Monroe County

As my Facebook followers may have seen, last week my husband and I celebrated his birthday by traveling down to Lancaster, one of our favorite cities, and touring President Buchanan's beautiful home at Wheatland. Kevin drove, and because he's an indulgent sort, he kept pulling over every time he spotted a marker, so I was able to catch a couple that I still needed. I also got plenty of pictures for the post I'm going to be doing next month about Wheatland itself.

Moving on to today's quest, I decided to revisit my trip to Stroudsburg from this past spring and learn more about Monroe County itself.

The marker is at the county courthouse, at the
intersection of Seventh and Monroe Streets,
Stroudsburg.

It's not hard to guess that Monroe County is named after James Monroe, fifth President of the United States (and the last President to be one of the guys known as the Founding Fathers). Exactly why it was named for him, however, nobody seems to know. He wasn't the President at the time, nor was he from Pennsylvania, and he had died five years before the 53rd county was established. 

We do know that Joseph Ritner, governor from 1835 to 1839, strongly supported the idea of making the area "north of the Blue Mountains" into a new county. The region was well settled and had a large enough population to deserve being a county of its own; it was then part of Northampton County, and its residents felt that the county seat of Easton was too far away for their concerns to be heard. So a large chunk of Northampton County was to be merged with a piece of Pike County and given official status, although from 1830 to 1836, nobody could figure out what to call it. A few attempts were made to name it Fulton County (after Robert Fulton, the engineer from Lancaster), but never got enough support to pass the state House of Representatives. Fulton got another county named for him later, so he probably didn't mind too much. The names Evergreen County (after the many pine trees) and Jackson County (after President Andrew Jackson, who was also not from Pennsylvania but actually was the President at the time) were considered, but neither one took hold. Finally, in 1836, the late James Monroe was honored with the name of the new county. The only explanation seems to be that he was popular during his term as President, and it was easy enough to garner the public support needed for the bill. However, as far as anyone is aware, Monroe never once set foot in what is now Monroe County.

Next order of business was figuring out where the county seat would be. Until that was selected, there could be no county commissioners, nor county facilities - there was no courthouse, no jail. For eight months of this odd limbo, a Board of Trustees operated the fledgling county. Finally, on August 31, 1837, Stroudsburg was selected to be the county seat. We've already talked about Col. Jacob Stroud and his many contributions to the welfare of his neighbors, so in hindsight it doesn't seem like it should have been that difficult a decision. Within that same year, county commissioners were elected and oversaw the construction of both a courthouse (seen at left) and a jail. Both the original 1890 courthouse building and its 1934 expansion are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Monroe County consists of 611 square miles in northeastern Pennsylvania, bordered by the Blue Mountains to the south and sandwiched between the Lehigh and Delaware Rivers on either side. Much of the county is rural, with farmlands and rolling hills. The Stroudsburg area in particular is known as the "gateway to the Poconos," including Big Pocono Mountain, one of the highest points in that entire mountain range. The county is home to East Stroudsburg University, originally established in 1893 as a "normal school" for teacher training and then later changed to a teachers' college before attaining university status. The scenic hills and mountains have naturally lent themselves to tourism, so the county offers several resorts, ski lodges, and water parks, as well as a casino (formerly Mount Airy Lodge) and a NASCAR raceway.

Monroe County has a rich military history, as indicated by the Stroudsburg war memorials pictured at right. As far back as the French and Indian War, residents of the county have defended the principles of what became the United States. The county is also home to a large part of the Sullivan campaign, a very complex piece of history which has several markers throughout the state (and which will be a challenge for me).

The tourism boom began in the mid-19th century. It was the result of all those railroads carrying anthracite coal down from the mountains; although Monroe County had no coal of its own, it sits right on the same corridor and some of the trains would pass through the area. This not only brought many tourists to the picturesque region, but it also helped to bring Monroe County into the industrial revolution by providing means of commerce for its many products and natural resources - textiles, lumber and wooden crafts, glass, block ice, and farm produce. However, after the decline of the railroads, a number of these industries were scaled back, and even farming only occupies a small percentage of the county today. 

The big draw is the natural beauty of the area; tourism remains its primary industry, and Monroe County is home to three state parks - Big Pocono, Gouldsboro, and Tobyhanna. Bushkill Falls has been operating as a public park for more than a century, with its spectacular waterfall views and invigorating hiking trails. Tannersville, meanwhile, is home to what is affectionately called "The Cranberry," an enormous relic from the last ice age where magnificent flowers grow in abundance. It's a genuine peat bog, maintained by the Nature Conservancy, and is the southernmost bog of its kind on the east coast. Monroe County is also home to some of the Pennsylvania portion of the Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area, which is more than 70,000 acres of protected wildlands in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. I'm not sure if it's still all that common, but I know that at one time it was considered rather prestigious to own a second home in the Poconos.

I'm hoping to return to Monroe County before the summer is over, and explore it beyond the borders of Stroudsburg. Like so many others, I can't help but be lured by the beautiful mountains and rivers, and I hope that if you get the chance you'll visit too.

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Sources and Further Reading:

Official website of Monroe County

Official website of the Monroe County Historical Association

Kuczynski, Terri L. Images of America: Monroe County. Arcadia Publishing, 2009.

Monroe County at the Historical Marker Database

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Except where indicated, all writing and photography on this blog is the intellectual property of Laura Klotz. This blog is written with permission of the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission. I am not employed by the PHMC. All rights reserved.