Rose Valley Borough

Rose Valley Borough covers .74 miles in the heart of Delaware County.  Please explore this newly designed website to learn about our government, community organizations, and our unique history. The Borough office is located in the Old Mill at the end of Old Mill lane 

History

Rose Valley was included in land grants by William Penn in 1681 to three Vernon brothers - Thomas, Robert and Randal - while they were still in England. They all arrived here the following year. Robert's grant was confirmed by patent in 1684, Thomas's in 1702 and Randal's in 1711. The three brothers' lands were contiguous, and each had considerable frontage on the east side of Ridley Creek. Randal Vernon built his home on what is now Rabbit Run, and that home still stands. The part of Rose Valley we know as Todmorden was also part of Randal Vernon's grant, but it was not until 1831 when Samuel Bancroft bought the farm and mill on that site that the house was called Todmorden - a name which is said to mean 'Death of the Fox' or 'End of the Hunt.' Robert Vernon's home may have been the three-story stone house on Old Mill Lane, now known as the Bishop White House, getting that name from William White who sent his family here from Philadelphia during an epidemic of yellow fever in 1793.

The power of Ridley Creek was harnessed in 1789 when Nicholas Stimmel built  his snuff mill where the Old Mill now stands. After snuff went out of fashion,  the mill was used to grind bark to make fever medicine and then converted to a  paper mill. The mill stood unused and deserted for a decade until Antrim Osborne  bought it in 1861 to manufacture woolens. To provide housing for his many  workers, Osborne built twelve six-room houses, six in a continuous row on the  east side of Rose Valley Road, and three double houses across the street. The  houses were completed in 1870 and they still stand. At the peak of his wool  business, in 1879, Osborne bought Hutton's mill, now Hedgerow Theatre. Osborne  died in 1890.

The era that makes Rose Valley unique among the Philadelphia suburbs is that  of the Arts and Crafts movement. Generally defined as the English revival of  decorative arts, it was one aspect of a many-sided reaction against the  Industrial Revolution and the diminished role of the craftsman in the production  of goods. The principal leader of the reaction was William Morris whose ideas  crossed the Atlantic and made their appeal to those interested in social and  philosophical concepts. One of those interested was William Lightfoot Price, a  successful Philadelphia architect and a man in love with people and ideas.

In 1901, Will Price bought eighty acres in the name of the Rose Valley Association from the bankrupt estate of Antrim Osborne. With the financial backing of a group of wealthy liberal Philadelphians interested in social reform, Price set about creating the Arts and Crafts movement's vision of 'the art that is life.' The Rose Valley Association was to be an association of shops whose purpose was the manufacture of handcrafted items. The Association would rent space to these shops and work that met the standards of the Association would be stamped with the Rose Valley seal, a wild rose superimposed by a 'V' and circled by a buckled belt to symbolize fellowship. On the social side, true to his democratic philosophy, Price envisioned a community where 'the tiniest cottages may be built side by side with a more spacious neighbor.'

From the beginning, the Association was plagued by financial problems, and it must be said that although many beautiful items were crafted here in those early years, the commercial aspect of the Arts and Crafts experiment was not a success. In the first five years, only three shops had been established, and of these, only the furniture shop had any real organization. By the end of the decade, the Rose Valley Association had been forced to sell most of its assets to pay its debts.

Although the commercial side of the experiment was not a success, the social and artistic sides were. From its beginning Rose Valley was attractive to people who saw an opportunity to use their creative talents in their living environment. The Rose Valley Folk, initially organized to deal with the practical problems of self-government, became more a social organization. The Folk organized all sorts of community events - picnics, swimming and canoeing parties, baseball games. At night the Guild Hall was kept in perpetual use with concerts, plays and dances. The community threw itself into these productions, writing the plays, designing sets, making costumes, printing programs and acting.

Today, the memories of the Arts and Crafts movement abound in the Borough. Many descendants of the original artists and artisans still live here, and the distinctive architectural style of William Price can be seen in many of the homes.

In 1923, in order to control their own destiny as a local community, the 250  residents of Rose Valley petitioned the Court of Quarter Sessions to establish a  Borough. The petition was approved on December 23, 1923. It created a separate  municipality of 410 acres of which 363 had been in Nether Providence and 47  across the creek in Middletown Township.

On July 19, 2010, the U. S. Department of the Interior placed a large portion of the Borough on the National Register of Historic Places.  The Rose Valley Historic District consists of 123 resources (105 buildings, 7 sites, 10 structures and 1 object (the Minquas Path Historic Marker on Rose Valley Road).  More details about the hisstoric district can be obtained at the Borough Office.

A more detailed history of Rose Valley Borough can be found in the two  volumes of A History of Rose Valley, available for purchase at the  Borough office.

Borough Services

• FIRE PROTECTION is provided by the Garden City and South Media Volunteer Fire Companies. The Borough shares the financial support of these fire companies with Nether Providence Township. 

• POLICE PROTECTION is provided by the Pennsylvania State Police. The Borough does not have its own police department.

• EMERGENCY ALERTS The Borough has a system to alert residents about urgent news using the Googlegroups email system. Residents can sign up to receive alerts by sending an email to the Borough office, rosevalleyborough@comcast.net. Residents are also encouraged to sign up for Delaware County's emergency alert system.

• RECYCLABLES are collected at Borough expense every other Wednesday. The recycler picks up glass, #1 through #7 plastic, cardboard (cut into 2' by 2' peices), newspapers, office paper, junk mail, magazines, filefolders, post-it notes, card stock paper, aluminum and bi-metal cans. All recyclables can be co-mingled. Recycling stickers and a schedule of collections can be obtained at the Borough Office. Click here for the schedule for recycling pickups.

• TRASH COLLECTION is conducted privately. Borough residents make their own arrangements with the trash hauler of their choice.

• HEAVY TRASH pickup is provided by the Borough once a year in the spring. Residents are advised of the exact date in the spring newsletter mailing.

• ROAD MAINTENANCE on Borough-owned roads is done by private contractors hired by the Borough for road repair and snow plowing. The residents of the private lanes arrange for the repair and plowing of their own lanes, and Penndot maintains Rose Valley Road, the only state road within the Borough.

• ROSE VALLEY SEWER PLANT, located off of Long Point Lane, serves most of the residences in the Borough (a few homes have their own on-site systems) as well as 140 residences in Nether Providence Township. The Borough owned and operated the plant for over 70 years. On June 29, 2009, the plant was sold to DELCORA, a regional sewer authority. DELCORA is now responsible for all maintenance and billing.