The Delaware: A National Treasure

The Delaware: A National Treasure. Delaware River Heritage Trail. , The 330-mile Delaware River is the longest free-flowing river east of the Mississippi River is the longest free-flowing river east of the Mississippi River. Its watershed drains an area of 14,119 square miles in four states. This nationally important corridor has been a major factor in the region's settlement and its subsequent economic and cultural history. It is also a critical natural resource. Nearly 20 million people rely on it for their drinking water, and it is a vital habitat for wildlife, including migrating birds. Millions of residents and visitors enjoy the river's remarkable scenic and recreational resources., The Delaware's pristine waters supported a thriving commerce in fishing and transportation and supplied fresh water to the many towns and industries which developed along its banks. For more than four hundred years it was a resource people took for granted. By the 1960s, unchecked growth, habitat destruction and pollution were destroying the river. Public outcry led to enactment of sweeping environmental protection laws and remediation efforts, as well as greater vigilance and citizen activism. These actions resulted in cleaner waters and increased recreational use, however environmental threats continue and some native species remain in peril. In the 1990s, the section of the river above Trenton to the Delaware Water Gap, the 'Lower Delaware', was designated as a National Wild and Scenic River, a Federal designation reserved for less than one percent of the nation's waterways., Indigenous peoples have lived beside the river for thousands of years. On early maps the river is shown simply as South River and the area remained a wilderness, known only to a few explorers, soldiers and traders. When England gained control of West Jersey in the 1660s, the river was named Delaware in honor of Baron De la Warr, a colonial baron. Immigrants from the British Isles, often fleeing religious persecution, began to arrive in great numbers. Bordentown was known in the 1680s as Farnsworth's Landing by an English farmer, is one of the Colony of West Jersey's important early river ports, along with Burlington and Trent's Town, now Trenton., Due to its strategic location along early roads and at the confluence of the river and Crosswicks Creek, Bordentown became an important transportation and cultural center for two centuries. It was home to a number of famous residents including Francis Hopkinson, Thomas Paine, Joseph Bonaparte, Clara Barton and Commodore Charles Stewart, as well as notable artists. Bordentown Beach is the site of the once bustling town wharves. The beach was created in the 1930s with dredge spoils from the river's navigation channel., [Captions:] , Karl Bodmer's View on the Delaware, near Bordentown, 1832, engraving by Ch. Vogel. A coach and delivery wagon hurry to meet the steamboat at Bordentown landing. Bodmer painted this scene near the Bonaparte estate. Credit: The Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Collection, Atlantic Sturgeon (Acipenser oxyrhynchus) , The Delaware River once supported the largest spawning population of Atlantic Sturgeon in North America. They are now listed as endangered under the federal Endangered Species Act. Atlantic sturgeon can reach lengths in excess of 10 feet and weigh several hundred pounds. The eggs, or roe, are a famous delicacy known as Atlantic caviar. Credit: Original illustration by Ellen Edmonson and Hugh Chrisp for 1927-1940 New York Biological Survey. Image courtesy of Cornell University and NYS DEC. . This historical marker is in Bordentown in Burlington County New Jersey