Contact period
Immigration of Europeans into land of the Lenni Lenape
The first people Before European settlement, the area that now includes Lower Macungie Township was inhabited by people who called themselves the Lenni-Lenape (Original People); English settlers called them the Delawares. The name “Macungie” is derived from a Native American word meaning “place of the bear,” and is spelled phonetically with many variations in early records. The leading chief of the Minsi tribe of the Delaware Indians used a form of the word Macungie in his own name.
William Penn, the founder of the colony of Pennsylvania, purchased land along the Perkiomen Creek (Pahkehoma) in 1684 from the Minsi Delaware Indian Chief Sachem Maughaughsin (Macungie), giving Penn the right to make this land available to speculators and homesteaders.
The agreement between Penn and Maughaushsin reads as follows:
“Upon my own desire and free offer, I Maughaughsin, in consideration of two Matchcoats, four pairs of stockings and four bottles of Sider, do hereby grant, make over all my land upon the Pahkehoma, to William Penn, Propr. and Govern’r of Pennsylvania and territories, his heirs and Assignees forever, with which I own myself satisfied and promise never to molest any Christian so call d yt shall seat thereon by his orders.
“Witness my hand and seal at Philadelphia ye third day ye fourth month 1684.”
Many Indians left this area and moved north over the Blue Mountains after the 1684 treaty was signed. However, others continued to live and hunt in the Lehigh Valley; pioneer families have passed down stories of Indians living peacefully in seasonal villages for some time after European settlers had arrived and established their early farmsteads. One is known to have been in the Ancient Oak area, another was along Mill Race Road. Findings of jasper chips in several locations provide evidence of workshops where tools were fashioned from jasper taken from pits along South Mountain in the Macungie-Vera Cruz area—these almost definitely date from the pre-contact period, as jasper quarrying seems to have ended about 1680.
Hostilities between settlers and Indians increased during the French and Indian War (1754–1763), although the war was not fought in the Lehigh Valley area. A string of forts was built in the mid-1750s north of the Blue Mountain ridge along the frontier. Colonial authorities planned these forts; some early settlers in northern parts of today’s Lehigh Valley also built a few small forts for protection, while others fortified and stockaded their family homes. These “block houses” were used by neighboring families as safe places when Indian raids were feared. A reconstruction of a frontier fort may be visited in Ontelaunee Park outside New Tripoli, not far from here.
Peace between the settlers and the Indians in the Lehigh Valley did not start until 1764, a year after the treaty that ended the French and Indian War. Instances have been recorded of behavior by some European settlers toward natives in 1763 that was so shameful and disrespectful that Indians quickly realized they would not be treated fairly. Parties of raiding Indians burned houses and killed European settlers north and east of here, but no belligerent actions have been recorded in the Macungie area.
Immigration of Europeans into land of the Lenni Lenape
The first people Before European settlement, the area that now includes Lower Macungie Township was inhabited by people who called themselves the Lenni-Lenape (Original People); English settlers called them the Delawares. The name “Macungie” is derived from a Native American word meaning “place of the bear,” and is spelled phonetically with many variations in early records. The leading chief of the Minsi tribe of the Delaware Indians used a form of the word Macungie in his own name.
William Penn, the founder of the colony of Pennsylvania, purchased land along the Perkiomen Creek (Pahkehoma) in 1684 from the Minsi Delaware Indian Chief Sachem Maughaughsin (Macungie), giving Penn the right to make this land available to speculators and homesteaders.
The agreement between Penn and Maughaushsin reads as follows:
“Upon my own desire and free offer, I Maughaughsin, in consideration of two Matchcoats, four pairs of stockings and four bottles of Sider, do hereby grant, make over all my land upon the Pahkehoma, to William Penn, Propr. and Govern’r of Pennsylvania and territories, his heirs and Assignees forever, with which I own myself satisfied and promise never to molest any Christian so call d yt shall seat thereon by his orders.
“Witness my hand and seal at Philadelphia ye third day ye fourth month 1684.”
Many Indians left this area and moved north over the Blue Mountains after the 1684 treaty was signed. However, others continued to live and hunt in the Lehigh Valley; pioneer families have passed down stories of Indians living peacefully in seasonal villages for some time after European settlers had arrived and established their early farmsteads. One is known to have been in the Ancient Oak area, another was along Mill Race Road. Findings of jasper chips in several locations provide evidence of workshops where tools were fashioned from jasper taken from pits along South Mountain in the Macungie-Vera Cruz area—these almost definitely date from the pre-contact period, as jasper quarrying seems to have ended about 1680.
Hostilities between settlers and Indians increased during the French and Indian War (1754–1763), although the war was not fought in the Lehigh Valley area. A string of forts was built in the mid-1750s north of the Blue Mountain ridge along the frontier. Colonial authorities planned these forts; some early settlers in northern parts of today’s Lehigh Valley also built a few small forts for protection, while others fortified and stockaded their family homes. These “block houses” were used by neighboring families as safe places when Indian raids were feared. A reconstruction of a frontier fort may be visited in Ontelaunee Park outside New Tripoli, not far from here.
Peace between the settlers and the Indians in the Lehigh Valley did not start until 1764, a year after the treaty that ended the French and Indian War. Instances have been recorded of behavior by some European settlers toward natives in 1763 that was so shameful and disrespectful that Indians quickly realized they would not be treated fairly. Parties of raiding Indians burned houses and killed European settlers north and east of here, but no belligerent actions have been recorded in the Macungie area.
