Lancaster

Sister cities

• Beit Shemesh

History

Originally called Hickory Town, Lancaster was renamed after the English city of Lancaster by native John Wright. Its symbol, the red rose, is from the House of Lancaster. Lancaster was part of the 1681 Penn's Woods Charter of William Penn, and was laid out by James Hamilton in 1734. It was incorporated as a borough in 1742 and incorporated as a city in 1818. In the summer of 1744 the Lancaster courthouse was the venue for an important colonial treaty between the Haudenosaunee Confederacy and the Provinces of Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia. Conrad Weiser served as interpreter, and the text of the treaty was soon after published by Benjamin Franklin. During the American Revolution, Lancaster served for one day as the temporary capital of the United States, seated at the Court House (built 1739, destroyed by fire in 1784 and rebuilt before relocating to current Lancaster County Courthouse in 1852; original site is now the Soldiers & Sailors Monument at Penn Square c. 1874), on September 27, 1777, after the Continental Congress fled Philadelphia, which had been captured by the British. The revolutionary government then moved still farther away to York, Pennsylvania. A surviving mid-18th-century Torah ark lintel from the Lancaster home of Joseph Simon reflects the use of private homes for traditional Jewish prayer in colonial cities without synagogues. Its carving depicts the Tablets of the Law and bears the Hebrew phrase “Know before Whom you are standing.” Lancaster was the capital of Pennsylvania from 1799 to 1812, with the state capital located at the Court House (built 1784 and demolished 1852 and now site of Soldiers & Sailors Monument at Penn Square). It replaced a 1737 structure on a different site. The first long-distance paved road in the United…

Geography

Lancaster is located in the Piedmont region of Pennsylvania. It lies slightly north of the Conestoga River, a left tributary of the Susquehanna River. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , of which, of it is land and 1.65% is water. * Cabbage Hill/The Hill (named for the cabbage patches kept by ethnic Germans in this area) * Chestnut Hill * Downtown/Center City * Downtown Investment District * Historic East Side * Eighth Ward * Gallery Row/Arts District * Galebach Ward * Northwest Corridor * Penn Square * Prospect Heights * Seventh Ward * Sixth Ward * Uptown * West End * Woodward Hill * Musser Park * Mussertown Under the Köppen climate classification, Lancaster falls within either a hot-summer humid continental climate (Dfa) if the isotherm is used or a humid subtropical climate (Cfa) if the isotherm is used. The hottest recorded temperature in the city was on August 7, 1918, while the coldest recorded temperature was on January 22, 1984. On average, the city receives 42 inches of precipitation a year. September is the wettest month of the year and February the driest. The snowiest winter on record for Lancaster was the winter of 2009-10 when 72 inches of snow fell and the smallest amount of snow on record was when four inches fell during the winter of 1949–50. The highest recorded January temperature was on January 26, 1950, and the coldest July temperature on July 4, 1918. On average, the city receives 203 days of sun a year. The shortest days of the year are between December 18 and December 25, when day length is nine hours and 19 minutes. The sun reaches its lowest point in the sky of 26° between December 11 and December 31. The longest days of the year are June 19 to June 23, reaching 15 hours and one minute. The sun reaches…

Race & ethnicity

Most-observed species

• Northern Cardinal

  Cardinalis cardinalis (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  24,996
• American Robin

  Turdus migratorius Linnaeus, 1766 · Aves
  21,454
• Carolina Wren

  Thryothorus ludovicianus (Latham, 1790) · Aves
  19,704
• Mourning Dove

  Zenaida macroura (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  19,012
• Blue Jay

  Cyanocitta cristata (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  17,937
• Carolina Chickadee

  Poecile carolinensis (Audubon, 1834) · Aves
  16,909
• Song Sparrow

  Melospiza melodia (A.Wilson, 1810) · Aves
  16,571
• American Goldfinch

  Spinus tristis (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  16,034

Largest nearby schools

• McCaskey Campus
  High · Lancaster · 2,620 students · 14.6:1 ratio
• Hempfield SHS
  High · Landisville · 2,268 students · 16.3:1 ratio
• Manheim Twp HS
  High · Lancaster · 1,899 students · 16:1 ratio
• Penn Manor HS
  High · Millersville · 1,783 students · 17:1 ratio
• Conestoga Valley SHS
  High · Lancaster · 1,282 students · 15.4:1 ratio
• Warwick SHS
  High · Lititz · 1,230 students · 11.8:1 ratio
• Gerald G Huesken MS
  Middle · Lancaster · 965 students · 14.6:1 ratio
• Manheim Twp MS
  Middle · Lancaster · 955 students · 13.3:1 ratio

Most recent

• M 2.6 — 2021-06-25
  2 km SE of Woodlawn, Maryland
• M 2.81 — 2019-09-15
  5 km ESE of East Berlin, Pennsylvania
• M 2.64 — 2015-01-25
  4 km ESE of Downingtown, Pennsylvania
• M 3.05 — 2010-06-03
  4 km ENE of Franklintown, Pennsylvania
• M 2.76 — 2009-10-25
  4 km ENE of Franklintown, Pennsylvania
• M 2.78 — 2009-07-01
  3 km ESE of Pennsville, New Jersey