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Haverford Township today

The Township is comprised of 10.01 square miles in the northeastern section of Delaware County in the Philadelphia Primary Metropolitan Statistical Area. It is also part of the western suburbs of the city of Philadelphia. Municipalities immediately adjacent to the Township of Haverford include the townships of Radnor, Marple, Springfield, and Upper Darby in Delaware County, Lower Merion Township in Montgomery County, and the city of Philadelphia.

People frequently cross municipal boundaries for employment and shopping and thus, an analysis of the Township must take into consideration its place in the region as a whole. Highway access for the Township is via U.S. 30, otherwise known as Lancaster Pike and Route 3, otherwise known as West Chester Pike.

The Township is also serviced by both Conrail and the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA). Haverford College is located within the Township.

Haverford Township history

Joshua Humphrey of Haverford: the Crucial Role of his Ships During the Infancy of the New Republic by Dick Walker

During the twenty years from 1795 to 1815, the newborn United States came under attack by three different foreign powers: the Barbary States, France and England. The U.S. response to these attacks owed much of its ultimate success to the genius of a Philadelphia Quaker and naval architect, named Joshua Humphrey, born in Haverford Township. Joshua, grandson of Daniel Humphrey, who emigrated from Wales in 1682 and settled in Haverford, was apprenticed to Philadelphia ship carpenter (Penrose) and because of his talent was placed in charge of the shipyard upon his master’s death.

In the late 18th and early 19th centuries, piracy and the white slave trade were the major industries of four Arab states on the north coast of Africa. Morocco, Algiers, Tunis and Tripoli, known as the Barbary States, were attacking merchant ships in the Mediterranean. These states acted independently, although they were supposedly part of the Turkish Empire. The “Christian Infidels” that they captured were held for ransom or sold as slaves, and made to work in chain gangs. Women were put into harems. Great Britain and France were paying huge sums of “protection money” to the pirates so that their merchant ships would not be seized. When the U.S. became independent from Britain, American ships became prime targets. In July, 1785 two American ships were seized and twenty-one Americans were forced into slave labor. John Jay in Philadelphia instructed John Adams in London, to negotiate with the Barbary States. The treaty with Tripoli cost 30,000 Guineas plus 3,000 Pounds for the Sultan’s Envoy. Still, the U.S. did not have a Navy and in 1793, eleven US merchant ships were taken by the Algerians, their crews enslaved. Because of these atrocities, President Washington asked Congress for money to build warships to protect US shipping. Finally in March, 1794 Congress passed a bill to provide funds for six frigates for a navy. (After the Revolution, the first US Congress had been reluctant to provide a standing army or navy because it did not want to give power to the central government.) Secretary of War, Henry Knox chose Humphrey and his partner, John Fox to design the ships. Together these two Quakers designed the strongest and fastest warships built at the time. The six ships were each to be built at different ports: the USS Congress at Portsmouth, USS Constitution at Boston, USS President at New York; USS United States at Philadelphia; USS Constellation at Baltimore and the USS Chesapeake at Norfolk. These six frigates slid down the ramps in 1797 and soon proved to the world that Humphrey’s designs for longer, wider vessels, rising low from the water, could out-run, out-maneuver and out-shoot any ship on the ocean. The new frigates defended merchant ships against the French in the West Indies and on Lakes Erie and Champlain in the War of 1812.  In May, 1801 President Jefferson refused to pay more tribute and sent a squadron of ships to Tripoli. In 1805, US Marines stormed the harbor and raised the flag over Tripoli.

Over the next ten years, the US alternately fought and made treaties with the pirates. Finally in 1815 President Madison sent Stephen Decatur with a squadron of ten ships to the Mediterranean and forced a surrender, release of all prisoners and merchandise taken from U.S. ships and payment of damages. The many victories that Humphrey’s ships and their crews achieved gave the US the freedom to trade world-wide without interference, to become a world power and to establish its economy. Joshua Humphrey lived the last 30 years of his life at Pont Reading in Haverford.

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Haverford Twp