Naugle Run

Named after Richard Naugle and his family who owned and operated an inn and tavern in Laughlintown along the creek since the early 1800’s.

Naugle Run’s headwaters are east-southeast of Rector and southeast of Laughlintown in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, Latitude: 401251n and Longitude: 0791228w. This small 2.58-mile second order tributary of Loyalhanna Creek flows through the Compass Inn Museum property just south of State Route 30 and ends just west of Laughlintown and State Route 381.

There are no fishable tributaries to Naugle Run and it is not floatable. However, for the most part, it is wadeable with some deeper pools of 3 to 4 feet. Because its banks are all privately owned, the only access is via road contact or crossing points where easements and right-of-ways exist. In addition, there is limited trail access along the upper parts of the creek with the best trailhead located off White Oak Road south of State Route 30 at Laurel Mountain Park.

Naugle Run is a very steep tumbling, mountain type creek that drops at a rate of 255.81 feet per minute (FMP). It can be anywhere from 4 to 14 feet wide and its upper reaches are remote, intermittent, and very, very steep with flatter areas just above Laughlintown. Fishing is rated as fair with some native brook trout where conditions are favorable.

Preliminary archeological investigations completed the summer of 2019 by Markosky Engineering’s Cultural Resources Division show that the valley bottom zone, near Compass Inn Museum, is extremely broad and terraced, reflecting that Naugle Run currently flows through a broad valley that once contained a larger stream. The study area is characterized by the presence of large, rounded boulders, some of which are larger than 3.3 feet (1.0 m) in diameter, lying above the Pennsylvania Period bedrock. This is evident from past maintenance on the property that encountered boulders below the ground surface and from hand-excavated auger borings that were attempted during the course of the investigation, but were refused due to bedrock. In addition, examination of the hand-excavated basement below the 1799 log portion and the 1820 stone addition display enormous boulders still in situ. These large boulders and cobbles document a former late Pleistocene age stream with a greater competence and capacity to transport large materials and greater load. (Markosky, 2020)