Neffs, OH

Neffs sits in the McMahon Creek valley in northwestern Pultney Township, where State Route 149 leads east to Bellaire on the Ohio River and then north toward Wheeling. The creek is the place's organizing feature, with the CDP tucked into a route between larger valley centers. Neffs began with a post office in 1892, and its earlier working map included a sawmill and gristmill. The Neffs family arrived in Belmont County from Switzerland by way of Pennsylvania and Maryland, giving the place an immigrant thread alongside its creek, road, and coal history.

The coal story has a hard date: on March 16, 1940, an explosion at Hanna Coal Company's No. 10 Mine at Willow Grove killed 72 men. Current services keep Neffs tied to the surrounding county. The Neff Volunteer Fire Department operates from Pike Street and was named in a Belmont County agreement to provide Medicaid non-emergency transportation beginning in 2026. Neffs remains a small creek-valley community with practical links to Bellaire and Wheeling, where an old post office, a mining tragedy, and a working emergency-service institution sit on the same road map.