Free Republic

The SS United States is facing eviction from its mooring at Pier 82 in Philadelphia in a lawsuit filed by Penn Warehousing, the pier’s landlord. The ocean liner has been rusting away in the Delaware River since 1996 but has a storied past. In 1952, it broke the once-highly sought record for the fastest transatlantic crossing, the last passenger ship to do so. The SS United States Conservancy, a non-profit attempting to restore the ship, admits that relocation will be necessary but is still aiming to preserve the vessel. The potential eviction stems from rent increases that could be against...

The City of Philadelphia issued an advisory to locals on Sunday that they should drink bottled water “out of caution” following a chemical spill in the nearby Delaware River. On Twitter, the city wrote that it is currently “responding to a spill of a latex product that occurred along a Delaware River tributary” and that “more information will be provided as it becomes available.” As of Sunday, it wrote that “no contaminants” were discovered in the city’s tap water but said that any potential contaminants would most likely be found at the Baxter Drinking Water Treatment Plant. “Out of an...

The remains of a dozen Revolutionary War soldiers who were killed in battle two centuries ago have been uncovered in a mass grave in New Jersey, scientists and officials said Tuesday. Researchers believe they have located the remains of as many as 12 Hessian soldiers — German troops hired by the British — in a field at Red Bank Battlefield Park along the Delaware River in Gloucester County. The remains were only discovered after a human femur was found back in June during a routine public archaeology dig at the site of the 1777 Battle of Red Bank. Further excavation...

WASHINGTON CROSSING, Pa. (AP) ” Thousands turned out Wednesday to watch the annual reenactment of George Washington’s daring Christmas Day crossing of the Delaware River in 1776 ” the first time the crossing was completed in three years. The event was scrapped because of bad weather the last two years, but historical interpreter Nancy O’Leary said at Washington Crossing Historical Park that the conditions this year ‘couldn’t be better.’ ‘We had lovely weather, and we probably had record attendance,’ said Jennifer Martin, executive director of the Friends of Washington Crossing Park. She estimated that 4,500 to 5,000 people were watching...

Natural gas developers in Pennsylvania are hoping a recent water quality report by the Susquehanna River Basin Commission could squelch plans for a fracking ban that’s currently being considered by the neighboring Delaware River Basin Commission. The SRBC’s Remote Water Quality Monitoring Network report, which was released last month, revealed that water quality scores at 14 of the 16 stations in the basin were in the “good” or “excellent” categories According to a fact sheet from the Susquehanna commission, the monitoring stations are located in areas where active drilling takes place, as well as areas free of development, in order...

The oldest standing log cabin the US - including George Washington-era artifacts - has been put on sale for $2.9 million. Nothnagle Log House was built around 1640 by Finnish settlers in the New Sweden Colony along the Delaware. The territory was taken over by the Dutch in 1655, but the magnificent 375-year-old oak cabin still stands in what is now New Jersey. It is owned and operated as a tour site by Harry Rink, 88, and his wife Doris, 75, of Greenwich Township. They are now looking for a buyer willing to accept their unique demands. The new owner...

On a rafting trip in early September, Christine Hutton, her husband, Richard, and a dozen of his corporate colleagues paddled to a flat, outcropped rock just a few miles from their push-off point at Jerry’s Three River Campground in Pond Eddy. The trip had been sluggish; the Delaware was at its lowest level in some 50 years, they’d been told. The group, in its triumvirate of rafts, stopped to have lunch. “One of our associates stepped out to a rock in the middle of the river, and picked up what looked like a stone tablet,” recalled Christine Hutton. It was...

HARRISBURG, PA. (JULY 23, 2015) — The Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission (PTC) recently approved toll rates for a cashless, nonstop tolling point for westbound motorists crossing the Delaware River Bridge from New Jersey into Pennsylvania on Interstate 276. E-ZPass customers, who make up more than 80 percent of traffic at the bridge, will pay $5 for a two-axle vehicle; non-E-ZPass customers will pay $6.75 via Pennsylvania Turnpike TOLL BY PLATE, a system that will take an image of the license plate and mail an invoice to the vehicle's owner. Each additional axle will cost an additional $5 for E-ZPass customers and...

This is part three of a 6-part 1997 PBS documentary on the Revolutionary War. The episode is titled "The Times That Try Men's Souls" (1776-1777). In addition to the Delaware River crossing and Hessian camp attack it also covers the British invasion of New York and subsequent Battle of Brooklyn, aka, The Battle of Long Island. "Days after the Declaration of Independence is signed, a British force arrives in New York harbor. Washington and his troops are driven to New Jersey. With only a few days of enlistment left for many of his volunteers, a desperate Washington leads his army...

Christmas morning dawned gloomy and cold over the rebel camp. The low, overcast sky promised drizzle, or worse, by afternoon. The temperature, hovering just above freezing the past few days, was now dropping rapidly. The weather conditions did not improve the mood of the soldiers who, having skewered chunks of meat with the ramrods from their flint-lock firearms, were squatting around low campfires preparing the morning's repast.  The general of this rag-tag army was cold too, but for the good of his men he tried not to let it show. Standing six feet, two inches tall and weighing nearly 220...

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — In a small survey boat, maritime archaeologist J. Lee Cox Jr. was checking the bottom of the Delaware River at the Sunoco Logistics pier in South Philadelphia when he got a hit on the side-scan sonar. A pipe? A log? A hazard to the oil tankers docking nearby? No one was sure until a diver was sent down weeks later and found a strange pointed object buried in the muck about 40 feet down. Earlier this month, Cox identified it as the business end of a cheval-de-frise, an iron-tipped log once embedded in the river, along with...

NATIONAL PARK -- Continental Army Col. Christopher Green withstood a Hessian force that outnumbered his troops five to one in the fall of 1777, but the monument to his memory has fallen prey to time, weather and skateboarders. Atop the seven-story-tall monument at Red Bank Battlefield, a Revolutionary soldier -- musket at the ready -- stands forever watching the Delaware River. Like his flesh-and-blood counterparts, the soldier looks in the wrong direction. As winter approached in 1777, the British had Philadelphia. Continental troops had put cheavaux de frise, pointed log devices that worked like giant riverborne punji spikes, into the...

The First Christmas Present to America - 1776 - The Revolution is saved at Trenton Ernest R. Bower | December 25, 2003 | Ernest R. Bower In the gloom of this holy Christmas night, a cold sleet fell. It was not a night for man nor beast but yet here they were. Huddled upon the banks of this frigid river, 2000 men contemplated their bleak fate. The past few months had gone very, very badly. Their hopes had been crushed time and again. The noble experiment in Liberty which had begun with such promise, had by this time deteriorated to...

In the gloom of this holy Christmas night, a cold sleet fell. It was not a night for man nor beast but yet here they were. Huddled upon the banks of this frigid river, 2000 men contemplated their bleak fate. The past few months had gone very, very badly. Their hopes had been crushed time and again. The noble experiment in Liberty which had begun with such promise, had by this time deteriorated to the point where every day was a battle just to survive. Defeat after defeat, at places like Long Island, Harlem Heights, Fort Washington and White Plains...

<p>The U.S. Coast Guard removed two Iraqi-national crew members from an oil tanker it boarded in the Delaware Bay and are holding them in an undisclosed location.</p> <p>The Qatar-flagged, 880-foot tanker is anchored at the Coastal Eagle Point Facility, a refinery across the Delaware River from Philadelphia, and remains under armed control of the Coast Guard, which boarded the ship last week.</p>