On a lovely January morning, I walked the LeTorte trail, which runs along the eponymous nature preserve. LeTorte’s name comes from an early 18th-century French-Swiss explorer who built cabins in the area after receiving the land from William Penn. James and his wife Ann fought with the American Indians (probably Shawnee) in 1720, but it was fellow Europeans — Scots-Irish — who eventually pushed the LeTortes out of their homestead. One hundred-fifty years later, beginning in 1869, the area formed part of the regional railway system known as the Sourh Mountain Railroad, linking it to the iron-smelting industries at Pine Grove Furnace. And today, a century and half after, conservationists working together (spearheaded by the Central Pennsylvania Conservancy) have successfully carved out 35 areas of greenspace: land that might otherwise have turned into urban sprawl, derelict or polluted, is instead available for the community to enjoy.