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A Walking Tour of Seaford, Delaware
Seaford is at the head of the deep Nanticoke River about 40 miles from its mouth in lower
Chesapeake Bay. The Nanticoke Indians and their ancestors lived along its banks for over 6,000 years. The first record of a European to explore the head of the Nanticoke, however, was in 1608 when Captain John Smith set out exploring the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries. Development along the Nanticoke River was slow partly due to friction that developed between the Nanticoke Indians and the English settlers.
Those who did settle the region were Marylanders until 1763 when, after many years in the courts of London, the boundary lines for Maryland and Delaware were established as the surveyors Mason and Dixon defined in 1763. The first record of any settlement in the area around Seaford was a very large tract of land identified as “Martin’s Hundred.” This 1,750-acre plot of land, bordered by the Nanticoke river and Herring Creek, was granted to Jeremiah Jadwin of Virginia on January 22, 1672.
Seaford was laid out in 1799 at what was then Hooper’s Landing on the river; it was presumably named after Seaford, Sussex County, England, whence came some of the early settlers. Henry Adams opened the settlement’s first store, at Front and Water streets, the following year. As one of the two important Delaware towns on navigable streams flowing into Chesapeake Bay, Seaford is similar to the many towns on the Eastern Shore of Maryland that have depended largely upon water transportation and the seafood industry of the Bay. Oyster-packing was an important early industry with dozens of rake-masted schooners making weekly trips down the winding river to the oyster beds of the lower Chesapeake. Shipbuilding was also carried on in Seaford.
In 1939, the DuPont Company chose Seaford as the site of the first Nylon plant in the world. By the 1960s the plant was employing 4,000 workers and Seaford was the “Nylon Capital of the World.” The largest employer in Sussex County also drew those workers to the new developments surrounding Seaford and away from downtown.
In 2000 more than a million dollars was invested back in downtown Seaford and our walking tour will start at the culmination of this project, the new City Hall...
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