Pennypack Creek from Pennypack Trail in Pennypack Park

Fetter's Mill Village, Bryn Athyn, Iron Bridge 04

Pennypack Creek is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline data
The National Map
accessed April 1, 2011 creek in southeastern

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

. It runs southeast through lower

Bucks County Bucks County is a county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. As of the 2020 census, the population was 646,538, making it the fourth-most populous county in Pennsylvania. Its county seat is Doylestown. The county is named after the English ...

, eastern Montgomery County and the northeast section of

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

, before emptying into the

Delaware River The Delaware River is a major river in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. From the meeting of its branches in Hancock (village), New York, Hancock, New York, the river flows for along the borders of N ...

Name

The creek draws its name from the

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 includ ...

word ''pënëpèkw'' meaning "downward-flowing water" or "deep, dead water; water without much current." Early cartographers gave various spellings for the name, including Pennishpaska, La Riviere de Pennicpacka, and Pennishpacha Kyl. In early Swedish patents it was called Pemipacka.

Thomas Holme Thomas Holme (1624–1695) was the first Surveyor General of Pennsylvania. He laid out the first and original plan for the city of Philadelphia. Holme was one of the Valiant Sixty, a group of early leaders and activists in the Religious Society ...

called it Dublin Creek, while in later maps it is called Pennypack and Pennepack.Philly H2O
"Changes in the Names of Streams In and About Philadelphia." ''Public Ledger Almanac: 1879''. Pages 3, 5, 7, 9, 11, & 13. (Accessed 2008-08-18)

Course

The Pennypack creek was first surveyed by

in 1687. The creek begins in two branches, one in

Horsham Horsham is a market town on the upper reaches of the River Arun on the fringe of the Weald in West Sussex, England. The town is south south-west of London, north-west of Brighton and north-east of the county town of Chichester. Nearby to ...

, the other in

Warminster Warminster () is an ancient market town with a nearby garrison, and civil parish in south west Wiltshire, England, on the western edge of Salisbury Plain. The parish had a population of about 17,000 in 2011. The 11th-century Minster Church of S ...

, joining in Bryn Athyn. The creek then flows through Lower Moreland, Abington and

Northeast Philadelphia Northeast Philadelphia, nicknamed Northeast Philly, the Northeast and the Great Northeast, is a section of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. According to the 2000 census, Northeast Philadelphia has a population of between 300,000 and 450,000, depending ...

Early use as an industrial waterway

Pennypack Creek was once the site of several mills. When

William Penn William Penn ( – ) was an English writer and religious thinker belonging to the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), and founder of the Province of Pennsylvania, a North American colony of England. He was an early advocate of democracy a ...

founded the

province of Pennsylvania The Province of Pennsylvania, also known as the Pennsylvania Colony, was a British North American colony founded by William Penn after receiving a land grant from Charles II of England in 1681. The name Pennsylvania ("Penn's Woods") refers to W ...

in 1682, the Pennypack valley was occupied by Swedish colonists, who continued to live as English settlement began. Penn ordered the first bridge built across the creek along the

King's Highway King's Highway or Kings Highway may refer to: Roads Australia * Kings Highway (Australia), connecting Queanbeyan to Batemans Bay Canada * King's Highways, an alternative designation for the primary provincial highway system in Ontario * King's ...

(now Frankford Avenue) in 1697; the bridge still stands. Despite the lack of navigability beyond the

Fall Line A fall line (or fall zone) is the area where an upland region and a coastal plain meet and is typically prominent where rivers cross it, with resulting rapids or waterfalls. The uplands are relatively hard crystalline basement rock, and the coa ...

(near the Frankford Avenue bridge), several early settlers built mills along the Pennypack, including Penn's "Pemmapecka Mill," built in 1701. The mills contributed to the growth of

Holmesburg Holmesburg began as a Village within Lower Dublin Township, Pennsylvania. It is now a neighborhood in the Northeast Philadelphia, Northeast section of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Holmesburg was named in Honor of Surveyor General of Pennsylvania Th ...

, the neighborhood near the mouth of the creek, and provided local farmers a place to sell their grain that was nearer than the city of Philadelphia. Fetter's Mill was added to the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...

in 1999.

