The officially accepted history[citation needed] is that, in 1753, Captain Barnabas Hughes acquired land and laid out a town, naming it for his wife, Elizabeth.

The town was primarily agricultural until the early 1900s, when the Klein Chocolate Company (now part of Mars, Inc.) and several shoe factories, the last of which closed in 1979, opened.

[5] Kreider Shoe Manufacturing Company in Elizabethtown was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1980.

They are responsible for setting policy in every aspect of the borough, including budgeting, public works, zoning, and ordinances.

The mayor is elected to a four-year term and is responsible for overseeing the police department and performing ceremonial duties.

Pennsylvania Route 283, a four-lane freeway, touches the northeast boundary of the borough and provides access from an interchange with PA 743.

[10] The borough is drained primarily by Conoy Creek, which flows southwest to the Susquehanna River at Bainbridge.

The borough has a hot-summer humid continental climate (Dfa), and average monthly temperatures range from 30.1 °F (−1.1 °C) in January to 74.9 °F (23.8 °C) in July.

The Pennsylvania Department of Corrections Training Academy is located in Mount Joy Township, near Elizabethtown.

[12][13] Elizabethtown is home to Continental Press, White Oak Mills (an animal feed plant), Elizabethtown College, the Masonic Village, a large Mars Chocolate North America (a division of Mars, Incorporated) plant, Nordstrom’s east coast fulfillment center, and numerous smaller businesses.

Town newspaper Radio Elizabethtown is served by an Amtrak station, where all Keystone Service and Pennsylvanian trains stop.

[19][20] Elizabethtown hosts an annual fair to show off the local agriculture that has impacted the town since its founding.