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Kent, New Castle, Sussex

Delaware Counties

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Delaware Counties

Delaware has three counties: New Castle, Kent, and Sussex, the fewest Counties of any U.S. state. The origin of the county boundaries go back to former court districts. The powers of the counties' legislative bodies are limited to issues such as zoning and development.

Kent County, Delaware

Kent County History, Geography, Demographics, Cities and Towns, and Education

County Seat: Dover
Year Organized: 1680
Square Miles: 591

Court House:

555 Bay Road
County Administrative Complex
Dover, DE 19901-0000

Etymology - Origin of County Name

Kent was named in 1682 by William Penn for the English county of Kent.

Demographics:

County QuickFacts: Census Bureau Quick Facts

County History

Kent County is one of three counties in the small state of Delaware (only Rhode Island is smaller). In about 1670 Englishmen began to settle in the valley of the St. Jones river formally known as Wolf Creek.

Originally part of the Hoornkill district court established by the Dutch Governor Colve in 1673. Hoornkill was divided into Saint Jones County and Deal County in 1680.

William Penn chartered Kent County as the Successor to St. Jones. Penn ordered a court town to be layed out, and the courthouse was built in 1697. The town of Dover was finally layed out in 1717, and became the capitol of Delaware in 1777. In 1787 Delaware was first to ratify the U.S. Constitution, and became "the First State." Kent County was a small grain farming region in the 18th Century.

Geography

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of 800 square miles (2,072 km²), of which, 590 square miles (1,527 km²) of it is land and 210 square miles (545 km²) of it (26.30%) is water.

Neighboring Counties:

New Castle County, Delaware - north
Salem County, New Jersey - northeast
Cumberland County, New Jersey - east
Cape May County, New Jersey - east
Sussex County, Delaware - south
Caroline County, Maryland - southwest
Queen Anne's County, Maryland - west
Kent County, Maryland - west
Delaware Bay; no land border

Cities and Towns:

- Bowers	town	Incorporated Area
- Camden	town	Incorporated Area
- Cheswold	town	Incorporated Area
- Clayton	town	Incorporated Area
- Dover (County Seat)	city	Incorporated Area
- Farmington	town	Incorporated Area
- Felton	town	Incorporated Area
- Frederica	town	Incorporated Area
- Harrington	city	Incorporated Area
- Hartly	town	Incorporated Area
- Houston	town	Incorporated Area
- Kenton	town	Incorporated Area
- Leipsic	town	Incorporated Area
- Little Creek	town	Incorporated Area
- Magnolia	town	Incorporated Area
- Smyrna	town	Incorporated Area
- Viola	town	Incorporated Area
- Woodside	town	Incorporated Area
- Wyoming	town	Incorporated Area

County Resources:

Enter County Resources and Information Here

County Resources

The history of our nation was a prolonged struggle to define the relative roles and powers of our governments: federal, state, and local. And the names given the counties, our most locally based jurisdictions, reflects the "characteristic features of this country!"

But age, size and colorful names of our counties isn't the only reason to explore counties' role in American history, or the history of county government itself. In fact, the story of county government reflects the larger meanings of American history.

Today's counties are the most flexible, locally responsive and creative governments in the US. They are the most diverse, varying in size, population, geography, and governmental structure. In their politics and policies, they express a 1990's political slogan "Think globally, act locally."