Wissahickon Creek

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Wissahickon Creek[1]
Wissahickon Creek runs under the Valley Green Bridge in Philadelphia
Schuylkill River watershed
Location
Country	U.S.
State	Pennsylvania
Region	Montgomery County, Philadelphia County
Physical characteristics
Source
• coordinates	40°14′34″N 75°15′16″W / 40.24278°N 75.25444°W / 40.24278; -75.25444
Mouth
• coordinates	40°0′47″N 75°12′25″W / 40.01306°N 75.20694°W / 40.01306; -75.20694
Length	23 mi (37 km)
Basin size	64 sq mi (170 km2)

Wissahickon Creek is a tributary of the Schuylkill River in Montgomery and Philadelphia Counties, Pennsylvania.

Wissahickon Creek rises in Montgomery County, runs approximately 23 miles (37 km) passing through and dividing Northwest Philadelphia before emptying into the Schuylkill River at Philadelphia. Its watershed covers about 64 square miles (170 km²).^[2]

Much of the creek now runs through or next to parkland, with the last few miles running through a deep gorge. The beauty of this area attracted the attention of literary personages like Edgar Allan Poe and John Greenleaf Whittier. The gorge area is now part of Wissahickon Valley Park in Philadelphia, and the Wissahickon Valley is known as one of 600 National Natural Landmarks of the United States.

The name of the creek comes from the Lenape word wiessahitkonk, for "catfish creek" or "stream of yellowish color."^[3][4] On the earliest map of this region of Pennsylvania, by Thomas Holme, the stream is called Whitpaine's creek, after one of the original settlers Richard Whitpaine, who owned several large tracts on the creek.^[5] Whitpaine was an early land owner in the days of William Penn.

Industry sprang up along the Wissahickon not long after European settlement, with America's first paper mill set up on one of the Wissahickon's tributaries. A few of the dams built for the mills remain visible today.