Local city information for Canonsburg, PA

Canonsburg is a borough in Washington County, Pennsylvania, 18 miles (29 km) southwest of Pittsburgh. Canonsburg was laid out by Colonel John Canon in 1789 and incorporated in 1802. It was the central point of the Whiskey Rebellion of 1794. The borough is in a rich coal district, and most of the town's work force once worked in local steel mills or coal mines. Canonsburg's population in 1910, including South Canonsburg, which was annexed in 1911, was 5,588; in 1920 it was 10,632; and in 1940 it was 12,599. The population was 8,607 at the 2000 census.

Interstate 79 and Route 19 passes through the town, as well as several railroad lines.The active railroad system in the town now is The Pittsburgh and Ohio Central Railroad. A trolley used to operate from Washington, Pennsylvania to Pittsburgh through Canonsburg until 1953.

Canonsburg was home to singers Perry Como and Bobby Vinton, NFL head coach Marty Schottenheimer,New York Giants' superstar Doug Kotar, Olympic gold medalist Kurt Angle, Bill Schmidt, Olympian bronze medalist in the javelin throw in Munich, 1972, the only American to ever medal in that event, and Theodosius Lazor, Metropolitan Bishop for the Orthodox Church in America. Jonathan Letterman, the "Father of Battlefield Medicine" during the Civil War, was also born in Canonsburg. The town was the birthplace of the members of the vocal group, The Four Coins, popular in the 1950s and 60s.

The town is the headquarters for Centimark, Mylan Laboratories, All-Clad Metalcrafters, Sarris Candies, and the Black Box Corporation. It is also the site of the Southpointe office park, where a branch of the California University of Pennsylvania is located. Yenko Chevrolet, one of largest and most notorious custom muscle car shops of the late 1960s and early 1970s, was also located in Canonsburg.

Canonsburg is also home to the Pennsylvania Enforcers. They are a United Junior Hockey League team. The Enforcers home is the Icoplex at South Point just outside of Canonsburg.

Canonsburg is home to an annual Oktoberfest and the second-largest Independence Day parade in the state of Pennsylvania, second only to Philadelphia. In the weeks leading up to the parade, the town frequently gains media attention for its residents setting up folding chairs along the town's main street to stake claim to prime viewing areas.

The borough is served by the Canon-McMillan School District.

The exact date of the first settlement near the current site of Canonsburg is unclear. Colonel John Canon, a common miller who also served as justice of the Virginia courts at Fort Dunmore (now Pittsburgh), purchased some land from the state of Virginia around Chartiers Creek, sometime before May 1780. The state had claimed what is now southwestern Pennsylvania in a dispute that would not finally be settled until later in the decade. In 1781 Pennsylvania carved Washington County out of Westmoreland, and the county seat was established at Washington. The notes of the first session of the Washington County Court during that year indicate a call for a road from Canon's mill to Pittsburgh. The road to Pittsburgh, called Pitt Street, remains in part today as an archaic and indirect route to the city. The first surviving plat of the town is from April 15, 1788. Lots were sold around Canon's property, and the emerging town took the name of Canonsburg shortly thereafter.

The town was the site of the first institution of higher learning west of the Allegheny Mountains, Jefferson College. Founded in 1787, it was the eleventh such institution in the United States. The Phi Gamma Delta and Phi Kappa Psi fraternities were both founded at Jefferson College. Phi Gamma Delta, of whom President Calvin Coolidge was a member, was founded in 1848. Phi Kappa Psi, of whom President Woodrow Wilson and over 100 U.S. Congressmen claim membership, was founded in 1852. The school would go on to become Washington & Jefferson College in nearby Washington.

For generations, Jefferson College financially supported Canonsburg by accounting for much of its income. However, in 1868, the college was moved to nearby Washington, leaving behind empty college rooming and boarding houses, known as the "forts". Canonsburg's largest financial draw having left, it would take the introduction of the railroad system to return the city to its former glory. The railroad system, on its way from Mansfield (Carnegie) to Washington (See: Chartiers Branch), was fully operational, as scheduled, on May 18, 1871. The first scheduled train departed from the Washington depot carrying "borough authorities, the committee of arrangement and reception, as well as Rankin’s Cornet Band and a number of…prominent citizens who had been invited to join the excursion." They traveled to Mansfield, where they waited for the special to arrive from Pittsburgh. The special had 12 coaches pulled by two locomotives and was filled with a large number of dignitaries, most especially the mayors of Pittsburgh and Allegheny. The special then made it down the newly laid tracks, passing stations full of spectators to cheer on the train. Canonsburg had a large crowd of supporters, and many people climbed aboard the train to ride along to Washington. There, led by Pittsburgh’s Great Western Band, the crowd marched to Town Hall for a round of speeches. The Washington Reporter editor pronounced the day "a grand success."

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