This vintage postcard shows Main Street in Ralston, Pennsylvania in 1900. This is a quaint view of a time when the roads where not paved and wood frame houses with front porches lined the streets. A couple is out in Victorian dress in this mid-winter Main Street view of 1900.
The town of Ralston, situated on Lycoming creek, at the mouth of Rock Run, derives its name from Matthew C. Ralston, of Philadelphia. He was the president of the railroad which was opened through to Ralston in 1837 and spent a great deal of his own fortune getting this railroad built as well as founded the town with some other men.
Ralston never grew to be what the founders had hoped for. When the railroad was completed through to Elmira, and the McIntyre Coal Company ceased operations, it came to a standstill, and its growth has been slow.
This old postcard is a great view into small town America in 1900. Today, Ralston is still a small town in north central Pennsylvania with the beautiful surrounding countryside and quaint, though paved, streets.