community Theatre puts the town's welcome on stage. Alongside its shows, classes, and camps, it runs the national Penguin Project, which casts young actors with special needs in modified Broadway productions. It is community theater in the most literal sense.
Then there is Mister Ed's Elephant Museum and Candy Emporium just outside town, home to shelves of sweets and a wall of elephant figurines. Small groups who book ahead can join a Friday fudge-making session where kids pull their own batch. Few roadside stops try this hard to entertain a carload of children.
Jim Thorpe
This town gave up its own name for an Olympian. Founded in 1818 as Mauch Chunk, it renamed itself for Jim Thorpe, who won two gold medals in track and field at the 1912 Stockholm Games and was later buried here. The streets carry the drama the name suggests, lined with Victorian mansions and framed by nearby waterfalls.
Penn's Peak sends the welcome up the mountain. The concert venue books a full slate of shows and looks out over Beltzville Lake and the Appalachian ridgeline. In the cold months, the free Jim Thorpe Winterfest fills the streets with ice carvings, live entertainment, and carriage rides, though a few extras like the scenic train ride and mug walk need a ticket ahead of time.
The Old Jail Museum is the eerie centerpiece. Built in 1870 and in use until 1995, it opens its cells to tours throughout the day, including the notorious Cell #17. A man there left a handprint on the wall while claiming his innocence before his execution, and repeated attempts to scrub it away have failed. The mark is still there.
Kennett Square
The farms around Kennett Square grow more than 500 million pounds of mushrooms a year, about half the national crop. The borough wears the title Mushroom Capital of the World on its water tower and means it. The quirk locals enjoy: not one of those farms sits inside the borough limits, just the reputation and the festival that comes with it.
That party is the Mushroom Festival, and it is welcoming by design. Held on the streets each September, it is run almost entirely by volunteers, with proceeds funneled back into local nonprofits through a grants program. A mile of State Street fills with food stands, a fried-mushroom eating contest, cooking demos, and live music, and the whole thing exists to pour money back into the community that throws it.
The town's welcome runs deeper than one weekend. Kennett Square was a busy stop on the Underground Railroad, and at least a dozen local homes sheltered people escaping slavery, a history the Kennett Underground Railroad Center keeps alive with year-round tours. Three miles out, Longwood Gardens spreads its 1,077 acres of fountains and conservatories, the legacy of Pierre S. du Pont. Downtown, State Street strings together galleries, breweries, and the Mexican bakeries and restaurants that the mushroom industry's families built.
Upper Black Eddy
Pack a hammer for this one. Ringing Rocks Park spreads across roughly 120 acres of boulder fields that chime like bells when struck, a phenomenon geologists still cannot fully explain, though many point to the rocks' high iron content. When the concert ends, the Delaware Canal State Park picks up the slack with a 59-mile towpath for walking and riding.
The water is the other draw. Delaware River Pedal and Paddle runs guided kayak tours along the Delaware River and the canal beside it. The town even guards its own legend: a spot on the canal called Candy Bend, named for the days when passing boats tossed coal to residents and got candy thrown back in thanks.
West Chester
West Chester has been taking people in since the Revolution. A log schoolhouse here served as a makeshift hospital for the wounded of the 1777 Battle of Brandywine, and the college town has kept that open-door habit through the centuries. Established around the early 1700s, it now welcomes students and visitors in equal measure.
Porchfest is the town at its friendliest. Held in late spring, the free event turns private porches and yards into stages, with musicians volunteering their spots while food trucks and kids' activities line the walk between them. The Restaurant Festival follows the same spirit, packing local vendors, artisans, and three stages of live music into one downtown celebration of food and sound.
The American Helicopter Museum & Education Center adds an unexpected twist. It holds one of the country's largest rotorcraft collections and fills the space with hands-on exhibits. A few times a year, visitors can even book a real helicopter ride.
Strasburg
Strasburg runs on rails. Train-loving families can walk between several railroad attractions clustered close together, starting with the Strasburg Rail Road. In winter, its Winterfest Character Days put passengers aboard a historic steam train alongside the Snow Queen and Frost Fairy, with themed activities filling the ride.
