![\"Central](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/01nb-tvde-sh1e-06wg.jpeg\" "\\"Central")
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Central Pennsylvania\u2019s nebulous definition can make efforts to talk about the region confusing \u2014 and occasionally contentious.<\/p>\n
Asha Prihar \/ Spotlight PA<\/p>\n
This story first appeared in PA Local, a weekly newsletter by Spotlight PA taking a fresh, positive look at the incredible people, beautiful places, and delicious food of Pennsylvania. Sign up for free here<\/a>.<\/p>\n When someone claims to live in \u201ccentral Pennsylvania,\u201d what do they mean?<\/p>\n It could be the area around the state capital, the forests of the Pennsylvania Wilds, a small Rust Belt city, or the rolling fields of Dutch Country. Or maybe they live near Penn State University, in the county that\u2019s got \u201ccenter\u201d right in the name (just spelled a little differently).<\/p>\n Central Pennsylvania\u2019s nebulous definition can make efforts to talk about the region confusing \u2014 and occasionally contentious. While the descriptor sounds straightforward, it often doesn\u2019t really tell you where someone is from, or what it\u2019s like to live there.<\/p>\n To explore why central Pennsylvania is so hard to pin down and why it stokes such strong feelings, PA Local spoke with residents and researchers, read through hundreds of comments from readers, and consulted news archives, government websites, nonprofit filings, books, and maps.<\/p>\n Central Pennsylvania, the reporting found, is a vernacular region<\/a> that\u2019s long meant different things to different people. People across the commonwealth rely on the term \u2014 whether or not they feel it accurately reflects their community\u2019s location and identity.<\/p>\n Sharon Nelson of Lancaster County grew up hearing the towns she\u2019d lived in, East Petersburg and Mount Joy, referred to as part of \u201ccentral Pennsylvania.\u201d But when she left for Juniata College in Huntingdon \u2014 about 30 miles south of State College \u2014 the terminology began to feel odd.<\/p>\n At Juniata, Nelson was much closer to the middle of Pennsylvania on a map, and the area (which she now calls the \u201cthe real central Pa.\u201d) felt markedly different from her hometown. There wasn\u2019t a \u201cbigger city\u201d with tens of thousands of residents like Lancaster anchoring the area, she said, but rather smaller boroughs of a few thousand.<\/p>\n \u201cWe had to drive like two and a half hours to get there,\u201d Nelson said of the trek from the Mount Joy area to Juniata. \u201cAnd then I just thought it was such a misnomer, saying we were central Pennsylvania.\u201d<\/p>\n A recent PA Local survey<\/a> about Pennsylvania\u2019s regions asked an open-ended question: \u201cWhat region of Pennsylvania would you say you currently live in?\u201d At least one respondent from each of 23 counties \u2014 ranging from Potter to Armstrong to Bedford to, yes, Lancaster \u2014 wrote \u201cCentral Pennsylvania\u201d or \u201cCentral PA.\u201d Six of those counties are classified as<\/a> urban, per the Center for Rural Pennsylvania\u2019s definition, and the other 17 are rural.<\/p>\n Responses from some of those counties, plus 13 others, included variations on the region, like north-central, south-central, eastern central, and west-central. That makes for a grand total of 36 counties \u2014 out of the state\u2019s 67 \u2014 where at least some residents incorporate \u201ccentral\u201d into their labels.<\/p>\n Many comments on the survey \u2014 even from people who didn\u2019t self-identify as central Pennsylvanians \u2014 singled out the region as tough to define, or offered strong thoughts about which areas truly are part of it.<\/p>\n \u201cI feel like there are two separate Central PAs (one around Adams\/York\/Cumberland, one north of Harrisburg) that are distinct regions in my head but I would call both Central PA,\u201d a respondent from Adams County wrote.<\/p>\n \u201cCentral PA does not extend to the northern and southern borders,\u201d said an Allegheny County resident.<\/p>\n \u201cAnyone who says Central Pa doesn\u2019t include Cumberland County is just wrong,\u201d wrote someone who just moved from the area to Montgomery County. \u201cLooks weird geographically, but we all say we\u2019re from Central Pa.