Colonial Germantown Historic District

Along Germantown Avenue in northwest Philadelphia, a district of nearly five hundred small-scale commercial and residential buildings runs for twenty-one blocks, mixing Colonial houses with Victorian shops and twentieth-century storefronts. The street grew from a German settlement founded in 1683, whose linen weavers and merchants built houses and workshops along the road. Its early houses are built of Wissahickon schist rubblework, sometimes stuccoed. After the railroad opened in 1832 and horse-car lines followed in 1859, the avenue became a commercial center. Between 1880 and 1910, new railroad and trolley lines drew shoppers to the intersection with Chelten Avenue, where large banks, theatres and department stores were built. The district is significant for documenting this commercial development from its colonial origins through World War II.