In the summer of 1888, John Wesley “J.W.” Etter, a popular Methodist pastor in Lebanon, camped for several weeks in the unsettled woods of Mount Gretna where he experienced an easing of the illnesses he had endured throughout much of his life.
It is not clear whether Etter ever attributed his improved health to drinking daily from one of the area’s many natural springs, but that didn’t stop others from asserting that Etter had discovered a “medicinal spring” with healing properties.
“The medicinal spring is one of the many that attracts special attention for its coldness and wonderful flow of crystal water,” according to a July 13, 1892, article in the Lebanon Daily News…