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAnyone who assumes Lancaster is in Central PA needs to look at a map and get some glasses,\u201d wrote one Centre County resident.<\/p>\n Organization names also show the term\u2019s wide range. Around 200 nonprofits<\/a> have \u201ccentral Pennsylvania\u201d in their names or have designated chapters for the region, and they\u2019re not all concentrated in the same area.<\/p>\n The Central Pennsylvania Humane Society, for example, is located in Altoona and serves Blair and surrounding counties. But that\u2019s not to be confused with the Central Pennsylvania Animal Alliance, a nonprofit based over 100 miles east in Mechanicsburg.<\/p>\n Some organizations named after the region serve huge tracts of the state. The Central Pennsylvania Food Bank is headquartered in Harrisburg and serves a 27-county area<\/a> that stretches all the way from the New York border to the Mason-Dixon line.<\/p>\n United Cerebral Palsy of Central PA similarly covers a big stretch of the commonwealth<\/a>. It used to be called \u201cUCP Capital Area\u201d and \u201cserved only Dauphin, Cumberland, and Perry Counties for many years,\u201d CEO Janeen Latin told PA Local. When it had the opportunity to add services in more areas, it adopted a more expansive name too.<\/p>\n The Central PA Chamber of Commerce<\/a> made a similar move a few decades ago. To \u201caccurately represent\u201d who it serves, in 2004 the chamber changed its name from the Milton Area Chamber of Commerce to its current one, according to CEO TeaJay Aikey.<\/p>\n The Milton-based org may again be \u201csomewhat outgrowing\u201d its name, she said, because businesses from anywhere can now join \u2014 though much of its membership comes from Northumberland, Snyder, Montour, Union, and Lycoming Counties. The group is working to publicize that it also supports companies outside of the area that want to reach central Pennsylvanians with their products or services.<\/p>\n That still begs the question: Where exactly is central Pennsylvania?<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s not the big cities like Philly and Pittsburgh. It\u2019s kind of in the center there,\u201d Aikey said. \u201cIt just makes me kind of think about the personalities, the work ethic, the type of folks that we have.\u201d<\/p>\n The Centre cannot hold?<\/p>\n Why does the imagined central Pennsylvania sprawl so widely?<\/p>\n One reason is that \u201ccentral,\u201d the word, can be pretty accommodating. Merriam-Webster defines<\/a> it as \u201csituated, at, in, or near the center\u201d \u2014 an inherently relational description.<\/p>\n For residents of Centre County, which is named after a furnace<\/a>, central Pennsylvania centers on them. In emails to and conversations with PA Local, numerous residents from the county conveyed pride over living smack dab in the middle of Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n Boalsburg resident and author Ken Hull, who said his family has lived in the county since the 1790s, told PA Local he thinks a \u201clegitimate way\u201d to define a \u201cbroader\u201d central Pennsylvania would be to include Centre\u2019s neighbors. When he hears people from areas farther away claim central Pennsylvania, he gets a little annoyed.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t, like, go into fisticuffs with people who insist that Harrisburg\u201d is central Pennsylvania, he said. \u201cIt\u2019s nothing like that. It\u2019s just that I\u2019m very proud of where I live, and where I grew up, and where my ancestors settled.\u201d<\/p>\n According to researchers, Pennsylvania\u2019s geographic center isn\u2019t possible to pinpoint perfectly<\/a>, but does fall somewhere within Centre County\u2019s<\/a> 1,113 square miles.<\/p>\n The U.S. Census Bureau calculates a different type of midpoint for each state: the \u201ccenter of population<\/a>,\u201d which it defines as \u201cthe point at which an imaginary, weightless, rigid, and flat (no elevation effects) surface representation\u201d of a state \u201cwould balance if weights of identical size were placed on it so that each weight represented the location of one person.\u201d<\/p>\n In 2020, that point in Pennsylvania<\/a> was on the eastern bank of the Susquehanna River \u2014 about 18 miles north of Harrisburg.