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Dover, Deleware

1911 Encyclopedia Britannica

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Dover, England

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The capital of Delaware, U.S.A., and the county seat of Kent county, on the St Jones River, in the central part of the state, about 48 m. S. of Wilmington and about 9 m. from Delaware Bay. Pop. (1890) 3061; (1900) 3329, of whom 772 were negroes. Dover is served by the Philadelphia, Baltimore & Washington railway (Pennsylvania system). The state house, built about 1722 for a court house, was remodelled for its present purpose in 1791; it contains the state library, which in 1908 had about 50,000 bound volumes. Dover is the seat of the Wilmington Conference Academy (Methodist Episcopal); and about 2 m. N. is the state college for coloured students (co-educational; opened in 1892), an agricultural and manual training school. The surrounding country is largely devoted to the raising of small fruit. Among the manufacturers are canned fruit and meat (especially poultry), timber, machine shop products, baskets and crates, and silk. The town was laid out in 1717; in 1777 it replaced New Castle as the capital of the state, and in 1829 it was incorporated as a town. Dover was the birthplace of the American patriot, Caesar Rodney (1728-1784), whose home near Dover is still standing.