Delaware Trivia & Tidbits - Page 13

Looking for Delaware trivia? Try our list Delaware little know facts, tidbits and trivia.

The official state seal contains seven symbols of Delaware life and history: wheat, corn, an ox, water, a ship, a farmer, and a militiaman.

first appeared: 8/4/2002

During World War II, hundreds of women pilots were trained at Wilmington’s New Castle Army Air Force Base. The base also was used as a departure point for women pilots ferrying planes all over the world.

first appeared: 7/28/2002

The 14-mile-long Chesapeake & Delaware Canal, opened in 1829, cut 285 miles off the voyage between Baltimore and Philadelphia.

first appeared: 7/21/2002

The state’s earliest European settlers arrived on the Swedish ship Kalmar Nyckel. Between 1637 and 1641, the ship made four trips from Sweden to the New World, a record unmatched by any other Colonial vessel.

first appeared: 7/14/2002

During heavy holiday travel, the state’s transportation department places cameras on tethered balloons to monitor traffic.

first appeared: 7/7/2002

To expand fish habitat, Delaware has created 11 artificial reef sites in Delaware Bay and along the Atlantic coast. Sites are constructed of recycled materials, including concrete culvert pipe and several sunken vessels.

first appeared: 6/30/2002

Wilmington’s first professional baseball team, the Quicksteps, began as amateur in the 1870s, going professional in 1883. Other professional teams in Wilmington have included the Blue Rocks, the Chicks, the Powder Monkeys, and the Diamonds.

first appeared: 6/23/2002

The 15,978 acres of tidal salt marshes at Bombay Hook National Wildlife Refuge were formed in 1878 when a storm breached the sand dunes protecting Bombay Hook Island, making it more of a lake than an island.

first appeared: 6/16/2002

When the Faithful Steward ran aground in 1785 near Cape Henlopen, 400 barrels of coins it carried were lost. Beachcombers in the area occasionally still find copper pennies in the sand.

first appeared: 6/9/2002

The Fenwick Island Lighthouse—which sits exactly on the eastern end of the Mason-Dixon Line—has warned ships away from the Fenwick Shoal for 138 years.

first appeared: 6/2/2002

During a storm in 1610, Dutch explorer Samuel Argall was blown off course into a strange bay, which he named in honor of his patron, Lord De La Warr—later called Delaware.

first appeared: 5/26/2002

Before collapsing in 1926, the Cape Henlopen Lighthouse—built of stone in 1767—guided vessels from the Atlantic Ocean into Delaware Bay for more than 150 years.

first appeared: 5/19/2002

Town names in Delaware include Pepperbox, Woodenhawk, Gumboro, Old Furnace, Shaft Ox Corner, Rising Sun, and Little Heaven.

first appeared: 5/12/2002

The 14-mile long Chesapeake & Delaware Canal, linking the bay with the river, opened in 1829. During its construction at a cost of $2.5 million, more than 2,600 men took part in the digging.

first appeared: 5/5/2002

Though Delaware is a major corporate and financial center—much of it in Wil-mington—agriculture continues to be the state’s primary industry.

first appeared: 4/28/2002

During Wilmington’s heyday as a shipbuilding center, one yard experienced a jump in employees from 400 in 1940, to 11,000 during the height of the shipbuilding effort in World War II.

first appeared: 4/21/2002

The state record tiger muskellunge, 15 pounds, 2 ounces, was caught on the Brandywine River in May 1991 by Richard Harris of Wilmington.

first appeared: 4/14/2002

Fort Salisbury, a former military installation east of Milford (pop. 6,732), housed German prisoners of war during World War II.

first appeared: 4/7/2002

The University of Delaware has an extensive collection of books, letters, pictures, and assorted memorabilia relating to 19th-century British poet Lord Byron. The collection includes a strand of his hair.

first appeared: 3/31/2002

The Kent County Courthouse in Dover was erected in 1874 on the site of the courthouse of 1691, which had replaced a still earlier version that a court had ordered “Burnt to get ye nails.” (Nails of that time were hand forged and quite valuable.)

first appeared: 3/24/2002

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