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Pennsylvania Counties

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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.

Luzerne County, Pennsylvania

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

County Seat: Wilkes-Barre
Year Organized: 1786
Square Miles: 891

Court House:

200 North River Street
County Courthouse
Wilkes Barre, PA 18711-1004

Etymology - Origin of County Name

Named for the Chevalier de la Luzerne, French minister to the United States.

Demographics:

County QuickFacts: Census Bureau Quick Facts

County History

Created on September 25, 1786 from part of Northumberland County and named for the Chevalier de la Luzerne, French minister to the United States. Wilkes-Barre, the county seat, was laid out in 1772 and named for two members of the English Parliament, John Wilkes and Isaac Barre, both advocates of American rights. It was incorporated as a borough on March 17, 1806 and as a city on May 4, 1871.

Pennsylvania settlers, Indians, and a Connecticut settlement company engaged in a three-way struggle for the Wyoming Valley. The Yankee Pennamite Wars were fought here from 1769 to 1782. In 1786 Connecticut's acceptance of the federal award to Pennsylvania allowed Pennsylvania to form the county, and a 1799 statute compromised the land titles claimed by Connecticut families. Led by the Delaware, "King" Teedyuscung, Indians committed the first Wyoming Massacre of settlers on Oct. 15, 1763; with British assistance Indians perpetrated the second Wyoming Massacre on July 3, 1778. In 1808, Judge Fell proved anthracite coal's burning potential, and in 1834 the North Branch Canal began to make coal exporting practical. Many canals and railroads followed, and Luzerne's two anthracite fields flourished. In time the city of Scranton rivaled Wilkes Barre, which led to the creation of Lackawanna County in 1887. Textiles and metal products manufacturing developed. Textile factories depended on miners' families for their laborers. Coal strikes of 1902 and 1925–1926 were so bitter that consumers sought alternate fuels, and mining declined. World War II revived anthracite prices, but the Knox Mine disaster of January 22, 1959, was the death knell of deep anthracite mining. Presently, Luzerne produces about one-fourth of the anthracite coal in the state, mostly by surface operations. Economically, the county has had heavy unemployment since World War II, although new mining machines had made mining labor-efficient long before the market diminished in the 1960s. Only about one-eighth of Luzerne is farmed; harvested crops are more valuable than animal products, especially potatoes.

Geography

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of 907 square miles (2,349 km²), of which, 891 square miles (2,307 km²) of it is land and 16 square miles (42 km²) of it (1.80%) is water. The Wyoming Valley in the North and Mid part of the county is flat at the Susquehanna Basin and rises from 700 feet to 2000 feet in some places. Bear Creek, on the eastern side of the valley, has a mean elevation of about 2000 feet, while Pittston, on the Susquehanna Basin, is about 700 feet.

Neighboring Counties:

Wyoming County (north)
Lackawanna County (northeast)
Monroe County (east)
Carbon County (southeast)
Schuylkill County (south)
Columbia County (west)
Sullivan County (northwest)

Cities and Towns:

- Ashley	borough	Incorporated Area
- Avoca	borough	Incorporated Area
- Bear Creek	borough
- Black Creek	township
- Conyngham	borough	Incorporated Area
- Courtdale	borough	Incorporated Area
- Dallas	borough	Incorporated Area
- Dennison	township
- Dorrance	township
- Dupont	borough	Incorporated Area
- Duryea	borough	Incorporated Area
- Edwardsville	borough	Incorporated Area
- Exeter	borough	Incorporated Area
- Fairmount	township
- Forty Fort	borough	Incorporated Area
- Foster	township
- Freeland	borough	Incorporated Area
- Harveys Lake	borough	Incorporated Area
- Hazle	township
- Hazleton	city	Incorporated Area
- Hollenback	township
- Hughestown	borough	Incorporated Area
- Hunlock	township
- Huntington	township
- Jeddo	borough	Incorporated Area
- Jenkins	township
- Kingston	borough	Incorporated Area
- Laflin	borough	Incorporated Area
- Lake	township
- Larksville	borough	Incorporated Area
- Laurel Run	borough	Incorporated Area
- Lehman	township
- Luzerne	borough	Incorporated Area
- Nanticoke	city	Incorporated Area
- Nescopeck	borough	Incorporated Area
- New Columbus	borough	Incorporated Area
- Nuangola	borough	Incorporated Area
- Penn Lake Park	borough	Incorporated Area
- Pittston	city	Incorporated Area
- Plains	township
- Plymouth	borough	Incorporated Area
- Pringle	borough	Incorporated Area
- Rice	township
- Ross	township
- Salem	township
- Shickshinny	borough	Incorporated Area
- Slocum	township
- Sugar Notch	borough	Incorporated Area
- Sugarloaf	township
- Swoyersville	borough	Incorporated Area
- Union	township
- Warrior Run	borough	Incorporated Area
- West Hazleton	borough	Incorporated Area
- West Pittston	borough	Incorporated Area
- West Wyoming	borough	Incorporated Area
- White Haven	borough	Incorporated Area
- Wilkes-Barre (County Seat)	city	Incorporated Area
- Wright	township
- Wyoming	borough	Incorporated Area
- Yatesville	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."