Day Out With Thomas is the marquee draw on select weekends. Young riders roll behind Thomas the Tank Engine, meet Sir Topham Hatt, and take a full 45-minute trip, with a Play Pod and imagination stations to explore between rides. For the full story, the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania displays more than 100 locomotives and cars, from massive steam engines to vintage coaches, making it one of the country's premier railroad museums.
Bushkill
They call it the Niagara of Pennsylvania. Bushkill Falls sends its main cascade about 100 feet down, and a network of trails links eight separate waterfalls through the woods. Incorporated in 1813 and once known simply as the Plains, the town built its reputation on this scenery, and the site throws in fishing and kids' gemstone mining for good measure.
Summer adds a scavenger hunt to the hike. Visitors track down a hidden Bigfoot figure along the falls trails, snap a selfie, and claim a prize at the event desk. Come winter, the Saw Creek Estates Winterfest pulls the community together with ski and sled races, vendors, and a fire pit built for lingering crowds.
York
The name of the country was written down here. Established around 1741, York hosted the Continental Congress when it drafted the Articles of Confederation, the document that first put the words "United States of America" on paper. That history is easy to trace at the Indian Steps Museum, which holds more than 10,000 Native American artifacts and runs cultural programs all year. The museum takes its name from steps carved into the rocks by the early people who lived along the Susquehanna River.
Keystone Kidspace turns learning into a mess worth making. Kids run loose in a digital lab and hands-on studios, with classes in cartooning, music-making, and an art camp on the schedule. For year-round energy, Roundtop Mountain Resort spreads across 1,200 acres, running the largest paintball operation in Central Pennsylvania and a summer camp in the warm months, then skiing, snow tubing, and night skiing once the temperature drops.
Bedford
George Washington once marched troops through here. Founded around 1750 as Raystown, Bedford played a role in the Whiskey Rebellion, when the president gathered forces to enforce a federal tax on alcohol. That history runs deep, and the town lays it out for visitors block by block.
The National Museum of the American Coverlet shows a craft most people have never studied. Its coverlets date between 1771 and 1889, woven entirely from scratch rather than pieced like quilts, and the collection rewards a close look. The museum stays open year-round but asks guests to call ahead.
Old Bedford Village lets visitors walk straight into the past. The preserved village gathers structures built in the 18th and 19th centuries and staffs them with hands-on activities that recreate daily life of the era. Golfers get their own history at the Blue Knob All Seasons Resort course, a 9-hole, par-36 layout designed by Ferdinand Garbin in 1974, with water and sand hazards that keep it honest.
Phoenixville
Phoenixville turned an old steel town into one of southeastern Pennsylvania's liveliest downtowns. The walkable center is stocked with restaurants, breweries, shops, and a year-round events calendar. Fun Dungeon Brewcade and Billiards leans into the fun with arcade games, pinball, darts, and billiards under one flat admission, plus a long list of drafts, cocktails, and cider to work through while you play.
The gatherings are what make it welcoming. From April through November, the Saturday Phoenixville Farmers' Market brings out local growers, bakers, artisans, live music, and family activities. Nearby, the 1903 Colonial Theatre screens classic and new films, stages live shows, and runs workshops covering improv, screenwriting, and more.
Shippensburg
Shippensburg mixes a college-town buzz with old country traditions. On the Shippensburg University campus, the H. Ric Luhrs Performing Arts Center books concerts, Broadway-style productions, comedians, and touring acts through the year. A short distance off, the Shippensburg Fairgrounds come alive for the annual community fair with livestock shows, carnival rides, and food vendors.
Every August, the town belongs to the corn. The volunteer-run Shippensburg Corn Festival fills downtown with thousands of visitors, a famous corn-eating contest, hundreds of craft vendors, regional food stands, and live music celebrating the crop that built the region. It is the clearest picture of this town's welcome you will find all year.
Small Towns, Big Welcome
The thread running through these towns is not the scenery or the history. It is the volunteer manning the festival booth, the porch turned into a stage, the fudge maker teaching a kid the trade. Pennsylvania's country towns hand a first-time visitor the same welcome they save for a neighbor, and that is worth planning a weekend around.
