Delaware History Facts

```mediawiki Delaware holds a distinctive place in American history as the first state to ratify the United States Constitution, earning it the nickname "The First State." Located on the Mid-Atlantic coast, Delaware is bordered by Pennsylvania to the north, New Jersey to the northeast across the Delaware River, Maryland to the west and south, and the Atlantic Ocean to the east. The state comprises three counties: New Castle in the north, Kent in the center, and Sussex in the south. Delaware covers approximately 1,982 square miles of total area, with a land area of roughly 1,954 square miles, making it the second-smallest state by area after Rhode Island. Delaware's population reached 989,948 in the 2020 U.S. Census, and estimates by 2023 placed it above one million residents — making it one of the most densely populated states in the nation, not one of the least. The state's history spans from Indigenous Lenape and Nanticoke settlements through European colonization by Swedish, Dutch, and English settlers, the American Revolution, and its evolution into a modern center of commerce and corporate law. Today, Delaware serves as a major hub for corporate business due to its favorable legal climate, with more than 60% of Fortune 500 companies incorporated within its borders, while maintaining significant historical sites and cultural institutions that reflect its colonial and Revolutionary War heritage.

History

Indigenous Peoples

Long before European contact, the region now called Delaware was home to two principal Indigenous nations: the Lenape and the Nanticoke. The Lenape, also known as the Delaware people, occupied territory throughout the Delaware River valley and much of present-day New Jersey and eastern Pennsylvania. They lived in semi-permanent villages, practiced agriculture alongside hunting and fishing, and organized themselves into loosely affiliated clans. The Nanticoke occupied the southern portions of the Delmarva Peninsula, including much of present-day Sussex County. European colonization brought devastating disruption through disease, displacement, and treaty dispossession; by the 18th century, most Lenape had been pushed westward, eventually settling in Ohio, Indiana, Kansas, and Oklahoma. The Delaware Tribe of Indians and the Delaware Nation, both federally recognized tribes, trace their ancestry directly to the original inhabitants of the Delaware River valley.

Colonial Era

Delaware's recorded European history begins with the arrival of Henry Hudson in 1609, sailing under Dutch sponsorship, followed by English captain Samuel Argall, who named Delaware Bay and the river after Thomas West, the third Baron De La Warr and governor of Virginia. The first permanent European settlement was established by Swedish colonists in 1638 at Fort Christina, located at the confluence of the Christina River and the Delaware River, at the site of present-day Wilmington. The settlement, known as New Sweden, remained small but introduced horizontal log construction techniques to North America — a building method that Swedish and Finnish settlers had practiced in Scandinavia and that spread widely through the American frontier in subsequent centuries.

New Sweden changed hands when Dutch forces under Peter Stuyvesant captured the colony in 1655, incorporating it into the Dutch territory of New Netherland. English forces then seized the region in 1664, making it part of the Duke of York's proprietary holdings. In 1681, King Charles II granted William Penn a charter for Pennsylvania, and Penn received the "Lower Counties on the Delaware" — essentially present-day Delaware — as a separate grant in 1682 from the Duke of York. The Lower Counties operated under Pennsylvania's proprietorship but maintained a separate assembly beginning in 1704. They remained under Penn family proprietorship until declaring independence in 1776, at which point Delaware established itself as a fully independent state with its own government, though for practical purposes it had functioned as a distinct political unit for decades before that.

Revolutionary War and Constitutional Ratification

Delaware played an outsized role in the founding of the United States relative to its size. Caesar Rodney (1728–1784), one of Delaware's three delegates to the Continental Congress, made his famous overnight ride from Dover to Philadelphia on July 1–2, 1776, arriving in time to cast Delaware's decisive vote in favor of independence — breaking a two-to-one deadlock among the state's delegates and helping secure the unanimous adoption of the Declaration of Independence. Rodney rode approximately 80 miles through a summer storm despite suffering from asthma and facial cancer, and his ride has since become one of the enduring stories of the Revolutionary era. He signed the Declaration of Independence alongside Thomas McKean and George Read. Delaware's state quarter, issued in 1999, depicts Rodney on horseback in commemoration of the ride.

