First: foremost in place; preceeding all others in time;that which precedes everything else. From Middle English first/furst/fyrst, from Anglo Saxon, fyrst, superlative of before, "fore" and "est".

Reference: Webster's New Universal Unabridged Dictionary.

The image above is Stonehenge. It seems appropriate when considering the natural heritage of the Schuylkill River to also consider our cultural heritage. The word "first" itself is an old one, an Anglo Saxon word which we have used since the beginning of our Anglo-American culture. Stonehenge summons to mind an image of the not-quite-savages who were our forefathers - those that preceeded all others. (Of course, our modern society is made up of people with various cultural heritages, but the story of the Schuylkill is mostly one of Anglo dominance, so that's what's recorded here. It would be a great WWW project to document the influences of other cultures in the region!)

Here are some links to "firsts" related to watersheds, and to the Schuylkill in particular:

• The first inhabitants of the Schuylkill Valley
• Philadelphia's First Citizen
• The first covered bridge in America
  This is a beautiful site, but contains some very large graphics! Be prepared to wait!
• The first European to visit the Schuylkill
• The first Map of the Schuylkill
• The first trailblazers - the Lenni Lenape trails evolved into our highways

And here's a list of other firsts of the Schuylkill area:

• The Lenape Council House - a long, rectangular longhouse, used for public assembly - was the first government building in America.
• The first Europeans to visit the region were the Dutch. They came for reasons of commerce, seeking furs and other goods. They established trading posts at sites that are now Gloucester, New Jersey, Lewes, Delaware, and New Castle, Delaware.
• The first Swedish settlement was at Ft. Christina (now Wilmington). The Swedes also built the first gristmill in Pennsylvania, on the banks of Cobbs Creek. The oldest church in continuous use in the United States is Gloria Dei or Old Swedes' Church, also established by the Swedish settlers.
• The Finns were responsible for building the first log cabins in America.
• William Rittinghuysen (Rittenhouse), a Mennonite, built the first paper mill in America on a branch of the Wissahickon in 1690.
• Philadelphia was the site of the First Continental Congress in 1774.
• John Fitch (1743-1798) built the first steamboat in America.
• In 1792 first coal company in the region was formed. Anthracite was abundant in the mountains northwest of Phladelphia. The region is the site of the richest known deposits in the world.
• The first art school in America was founded in Philadelphia in 1805, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.
• In 1809 the first American theatre opened at Ninth and Walnut streets in Philadelphia. The area is still the "theatre district".
• Mathias W Baldwin (1795-1866) built "Old Ironsides", which had its first run on Nov 12, 1832. It was the first effective steam locomotive in North America. It ran a route along North Ninth Street in Philadelphia, and attained a speed of 30 mph.
• In 1825 the newly founded Franklin Institute offered a gold medal to the first person to smelt 20 tons of iron with unmixed anthracite coal. This proved to be an elusive goal, as the cold blast furnacesof the day just didn't heat the ore to a high enough temperature. The industrialists of the region knew that the combination of anthracite coal and iron ore could be a boon to the region if they could develop an anthracite furnace. Can you find out who won this prize?
• John Wannamaker (1838-1922), a Philadelphian, founded the first department store in America.
• In 1861, two years after Edward Drake found oil at Titusville, Pennsylvania, the first oil to be exported from America left on the 224 ton brig Elizabeth Watts, headed for England.
• The Philadelphia Zoological Garden was the first Zoo in the United Staes, founded in 1874.
• By 1889 the United States was first in the world in steel production. It was a natural industry for the region, as so much coal and iron ore were readily available. At that time the mills of the Schuylkill and Delaware Valleys were major suppliers of steel to the world. Some historic mills were at Bethlehem, Chester, Coatesville, Morrisville, Philadelphia and Phoenixville.
• Fairmount Park, the world's largest landscaped park, was host to many firsts in its' almost 200 year history - the first Botanical Garden, the first Children's Zoo, the first Paper Mill, the first Gin Mill, the first suspension bridge, the first public water works, the first computerized water system, the first public drinking fountain, the first international youth hostel, and the first environmental education center....

References:

• Anderson, Florence S. and Kathryn Fields Bovaird. The Delaware Valley and River.
• Klein, Esther M.Fairmount Park.
• Nolan, J. Bennet. The Schuylkill.
• Wallace, Anthony F.C.St. Clair: A Nineteenth-Century Coal Town's Experience with a Disaster-Prone Industry.

Back to: The Schuylkill River