Delanco History

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After the time of the Lenni Lenape and the coming of settlers from Sweden, Belgium and England, our land was farmed by peaceful Quakers; hard-working fishermen, farmers and boat-builders who needed a way to ship produce to markets in Philadelphia. The Rancocas was a hiding place for American ships during the American Revolution and the War of 1812. When steamboats came to the Rancocas Creek in 1824, the settlement here was known as Wallace’s Landing. It was renamed Rancocas Crossing when the C&A railroad completed a drawbridge here in 1834. Richard Wilmerton built his steam-powered sawmill here and the Fletcher family established a vineyard and winery here in 1848. The town was renamed Dela-Ranco or Delanco about 1848 by its founder Richard Wilmerton, the names coming from the Delaware River and Rancocas Creek. It was a planned community with a village green and a main street running from the 1850 steamboat wharf on the Delaware to the train platform on the creek. Philadelphia industrialists built summer homes on the bank of the Delaware.

 

Inventor Brutus de Villeroi tested his “Alligator” submarine on the Rancocas in 1859 just prior to the Civil War. Its successor became the US Navy’s first commissioned submarine. We established local commerce and industry even as we served as a bedroom community for the factories of the Delaware Valley. Shipyards were built on the Rancocas. The Ridgway brothers built a leatherworks and a shoe factory here in the 1890s. Theophilus Zurbrugg built his watch case factory in Riverside and a mansion in Delanco. Artisans arrived to work in the factories. Homes, schools and churches were built. Originally a part of Wellingborough, then Beverly Townships, Delanco was officially recognized in 1926 following a public referendum. Delanco’s sons and daughters have fought in every American conflict since the Revolution.