On December 7, 1787, Delaware became the first state to ratify the United States Constitution, with a unanimous vote of 30–0 at a convention in Dover. The speed and unanimity of Delaware's ratification reflected both the state's small size — which stood to benefit from equal representation in the Senate — and broad agreement among its delegates that a stronger federal government was necessary. Delaware's early and decisive action opened the ratification process for the remaining states. During the war itself, Delaware contributed the Delaware Regiment to the Continental Army, a unit that earned a reputation for discipline and endurance at engagements including the Battle of Long Island in 1776, where the regiment suffered heavy losses while helping cover Washington's retreat. The regiment's performance earned Delaware soldiers the nickname "Blue Hen's Chickens," a reference to fighting gamecocks allegedly carried by the regiment's officers — a name that eventually gave Delaware the Blue Hen Chicken as its state bird.

19th Century: Industrialization and the Civil War Era

The 19th century transformed Delaware from an agricultural society into an industrial one. The change began in 1802, when Eleuthère Irénée du Pont de Nemours, a French immigrant and trained chemist, established a black powder mill along the Brandywine River near Wilmington. The E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company grew steadily throughout the century, supplying gunpowder for the War of 1812, the Mexican-American War, and the Civil War. By the late 19th century, the company had become one of the largest industrial enterprises in the United States, and the Du Pont family's wealth and influence permeated Delaware's politics, economy, and civic institutions in ways that persisted well into the 20th century. Wilmington grew alongside the company, attracting immigrant workers from Ireland, Italy, Poland, and other countries, and developing into a significant manufacturing center for ships, railroad cars, leather goods, and chemicals.

Delaware occupied an ambiguous position during the Civil War. A slave state that never seceded, it supplied soldiers to both the Union and Confederate armies, though its official stance was Unionist. Slavery had diminished considerably in Delaware by 1860 — the state's enslaved population was less than 1,800 — but the institution remained legal there until the Thirteenth Amendment abolished it nationally in 1865. Delaware was one of only two states to reject the Thirteenth Amendment when it was submitted for ratification; the state legislature didn't formally ratify it until 1901. Fort Delaware on Pea Patch Island in the Delaware River served as a Union military prison during the war, holding Confederate prisoners of war under harsh conditions. Pea Patch Island takes its name from local folklore: one story holds that a ship carrying a cargo of peas ran aground on a shoal in the river, and the peas sprouted and accumulated silt until they formed an island. Whether true or not, the story has circulated in the region for generations.

Patty Cannon and Delaware's History of Slavery

One of the darkest chapters in Delaware's history involves Patty Cannon, a criminal who operated along the Delaware-Maryland border in the early 19th century. Cannon ran a gang that kidnapped both enslaved Black people who had escaped to freedom and free Black residents of Delaware and Maryland, transporting them south to be sold into slavery. Her tavern and house straddled the state line between Delaware and Maryland in the area of Johnson's Crossroads (present-day Reliance), a location chosen deliberately because it allowed her to evade law enforcement by slipping across the border when authorities from one state approached. The gang's crimes included murder; human remains were discovered buried on Cannon's property after her arrest in 1829.

Cannon died in jail in Georgetown, Delaware, in 1829, before she could be tried, reportedly by self-administered poison. Her skull was preserved and eventually donated to the Delaware State Archives; for decades it was kept at the Dover Public Library, reportedly stored in a pink hat box, where it was occasionally displayed. The skull was later removed from public exhibition due to legal restrictions on displaying human remains. In Sussex County, Cannon's name was used for generations as a cautionary figure — local parents reportedly warned children that Patty Cannon would take them if they misbehaved. A residential development in Sussex County was at one point named after her, a naming choice that drew criticism in later years. Her story remains a significant, if often overlooked, part of Delaware's history of slavery and racial violence.

Geography

Delaware's location on the Mid-Atlantic coast has shaped its development throughout its history. The state lies between 38° and 40° north latitude and extends approximately 96 miles from north to south while averaging only 30 miles in width. The Delaware River and Delaware Bay form the state's eastern boundary, serving as crucial waterways for commerce since the colonial period. The Atlantic coast extends roughly 28 miles of ocean-facing shoreline, backed by barrier islands, marshlands, and sandy beaches that draw visitors from across the Mid-Atlantic region.

Delaware's northern boundary with Pennsylvania follows the arc of the "Twelve-Mile Circle," a curved boundary drawn at a radius of twelve miles from the courthouse in New Castle — one of the few curved state boundaries in the United States. This unusual border dates to the original colonial land grants and creates New Castle County's distinctive shape. The state's terrain is predominantly flat, part of the Atlantic Coastal Plain, with the highest point reaching 448 feet above sea level at Ebright Azimuth in New Castle County. The northern portion of the state, where the Piedmont physiographic province meets the Coastal Plain, has slightly more rolling terrain than the flat southern counties.

The Delaware Bay, formed by the Delaware River estuary, creates critical habitat for migratory shorebirds, particularly during the annual horseshoe crab spawning season in May and June, when tens of thousands of red knots, ruddy turnstones, and other shorebirds stop along Delaware Bay beaches to feed on crab eggs. The Brandywine and Christina Rivers in northern Delaware historically powered dozens of mills and continue to shape Wilmington's geography. The Chesapeake and Delaware Canal, completed in 1829 and subsequently widened and deepened over the following century, cuts across the northern Delaware peninsula connecting the two bays and remains one of the busiest waterways in the nation for commercial shipping.

The state is divided into three counties that differ significantly in character. New Castle County in the north is the most urbanized, containing Wilmington — the state's largest city — along with the state's major corporate and financial infrastructure. Kent County in the center is home to Dover, the state capital, and maintains a more agricultural and small-city character. Sussex County in the south is the largest county by area and the fastest-growing, driven by beach tourism and a substantial poultry industry. Locals sometimes refer to Sussex and lower Kent County as "Lower Slower" — a phrase that captures the region's more relaxed, rural character compared to the congested north.

Lewes, Delaware's oldest city, sits at the mouth of Delaware Bay in Sussex County. The city's name is pronounced "Loo-iss" — not "Lewis" or "Leez" — following the pronunciation of Lewes, the English town in East Sussex after which it was named. The mismatch between spelling and pronunciation catches many visitors off-guard. Lewes was established in 1631 by Dutch colonists under David de Vries, making it the site of the first European settlement in Delaware, though that original settlement was destroyed by the Lenape the following year. The town later developed under English rule and today preserves a number of colonial and Federal-period buildings.

Delaware's climate is humid subtropical in the south and humid continental in the north, with average temperatures ranging from roughly 35°F in winter to 75°F in summer. The state's low elevation and coastal exposure make it vulnerable to Atlantic hurricanes, nor'easters, and rising seas. Sea-level rise poses a particular threat to Sussex County's barrier beaches and Delaware Bay shoreline marshes, which face increased flooding and erosion.

Economy

Delaware's modern economy rests on an unusual foundation: corporate law. The state's General Corporation Law, first enacted in its modern form in 1899, offers companies a flexible legal framework, a specialized court system called the Court of Chancery that handles corporate disputes without juries, and a well-developed body of case law that provides predictability for businesses. As a result, more than 60% of Fortune 500 companies are incorporated in Delaware, regardless of where their physical operations are located. Incorporation fees and corporate franchise taxes generated approximately $1.3 billion in fiscal year 2022, representing roughly a quarter of the state's total revenue — a remarkable figure for a state of Delaware's size. This legal advantage has made Delaware less dependent on traditional manufacturing than neighboring states and given it a fiscal stability unusual among small states.

Traditional economic sectors remain important. Sussex County's poultry industry is the largest agricultural sector in the state, producing hundreds of millions of dollars in broiler chickens annually. Companies including Perdue Farms and Mountaire Farms maintain significant operations in Sussex County, and the poultry industry is the dominant employer in parts of the county. Agriculture in Delaware also includes grain cultivation, soybean production, and vegetable farming. The state's nursery and greenhouse industry has grown in recent decades as suburban development in New Castle County created demand for landscaping products.

Tourism, driven primarily by Sussex County's beaches, represents another major economic sector. Rehoboth Beach, known as the "Nation's Summer Capital" due to its proximity to Washington, D.