 Penns Valley also hosts the oldest town of Centre County, Aaronsburg, which was planned out in 1786.At the close of the 18th century Penns Valley was already set aside for farmland, however, the surrounding county rapidly boomed as iron ore was discovered and the first road built by Philadelphia land speculator Reuben Haines brought the rest of Pennsylvania into the heart of Penns Valley terminating at the location of Spring Mills.In the following two hundred years the iron industry would wane, but the agricultural heritage within Penns Valley would continue, and with the growth of a small land grant university just to the west in State College, The Pennsylvania State University would give the region a new academic wave of prosperity for the 21st century.