Our Chamber covers three large areas of the Susquehanna River Valley region. We cover Marietta, Columbia, and Wrightsville. We are made up of several different types of businesses - which provide an entertaining and relaxing visit to our area!

Our Chamber also holds several different events through the year. Our most famous events are the Bridge Bust, Antique, Art and Craft Show, and River Run.

Columbia once had the distinction of being known far and wide as the Gateway to the West. That was when Columbia was called Wright's Ferry and the ferryboat was the only means of transportation across the Susquehanna River. That was also the era when canal boats, gliding with the current and maneuvering through the locks led by mules, brought merchandise and lumber from upstate logging centers.

Columbia has pride in its history which can be traced back some 260 years, when its first settlers, Robert Barber, John Wright and Samuel Blunston, took up residence in what was Shawannah, an Indian town. In 1730, it was named Wright's Ferry and grew with such unbridled vigor that in 1788, Samuel Wright began laying out the boundaries for a new community destined to become Columbia.

During the Revolutionary and Civil wars, Columbia and its residents experienced a multitude of significant historical events highlighted by the burning of the bridge on June 28, 1863, a most momentous and spectacular event aimed at halting the Confederate advance toward Philadelphia. The Columbia Historical Preservation Society Museum located at 19-21 Second St.

While aiming for the future, Columbia is proud of its past and remembers its founders by naming streets in their honor. Today, the town's outstanding architecture is recognized in the National Historic Register in Washington D.C.

Marietta in Colonial days was a Susquehanna River crossing known as “Anderson's Ferry.” In the early 1800s, James Anderson and David Cook consolidated their adjoining farms into the borough of Marietta—named, it is said, for the Anderson and Cook womenfolk who included many Marys and at least one Henrietta.

Marietta prospered as a result of flourishing river commerce on the Pennsylvania Canal (built between 1825 and 1830) and the Pennsylvania Railroad (built in the early 1850s). The town became a lumbering and iron smelting center—an earthy mixture of rich ironmasters, crude lumbermen, skilled artisans, educational scholars, religious revivals and brawling rivermen.

But in the first half of the 20th century, Marietta suffered economic doldrums due to dwindling river-related industries. Those hard times in Marietta meant that residents could not afford to modernize local buildings—making them desirable for restoration.

Marietta's early grandeur had produced handsome Federal and Victorian homes; later poverty kept many of those homes in the untouched condition until recent restoration. Today, Marietta is a recognized center for restoration and much of the town has been declared a National Historic District. The Haldeman Mansion on River Road in Bainbridge houses the Preservation Society for the area.

Wrightsville located on the western banks of the Susquehanna River in York County is rich in history and beauty. From the mid-1800s on, many U.S. presidents traveled through Wrightsville on the main branch of the Pennsylvania Railroad from New York and Philadelphia to Washington, D.C.

The Confederate Army was stopped in Wrightsville because of the burning of the enclosed wooden bridge during Civil War times. One of the oldest buildings in Wrightsville that has been restored is the Wrightsville House on Locust and Front Street, which received the Best Historic Preservation Award from the Pennsylvania Historic and Museum Commission in 1987. The two-and-a-half-story stone house was built around 1800 as a tavern overlooking the Susquehanna where the ferry crossed from Columbia.

There were 100 original lots laid out in Wrightsville in the 1700s. One Victorian home, at 112 North Third Street, was built in the 1800s and features original design and layout. In 1986, the Wrightsville Historical Museum was given to Historic Wrightsville, Inc. by the Redman heirs for use as a museum at 309 Locust Street. In 1996 the Civil War Diorama opened in the building located at 124 Hellam Street that had once been a post office, a barbershop and a stove store.

We invite you to get to know our river towns' rich histories and the richness they still have to offer today. Although, in this day and age, there are few events of such magnitude as the burning of the bridge, our communities and their residents continue to make history through their everyday activities.

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