The major Adhesives Research fire last week leads to the question of how the nearby crossroads of Potosi got its name.
John D. Kilbourne, Historical Society of York County director, weighed in about 50 years ago after receiving an inquiry from a Wisconsin resident.
The inquirer was trying to link mining with other towns in the Americas called Potosi.
Kilbourne wrote back that Iron ore mining occurred in the 1880s in Springfield Township. The Potosi Post Office was established there in 1901.
"Circumstances seem to indicate a tie-in with the mining activities," Kilbourne wrote.
This information came from a York Daily Record article in 1995.
The newspaper further reported that in 1540, Spanish colonists discovered silver in the Potosi state of southern Bolivia. Cerro Potosi mountain was "honeycombed with thousands of mines," according to the Encyclopedia Britannica. "Legend attributes its name to "potojchi,' a Quechua Indian word meaning 'to explode,' because of rumblings inside the mountain."
The capital city of Potosi became famous for its wealth from silver mining in the 1650s.
For more on Potosi, Pa., see a York Daily Record story on the community below:
