Pennsylvania
Dingman Township, Pike County, Pennsylvania
Marker Inscription
Founded 1681 by William Penn as a Quaker Commonwealth. Birthplace of THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE and THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES.
Erected by Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission
The Story
In 1681 King Charles II granted William Penn a vast American territory to settle a debt, and Penn used it to launch a bold experiment in religious tolerance and self-government rooted in his Quaker faith. That founding vision helped make Philadelphia a natural cradle for the young republic: within a century the colony hosted the drafting of both the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution. This state-line marker greets travelers with that heritage as they enter Pennsylvania.
Why it matters
Pennsylvania's Quaker commitment to liberty of conscience shaped the founding documents that still define American democracy.
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Related people
- · William Penn
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Delaware Cemetery Veterans Memorial
Delaware Township, PA
This memorial stands in the Delaware Cemetery near Dingman's Ferry, a Delaware River hamlet in Pennsylvania's Pike County that grew up around one of the region's early ferry crossings. It was raised in 1982 by American Legion Post No. 851 — part of the veterans' organization chartered by Congress in 1919 in the wake of World War I — whose posts are customarily named for local servicemen, here Tilghman, Angle, and Smith. Rather than marking a single battle or soldier, the stone deliberately gathers 'all veterans' under one dedication, the kind of collective remembrance found in small-town cemeteries across America.
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The modern highway here traces an old Delaware Indian path that ran from Minisink Island on the river to the Wyoming Valley. Along it, in July 1778, terrified refugees fled the Massacre of Wyoming — a bloody Revolutionary War raid by Loyalist and allied Iroquois forces — pausing to camp beside a bubbling spring still visible in the woods nearby. The path carried both ancient travelers and the human wreckage of the frontier war.
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Lackawaxen Township, PA · est. 1948
On July 22, 1779, the Revolutionary War reached this stretch of the upper Delaware. Some 175 patriot militia attacked a force of roughly 300 Loyalists and allied Native fighters led by the Mohawk chief Joseph Brant, who was returning from raids on the New York frontier. The battle turned into a disaster for the settlers, most of whom were killed, while Brant slipped away.
Moody’s Raids
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