Conversion to parkland

With the development of

steam power A steam engine is a heat engine that performs mechanical work using steam as its working fluid. The steam engine uses the force produced by steam pressure to push a piston back and forth inside a cylinder. This pushing force can be trans ...

in the

Industrial Revolution The Industrial Revolution was the transition to new manufacturing processes in Great Britain, continental Europe, and the United States, that occurred during the period from around 1760 to about 1820–1840. This transition included going f ...

, water power's influence on industry declined. As a result, many of the mills on the Pennypack closed, and by 1905 the land around it was acquired by the city for parkland. The creek now runs through

Pennypack Park Pennypack Park is a municipal park, part of the Philadelphia Parks & Recreation system located in Northeast Philadelphia in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. Established in 1905 by ordinance of the City of Philadelphia, it includes about of woodlan ...

in Philadelphia and

Lorimer Park Lorimer Park is a public park in Abington Township, Pennsylvania. The park, a bequest from George Horace Lorimer (long-time editor-in-chief of ''The Saturday Evening Post''), is connected to Pennypack Park in Philadelphia County, and the Pennypa ...

in Montgomery County. Segments of park trail help form the

East Coast Greenway The East Coast Greenway is a pedestrian and bicycle route between Maine and Florida along the East Coast of the United States. In 2020, the Greenway received over 50 million visits. The nonprofit East Coast Greenway Alliance was created in 1991. ...

, a 3,000 mile long trail system connecting Maine to Florida.

Historic bridges

Several historic bridges cross Pennypack Creek and its tributaries. *The

Frankford Avenue Bridge The Frankford Avenue Bridge, also known as the Pennypack Creek Bridge, the Pennypack Bridge, the Holmesburg Bridge, and the King's Highway Bridge, erected in 1697 in the Holmesburg section of Northeast Philadelphia, in the U.S. state of Pennsylvan ...

, a triple-span stone-arch bridge built in 1697, carries Frankford Avenue. It is the oldest stone bridge in the United States still in use. *The Fetters Mill Road Bridge, a Pratt through-truss bridge built in 1883, is still in use. *The Krewstown Road Bridge, a stone arch bridge built in 1800 and rehabilitated 1907, is still in use. *The Holme Avenue Bridge, a closed-spandrel concrete arch bridge built in 1918, is still in use. *The Roosevelt Boulevard Bridge, a closed-spandrel concrete arch bridge built in 1920, is still in use. *The

Holme Avenue Bridge The Holme Avenue Bridge is a closed-spandrel concrete arch bridge that carries Holme Avenue across Wooden Bridge Run (a tributary of Pennypack Creek) in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Owned by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania's Department of Transpor ...

, a closed-spandrel concrete arch bridge across Wooden Bridge Run built in 1921, is still in use. *The Ryan Avenue Bridge, a closed-spandrel concrete arch bridge over Sandy Run built in 1929, is still in use. *The Rhawn Street Bridges, two closed-spandrel concrete arches bridge built in 1930, are still in use.Rhawn Street Bridge
at bridgehunter.com

External links

U.S. Geological Survey: PA stream gaging stations
*
picture
of Pennypack Creek from Windows Live Local. This scene shows the creek as it flows beneath the bridge on Frankford Avenue in

, believed to be the oldest stone arch bridge in use in the United States. *
Friends of Pennypack Park
- from the Lincoln Cartledge Collection of the Historical Society of Frankford

(now part of Philadelphia: see

Act of Consolidation, 1854 The Act of Consolidation, more formally known as the act of February 2, 1854 (P.L. 21, No. 16), is legislation of the Pennsylvania General Assembly that created the consolidated City and County of Philadelphia, expanding the city's territory to ...

) * Headquartered at 2955 Edgehill Road in

Huntingdon Valley Huntingdon Valley is a village, as well as a suburban mailing address located in Lower Moreland Township, Upper Moreland Township and Abington Township all in Montgomery County, and in small sections of Upper Southampton Township and Lower S ...

, th
Pennypack Ecological Restoration Trust
manages the Pennypack Preserve which is open to the public and includes of pedestrian, equestrian, and bicycle trails.

References

{{authority control Rivers of Pennsylvania Tributaries of the Delaware River Rivers of Philadelphia Rivers of Montgomery County, Pennsylvania Rivers of Bucks County, Pennsylvania