<\/p>\n \u201cCentral\u201d can also mean \u201ceasily accessible from outlying districts\u201d or \u201cof primary importance,\u201d according to the dictionary.<\/p>\n Even before it became the capital in 1812, Harrisburg was a central locale. The city had a lot of early infrastructure and was a transportation hub for European settlers moving west during the colonial period, said Doug Miller, a self-described \u201cnative son of Pennsylvania\u201d and lifelong student of state history who runs Pennsbury Manor<\/a>.<\/p>\n Harrisburg had a ferry point on the mile-wide Susquehanna River, as well as links to other early towns, he said. And Carlisle, about 20 miles west, was a \u201cbig hub point\u201d for western expansion.<\/p>\n \u201cCentre County was, of course, connected by roads and so on,\u201d Miller said, \u201cbut the population expansion that\u2019s moving west out of the port of destination, Philadelphia, is really going across south-central Pennsylvania and expanding outward, much to the discomfort of certain Native American groups that were in the area.\u201d<\/p>\n How media and the government define central Pa.<\/p>\n If the dictionary can\u2019t clarify what constitutes central Pennsylvania, surely journalists know, right?<\/p>\n Unless you\u2019re willing to embrace an \u201call of the above\u201d interpretation, not quite. The press, past and present, has used the term to describe just as wide a swath of the state as the readers who answered our survey.<\/p>\n Altoona, Bloomsburg, Gettysburg, Harrisburg, Johnstown, Lebanon, Pottsville, Philipsburg, Ridgway, Shamokin, and Williamsport have all been described as \u201ccentral Pennsylvania\u201d in newspaper articles and advertisements, per a PA Local review of clippings ranging from 1829 to 2000.<\/p>\n Today, three different TV media markets<\/a> in Pennsylvania include stations that refer to at least part, if not all, of their coverage area as \u201ccentral Pennsylvania.\u201d<\/p>\n Exact terminology varies, and can get creative. Johnstown-based FOX 8 directs some of its programming at what it calls<\/a> \u201cWest-Central Pennsylvania,\u201d while the descriptor \u201csouth-central<\/a>\u201d gets used on Lancaster-based WGAL, and ABC27 in Harrisburg often opts for \u201cMidstate<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n Plain-and-simple \u201ccentral\u201d makes plenty of appearances too, from WTAJ in Altoona<\/a>, to CBS21 in Harrisburg<\/a>, to WNEP<\/a>, a Moosic-based news station that claims to cover both northeastern and central Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n Government sources don\u2019t provide much clarity either. State agencies have a variety of regional definitions that each serve different goals, and not all of them include a dedicated \u201ccentral\u201d area.<\/p>\n The Game Commission<\/a> and the Department of Health<\/a> designate \u201cnorthcentral\u201d and \u201csouthcentral\u201d divisions rather than carving out a \u201ccentral\u201d district \u2014 and the definitions of each vary between the agencies.<\/p>\n The Department of Community and Economic Development splits the state into five regions \u2014 including \u201cCentral Pennsylvania\u201d \u2014 on a business-facing \u201cPennsylvania Gets It Done\u201d website<\/a>. The marketing effort is meant to \u201ctell a more relevant and comprehensive story to companies that are looking for a location that meets their specific needs to succeed and thrive,\u201d per a DCED spokesperson.<\/p>\n The DCED\u2019s \u201cCentral Pennsylvania\u201d bends the term pretty far: Its map of the region features 17 counties in an upside-down \u201cV,\u201d<\/a> stretching from Clinton County at the northern tip to five counties along the southern border. The area\u2019s \u201cstrength,\u201d the website says, \u201clies in the diversity of the companies and people that call the region home.\u201d<\/p>\n \u2018Feels right\u2019<\/p>\n Underneath the collective frustration of determining what exactly counts as central Pennsylvania is a sense that it\u2019s a unique place worth acknowledging.<\/p>\n The region contains a multitude of local cultures, natural features, and built environments that can feel undervalued when lumped together haphazardly.