Stump Grinding in Emmaus, PA

Emmaus was settled in the early 1700s during the colonial era by German Protestants of the Lutheran and Reformed faiths who had fled religious persecution in Europe. Its earliest German settlers were primarily farmers. Three historic Emmaus residential structures built during the 18th and 19th centuries, each still standing, have been added to the National Register of Historic Places. Shelter House, constructed in 1734 by Pennsylvania Dutch settlers, is the oldest building structure in Emmaus and the oldest continuously occupied structure in the Lehigh Valley. The other two historic residences are The 1803 House, built in 1803 by American Revolutionary patriot militia member Jacob Ehrenhardt, Jr., and Kemmerer House, a farmstead built between 1840 and 1850.

In 1741, the land on which present-day Emmaus is located was donated to the Moravian Church by Sebastian Heinrich Knauss and Jacob Ehrenhardt for the purpose of creating a closed faith-based village. The village was originally named Salzburg. At the time of its founding in 1759, Emmaus was one of the four leading Moravian communities in the Northeastern United States; Bethlehem, Lititz and Nazareth, each in Pennsylvania, were the others.

Two years later, in 1761, Moravian Bishop August Gottlieb Spangenberg announced the town’s new name would be Emmaus, saying “Now here we build a village small; toward its completion we give all. Here, too, our hearts within shall flame; Emmaus then shall be its name.” For approximately 100 years, until the mid-19th century, Emmaus was a closed community of the Moravian Church. Emmaus was named for the Biblical village of Emmaus, where, according to the Bible’s Gospel of Luke, Jesus was seen by his disciples Luke and Cleopas in what is known as his Road to Emmaus appearance following his crucifixion and resurrection.