May 15, 2026 By Conner Goetz 2 min read

Montour Trail visitors will have a new opportunity to learn about an underappreciated aspect of western Pennsylvania lore thanks to a freshly unveiled historic marker on the trail near Southview.

The marker, which was installed in collaboration with the William G. Pomeroy Foundation and Rails to Trails Conservancy nonprofits, commemorates President George Washington’s local legacy, including his ownership of a 2,813-acre tract of land along Millers Run creek in the late 18th century.

According to Montour Trail Council President Julian Wolfe, a comment left on the council’s Facebook page by Montour Trail founder Tim Killmeyer in 2025 about the parcel “sparked a lot of interest within the Trail Council,” which launched a joint research project into Washington’s local landholdings alongside volunteers from Historic Fort Cherry.

The research resulted in the newly installed plaque, which sits near mile marker 20.5 southeast of Southview.

According to Wolfe, Washington was awarded the nearly four-and-a-half-square-mile parcel in 1774 in recognition of his service to the Colonial Virginia Militia during the French and Indian War over a decade prior.

The founding father would visit the parcel 10 years later in 1784, in which he made a notable visit to the Reed House where he told a group of squatters on his property, “I’ll have this land as sure as I hold this red handkerchief,” according to Canonsburg resident Brad Strimel, who now owns the land that includes the original location of the Reed House, which has since been relocated and restored in North Strabane Township.

Washington would go on to own the land for over 20 years before eventually selling it in 1796, three years before his death in 1799.

Strimel said that after he first learned of the Washington connection ahead of buying the property, he worked with the previous owner and later volunteers from Historic Fort Cherry to better research the visit.

Strimel later commissioned Houston artist James Sulkowski to paint a scene of the visit.

“I quickly realized that there wasn’t an image to go along with the story, and I really wanted to capture that imagery of the events that took place during that Washington visit,” Strimel said.

Now, trail users can scan a QR code on the marker to view a digital scan of the painting to illustrate the visit as mentioned on the plaque.