For Everything, There's a Season

The booming peach industry of the 1860s and 1870s contributed to the area’s agricultural achievement. Grain, grown on the uplands, and tomatoes were the predominant crops. It appeared that Port Penn might finally achieve the success boosters like Dr. Stewart had envisioned almost a century earlier.

However, a series of natural and man-made events hindered Port Penn’s progress. A damaging peach blight, construction of the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal, and the opening of the Delaware Railroad reduced Port Penn’s ability to compete as a port town. The town of Delaware City developed at the mouth of the C & D Canal and produce shipped via railroad bypassed Port Penn’s once bustling harbor. Though Port Penn lost its role as a vital port, it continued to slowly develop and remained dependent on the abundant river resources which are still an integral part of the local life-style.

Through the end of the 19th century, Port Penn’s population continued to increase. Maritime, agricultural and manufacturing jobs were equally distributed among the workforce. A balance was struck where each Port Penner engaged in a combination of activities for survival.

During this period, Port Penn’s harbor became the destination of popular boating excursions. Trips from the city on streamers like the Cleo and the Thomas Clyde were an elite and fashionable form of leisure. An 1888 advertisement states, “Forty miles for 30 cents. Fine fishing and good bathing, an elegant grove with tables at Augustine Park.” Picnic grounds, bath houses and piers dotted the coastline. These leisure seekers also stopped in Port Penn to join fishing and hunting parties. Summer colonies and camp meeting grounds developed to serve the urban clientele.

Despite this period’s population growth and flourishing leisure industry, detrimental events plagued Port Penn again. Great storms in 1870 and 1930 damaged the coastline and flooded reclaimed marsh land. Overfishing, pollution, erosion, silting and industrialization affected Port Penn’s water resources. It appeared that Port Penn’s life blood, its abundant water resources, might never return to normal.

Although a significant segment of domestic trapping, fishing and boat building occupations were eliminated, Port Penners continued these as supplemental activities.

Twentieth Century Port Penn

Time has seen improvements in the area’s water quality. Many species of fish are beginning to return. As before, the people of Port Penn continue their traditional lifeways tied to fishing, hunting and trapping. However, Port Penn’s view of the Delaware River is no longer filled with small market-bound sailboats, commercial fishermen or Victorian excursion boats. The nuclear generating stations, across the river in New Jersey, dominate the vista. Nonetheless, despite intensive industrialization on the Delaware River, Port Penn has carved a unique niche in the landscape.