e-ReferenceDesk's College and 50 State Learning Resource Guide

Find Online Colleges

Find Campus Colleges

Pennsylvania State...

Pennsylvania

Choose a County

Adams, Allegheny, Armstrong, Beaver, Bedford, Berks, Blair, Bradford, Bucks, Butler, Cambria, Cameron, Carbon, Centre, Chester, Clarion, Clearfield, Clinton, Columbia, Crawford, Cumberland, Dauphin, Delaware, Elk, Erie, Fayette, Forest, Franklin, Fulton, Greene, Huntingdon, Indiana, Jefferson, Juniata, Lackawanna, Lancaster, Lawrence, Lebanon, Lehigh, Luzerne, Lycoming, McKean, Mercer, Mifflin, Monroe, Montgomery, Montour, Northampton, Northumberland, Perry, Philadelphia, Pike, Potter, Schuylkill, Snyder, Somerset, Sullivan, Susquehanna, Tioga, Union, Venango, Warren, Washington, Wayne, Westmoreland, Wyoming, York

Pennsylvania Counties

Click Image to Enlarge

Pennsylvania Counties

There are sixty-seven counties of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania in the United States of America. The city of Philadelphia is coterminous with Philadelphia County, and governmental functions have been consolidated since 1854.

Delaware County, Pennsylvania

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

County Seat: Media
Year Organized: 1789
Square Miles: 184

Court House:

201 West Front Street
County Government Center Building
Media, PA 19063-2708

Etymology - Origin of County Name

Named for the Delaware River, which in turn had been named for Lord de la Warr, governor of Virginia. Media

Demographics:

County QuickFacts: Census Bureau Quick Facts

County History

Created on September 6, 1789, from part of Chester County, and named for the Delaware River, which in turn had been named for Lord de la Warr, governor of Virginia. Media, its county seat since 1850, was incorporated as a borough on March 11, 1850, and named for its central location in the county. Chester, its original county seat, was the county seat of Chester County before 1788, and the temporary capital of Pennsylvania, 1681–1682, before Philadelphia was laid out. The county adopted a home rule charter in May 1975.

Delaware includes the first permanent European settlement, the Swedes on Tinicum Island in 1643. The center of the Battle of Brandywine in 1777 was in Delaware. Phenomenal population growth occurred steadily after 1800, until a fall off began in 1980. Its many fast streams made it a milling center for lumber, grains, paper, tobacco, and textiles, and it was located on main roads south and west from Philadelphia. Shipbuilding flourished, beginning in the colonial period, and oil refineries arose in the early twentieth century. Industrial jobs brought in a large immigrant population and from 1885 to 1915 middle class families from Philadelphia relocated here. Once a strong dairy and mushroom farm area, agriculture is now almost gone. Farms occupy only 7 percent of the land. There were Underground Railroad stations in Chester Borough, Upper Darby, and Newtown Square, and Martin Luther King Jr. was educated at Crozier Baptist Seminary. Colleges and universities include Swarthmore, Haverford, Villanova, Cheyney State, and Widener.

Geography

Delaware County is roughly diamond- or kite-shaped, with the four sides formed by the Chester County boundary to the northwest, the boundary with the state of Delaware (a portion of the "Twelve Mile Circle") to the southwest, the Delaware River (forming the border with the state of New Jersey to the southeast, and the city of Philadelphia and Montgomery County to the east and northeast.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of 191 square miles (494 km²), of which, 184 square miles (477 km²) of it is land and 7 square miles (17 km²) of it (3.42%) is water.

Neighboring Counties:

Montgomery County (north)
Philadelphia County (east)
Gloucester County, New Jersey (southeast)
New Castle County, Delaware (southwest)
Chester County (west)

Cities and Towns:

- Aldan	borough	Incorporated Area
- Aston	township
- Brookhaven	borough	Incorporated Area
- Chadds Ford	township
- Chester	city	Incorporated Area
- Chester Heights	borough	Incorporated Area
- Clifton Heights	borough	Incorporated Area
- Collingdale	borough	Incorporated Area
- Colwyn	borough	Incorporated Area
- Darby	borough	Incorporated Area
- East Lansdowne	borough	Incorporated Area
- Eddystone	borough	Incorporated Area
- Edgmont	township
- Folcroft	borough	Incorporated Area
- Glenolden	borough	Incorporated Area
- Haverford	township
- Lansdowne	borough	Incorporated Area
- Lawrence Park	township
- Lower Chichester	township
- Manor	borough	Incorporated Area
- Marcus Hook	borough	Incorporated Area
- Marple	township
- Media (County Seat)	borough	Incorporated Area
- Millbourne	borough	Incorporated Area
- Morton	borough	Incorporated Area
- Nether Providence	township
- Norwood	borough	Incorporated Area
- Parkside	borough	Incorporated Area
- Philadelphia	city	Incorporated Area
- Prospect Park	borough	Incorporated Area
- Ridley	township
- Ridley Park	borough	Incorporated Area
- Rose Valley	borough	Incorporated Area
- Rutledge	borough	Incorporated Area
- Sharon Hill	borough	Incorporated Area
- Springfield	township
- Swarthmore	borough	Incorporated Area
- Thornbury	township
- Tinicum	township
- Trainer	borough	Incorporated Area
- Upland	borough	Incorporated Area
- Upper Chichester	township
- Upper Darby	township
- Upper Providence	township
- Wayne	township
- Yeadon	borough	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."