Warriors Path
Union Township, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania
Marker Inscription
This Indian path intersects here. It led from the Great Island (Lock Haven) past the Indian town of Muncy, and then it followed the gap between these mountains to join the Great Warriors Path at Shickshinny. This path was used by Count Zinzendorf in 1742 after leaving Otstonwakin (Montoursville). There he had met with Madame Montour to secure her help in introducing the gospel to tribes under her influence.
Erected by Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission
The Story
Long before roads crossed these ridges, Native travelers moved along well-worn footpaths, and one of them intersected here — running from the Great Island at present-day Lock Haven, past the Indian town of Muncy, and through a mountain gap to meet the Great Warriors Path at Shickshinny. In 1742 the Moravian leader Count Zinzendorf followed this route after meeting Madame Montour at Otstonwakin, seeking her influence to bring Christian missions to the region's tribes.
Why it matters
These Indigenous trails were the original transportation network of the eastern woodlands, and this junction marks where Native geography and early European missionary efforts intersected in colonial Pennsylvania.
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Related people
- · Count Zinzendorf
- · Madame Montour
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Wapwallopen
Conyngham Township, PA · est. 1948
Near the mouth of Wapwallopen Creek once stood a Native town at a crossroads of ancient travel. Here the great foot routes of the region converged—the paths linking the Wyoming Valley, the north–south "Warrior's Path," and the trails reaching toward the Juniata and West Branch Susquehanna valleys. Long before roads and rails, such junctions made a place important, funneling trade, migration, and war parties through a single point.
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Lehigh Path
Dennison Township, PA · est. 2001
Long before roads crossed these mountains, a Native American footpath threaded through this rugged country, one strand in a network of trails linking villages of the Delaware and Susquehanna watersheds. The Lehigh Path ran from the Forks of the Delaware near present-day Easton northwestward to the Wyoming Valley on the Susquehanna near Wilkes-Barre. The Lenni-Lenape and Susquehannock traveled its steep grades until roughly 1800, when European settlement finally displaced the old ways of moving through the land.
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