<\/p>\n For that reason, some central Pennsylvanians embrace nondirectional names for the places they call home. These include the Capital Region, the Susquehanna River Valley, the Cumberland Valley, and the Pennsylvania Wilds, among others.<\/p>\n And to some residents, placing another direction \u2014 like north, south, east, or west \u2014 in front of the \u201ccentral\u201d makes it feel truer to the essence of their area.<\/p>\n If Ben Cattell Noll of Lancaster is talking to someone from out of state, he might describe his area as \u201csoutheastern\u201d or as \u201can hour and a half from Philly.\u201d But if he\u2019s speaking to a fellow Pennsylvanian, \u201csouth-central\u201d is the term that \u201cfeels right to Lancaster.\u201d<\/p>\n Most of the 49 Lancaster County residents who answered PA Local\u2019s survey said \u201csouth-central\u201d when asked to name their region. Five opted for \u201csoutheastern,\u201d five said just \u201ccentral,\u201d and others used terms like \u201cAmish Country,\u201d \u201cSusquehanna Valley,\u201d and simply \u201cLancaster.\u201d<\/p>\n Cattell Noll said his perception of his region might be influenced by his media market mostly looking westward from where he lives. His in-laws and spouse grew up in the western part of Chester County \u2014 not that far away, and not that dissimilar from Lancaster County \u2014 but \u201ctheir orientation was Philly, and my orientation was to Lancaster, a little towards Harrisburg,\u201d Cattell Noll said.<\/p>\n He wouldn\u2019t describe his area simply as \u201ccentral PA\u201d though \u2014 Harrisburg is \u201cprobably where my mind goes\u201d when he hears that term, he said.<\/p>\n Bob Kirchner bounced around Pennsylvania before settling in Elk County, where he\u2019s lived for the past 32 years. He wrote in an email that he\u2019s never quite sure what to call the area since he doesn\u2019t perceive \u201cmuch of a regional identity,\u201d but noted that it\u2019s probably \u201cmore Northcentral PA.\u201d (Five out of the nine Elk Countians who answered PA Local\u2019s survey agreed with that label.)<\/p>\n In an interview with PA Local, though, Kirchner drew \u201cattitudinal\u201d contrasts between his current home and other places he\u2019s lived, including York County.<\/p>\n He described the York area as friendly, albeit too densely populated for his liking. Where he lives now, people have more of a \u201cstoic,\u201d \u201coutdoor attitude,\u201d he said, and \u201cyour time is going to be your own.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI used to tell the people in south-central Pennsylvania, \u2018You\u2019re the nicest people I\u2019ve ever met,\u2019\u201d Kirchner said. \u201c\u2018There\u2019s just too damn many of you.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Steve Mellin, who recently retired to Tioga County and refers to it as \u201cNorth Central Pennsylvania,\u201d has also noticed a \u201cdistinct difference\u201d between the areas north and south of Interstate 80, the east-west highway that roughly bisects the state. A decade-plus of traveling up U.S. Route 15 helped solidify that perception, he told PA Local by email.<\/p>\n \u201cThe drive, and scenery, really changes once I get north of Williamsport,\u201d Mellin said.<\/p>\n Is \u201ccentral Pennsylvania\u201d the sum of all of the hyphenated versions of the term, or its own designation entirely?<\/p>\n To Mellin, the answer is no. \u201cI really can\u2019t imagine anyone that lives in this state saying central PA and meaning a combination of the north central PA and south central PA.\u201d<\/p>\n Norman St. Amour of Mechanicsburg disagrees, and thinks it\u2019s all technically \u201ccentral Pennsylvania\u201d \u2014 but noted that people use the phrase to add extra context to clarify exactly where in the region.<\/p>\n \u201cNo matter which description you use, we are discussing very large areas that leave a lot to the imagination,\u201d St. Amour said.<\/p>\n This is the third installment in a series about Pennsylvania\u2019s regions. Find the first piece here<\/a>, and the second here<\/a>. To make sure you don\u2019t miss future installments, subscribe to our free, weekly PA Local newsletter<\/a>.<\/p>\n![\"map](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/1791044169_952_thumbnail.jpeg\")
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