What’s in a name? Spring Mills was once known as Rising Springs and was a stop on the Lewisburg and Tyrone Railroad, part of a Pennsylvania Railroad project to connect the Susquehanna Valley to Tyrone.
The rail project began in the early 1900s and existed until its abandonment in 2008. But the former town and rail stop name lives on in the new Rising Spring Meat Co., founded by Mike and Virginia Byers, of Demeter’s Garden and Lost Hollow Honey, and Jay Young and myself, of Young American Growers.
RSMC is nestled among houses along Cooper Street in a quiet Spring Mills neighborhood, standing out to passers-by only because of its shiny new green roof, at the site of the former Myers Bros. meat plant. We opened in early June as a local meat processing plant, processing cows, pigs, sheep, goats, deer and bison for local farmers, providing a source of meat for local meat buyers and employing four full-time and two part-time workers.
Currently, the company processes meat under the USDA custom exemption for owners of animals planning to consume their own meat, but we’ve undergone an initial USDA food-safety inspection and expect to process USDA-inspected meat for public sale — through retail or wholesale outlets, restaurants, institutions and farmers markets — within a few weeks.
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