Muckinipattis Creek or Muckinipates Creek is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline data
The National Map
accessed April 1, 2011 creek which runs through

Delaware County, Pennsylvania Delaware County, colloquially referred to as Delco, is a county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. With a population of 576,830 as of the 2020 census, it is the fifth-most populous county in Pennsylvania and the third=smallest in area. Del ...

and enters Darby Creek just prior to the Delaware River. The creek is believed to begin with two branches, one in Springfield Township and the other on the southwest corner of Springfield Road and Bishop Avenue. The Muckinipattis then proceeds past the Primos-Secane swim club in

Upper Darby Township Upper Darby Township, often shortened to Upper Darby, is a home rule township in Delaware County, Pennsylvania. The township borders Philadelphia, the nation's sixth most populous city as of 2020 with 1.6 million residents. As of the 2020 cen ...

. Further downstream it flows under the former A&P parking lot in Secane before forming the border of Darby and Ridley townships. It empties into Darby Creek between the shores of Montgomery Park in the borough of Folcroft and the historic

Morton Morton House Morton Morton House, also known as the Morton Mortonson House and Morton and Lydia Morton House, is a historic home located at Norwood, Delaware County, Pennsylvania at the confluence of the Muckinipattis Creek and Darby Creek. It was built a ...

in Norwood. The name ''Muckinipates'' derives from a Lenape word meaning 'deep running water'. The Otter and Turtle tribes within the

Lenni Lenape The Lenape (, , or Lenape , del, Lënapeyok) also called the Leni Lenape, Lenni Lenape and Delaware people, are an indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands, who live in the United States and Canada. Their historical territory inclu ...

nation lived and hunted along the creek, and had a small village on what today is Montgomery Park in Folcroft. The Old Mill, or Old Mill Dam, which today sits at the junction of Delmar Drive in Folcroft, South Avenue in Glenolden, and East Amosland in Norwood was built in 1775 by Thomas Shipley. The

gristmill A gristmill (also: grist mill, corn mill, flour mill, feed mill or feedmill) grinds cereal grain into flour and middlings. The term can refer to either the grinding mechanism or the building that holds it. Grist is grain that has been separat ...

was popular among grain farmers from as far away as

Delaware Delaware ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Maryland to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and New Jersey and the Atlantic Ocean to its east. The state takes its name from the adjacent Del ...

and

New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...

, who would operate barges called "one stickers" up the Muckinipattis to have their goods processed. The mill was at one time owned by John Morton, grandson of Morton Mortensen, and the deciding vote on the

Declaration of Independence A declaration of independence or declaration of statehood or proclamation of independence is an assertion by a polity in a defined territory that it is independent and constitutes a state. Such places are usually declared from part or all of th ...

. The mill was sold and re-purposed a number of times. It was a bobbin factory when it finally burned down in February 1899. The confluence of Muckinipattis Creek with Darby Creek is next to the

John Heinz National Wildlife Refuge at Tinicum The John Heinz National Wildlife Refuge at Tinicum is a 1000-acre (4.05 km2) National Wildlife Refuge in Philadelphia and Tinicum Township, Pennsylvania. Adjacent to Philadelphia International Airport, the refuge is designed to the largest ...

References

{{authority control Rivers of Pennsylvania Rivers of Delaware County, Pennsylvania Tributaries of Darby Creek (Pennsylvania)

Further reading

References