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Christopher Boan has been covering sports and sports betting for more than seven years, including stops at ArizonaSports.com, the Tucson Weekly and the Green Valley News.
What Big Pennsylvania Cities Are Most Forgotten?
While the biblical region of Bethlehem is forever enshrined in the history books, the Keystone State version of the holy land hotspot is less well known, as the Lehigh Valley city finished as Pennsylvania’s least well known city in a recent survey of state residents.
Overall, the city that’s stretched across two counties (Lehigh and Northampton) finished with the lowest percentage of correct responses in that survey, finishing up at 35.5% to knock off other forgotten Pennsylvania cities, such as York (36.6% correct guesses), Reading (43.6%) and Lancaster (46.6%).
PennStakes.com wondered which big PA cities tend to be forgotten the most. A quiz on Sporcle.com asked respondents to fill in the blanks for the top 10 most populous cities in PA. We then ranked the cities based on the percentage of people who remembered them within the quiz’s time limit.
Top 10 Most Forgotten Populous Pennsylvania Cities
Rank | City | % Guessed Correctly |
1 | Bethlehem | 35.5% |
2 | York | 36.6% |
3 | Reading | 43.6% |
4 | Lancaster | 46.6% |
5 | Allentown | 62.1% |
6 | Erie | 65.6% |
7 | Scranton | 72.8% |
8 | Harrisburg | 83.0% |
9 | Pittsburgh | 96.1% |
10 | Philadelphia | 98.6% |
Which PA City Is Forgotten The Most?
While Bethlehem took home top honors this year in the race to be Pennsylvania’s most forgotten city, others like York, Reading, Lancaster and another Lehigh Valley hotspot (Allentown, at 62.1%) were among the others that cracked the Keystone State top 10 this year.
Throw in No. 6 Erie at 65.6% and four more Pennsylvania cities, in Scranton (72.8%), Harrisburg (83.0%), Pittsburgh (96.1%) and Philadelphia (98.6%) and you have the full rundown of the state’s most forgotten cities in 2025, though none of them could hold a candle to the town lovingly nicknamed Christmas City USA.
That’s because Bethlehem was the top city in Pennsylvania when it came to being forgotten about entirely, which is an honor that many in the greater Lehigh Valley would most likely long to forget.
USA Today photo by Eric Hartline.
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