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The coat of arms of Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania (, lit. ' Penn's forest country ' ), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania (Pennsylvania Dutch : Pennsylvanie ), is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic , Northeastern , Appalachian , and Great Lakes regions of the United States . Pennsylvania borders Delaware to its southeast, Maryland to its south, West Virginia to its southwest, Ohio and the Ohio River to its west, Lake Erie and New York to its north, the Delaware River and New Jersey to its east, and the Canadian province of Ontario to its northwest.
Pennsylvania is the fifth-most populous state in the United States , with over 13 million residents as of the 2020 United States census . The state is the 33rd-largest by area and has the ninth-highest population density among all states. The largest metropolitan statistical area (MSA) is the southeastern Delaware Valley , which includes and surrounds Philadelphia , the state's largest and nation's sixth-most populous city. The second-largest metropolitan area, Greater Pittsburgh , is centered in and around Pittsburgh , the state's second-largest city. The state's subsequent five most populous cities are Allentown , Reading , Erie , Scranton , and Bethlehem . The state capital is Harrisburg .
Pennsylvania's geography is highly diverse. The Appalachian Mountains run through the center of the state; the Allegheny and Pocono mountains span much of Northeastern Pennsylvania ; close to 60% of the state is forested . While it has only 140 miles (225 km) of waterfront along Lake Erie and the Delaware River, Pennsylvania has the most navigable rivers of any state in the nation, including the Allegheny , Delaware, Genesee , Ohio , Schuylkill , Susquehanna , and others. (Full article... )
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Portrait of Cope,
c. 1895
Edward Drinker Cope (July 28, 1840 – April 12, 1897) was an American zoologist , paleontologist , comparative anatomist , herpetologist , and ichthyologist . Born to a wealthy Quaker family, he distinguished himself as a child prodigy interested in science, publishing his first scientific paper at the age of 19. Though his father tried to raise Cope as a gentleman farmer , he eventually acquiesced to his son's scientific aspirations.
Cope had little formal scientific training, and he eschewed a teaching position for field work. He made regular trips to the
American West , prospecting in the 1870s and 1880s, often as a member of
U.S. Geological Survey teams. A personal feud between Cope and paleontologist
Othniel Charles Marsh led to a period of intense fossil-finding competition now known as the
Bone Wars . Cope's financial fortunes soured after failed mining ventures in the 1880s, forcing him to sell off much of his fossil collection. He experienced a resurgence in his career toward the end of his life before dying on April 12, 1897. (
Full article... )
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Bethlehem is a city in Northampton and Lehigh Counties in the Lehigh Valley region of eastern Pennsylvania , United States. As of the 2020 census , Bethlehem had a total population of 75,781, making it the second-largest city in the Lehigh Valley after Allentown and the seventh-largest city in the state. Among its total population as of 2020, 55,639 were in Northampton County and 19,343 were in Lehigh County. The city is located along the Lehigh River , a 109-mile-long (175 km) tributary of the Delaware River .
Bethlehem lies in the geographic center of the Lehigh Valley, a metropolitan region of
731 sq mi (1,890 km2 ) with a population of 861,899 people as of the 2020 census that is Pennsylvania's
third-most populous metropolitan area and the 68th-most populated
metropolitan area in the U.S. Bethlehem borders Allentown to its west and is 48 miles (77 km) north of
Philadelphia and 72 miles (116 km) west of
New York City . (
Full article... )
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Johnstown, Pennsylvania Scranton, Pennsylvania Pittsburgh Philadelphia Allentown, Pennsylvania Lancaster, Pennsylvania State College, Pennsylvania Warren, Pennsylvania DuBois, Pennsylvania Erie, Pennsylvania Chambersburg, Pennsylvania Juniata County, Pennsylvania Pithole, Pennsylvania Lock Haven, Pennsylvania Larrys Creek State Route 1002 (Lehigh County, Pennsylvania) Pennsylvania Route 563 Hull Creek (Lackawanna River tributary) Little Fishing Creek Ganoga Lake Mahoning Creek (Susquehanna River tributary) Shawnee on Delaware, Pennsylvania Roaring Brook (Lackawanna River tributary) Pennsylvania Route 463 Kettle Creek (Pennsylvania) Spanish Hill West Branch Fishing Creek West Creek (Pennsylvania) Plunketts Creek Bridge No. 3 White Deer Hole Creek Plunketts Creek (Loyalsock Creek tributary) Horseshoe Curve (Pennsylvania) Kinzua Bridge Quehanna Wild Area Harrisburg, Pennsylvania Levittown, Pennsylvania Pennsylvania Turnpike Pocono Mountains Altoona, Pennsylvania
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This is a Good article , an article that meets a core set of high editorial standards.
Avram Noam Chomsky (born December 7, 1928) is an American professor and public intellectual known for his work in linguistics , political activism, and social criticism . Sometimes called "the father of modern linguistics", Chomsky is also a major figure in analytic philosophy and one of the founders of the field of cognitive science . He is a laureate professor of linguistics at the University of Arizona and an institute professor emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Among the most cited living authors, Chomsky has written more than 150 books on topics such as linguistics, war, and politics. Ideologically, he aligns with anarcho-syndicalism and libertarian socialism .
Born to
Ashkenazi Jewish immigrants in
Philadelphia , Chomsky developed an early interest in
anarchism from alternative bookstores in
New York City . He studied at the
University of Pennsylvania . During his postgraduate work in the
Harvard Society of Fellows , Chomsky developed the theory of
transformational grammar for which he earned his doctorate in 1955. That year he began teaching at MIT, and in 1957 emerged as a significant figure in linguistics with his landmark work
Syntactic Structures , which played a major role in remodeling the study of language. From 1958 to 1959 Chomsky was a
National Science Foundation fellow at the
Institute for Advanced Study . He created or co-created the
universal grammar theory, the
generative grammar theory, the
Chomsky hierarchy , and the
minimalist program . Chomsky also played a pivotal role in the decline of linguistic
behaviorism , and was particularly critical of the work of
B. F. Skinner . (
Full article... )
The Pennsylvania Dutch (Pennsylvania Dutch : Pennsylvanisch Deitsche ), commonly referred to as Pennsylvania Germans , are an ethnic group in Pennsylvania and other regions of the United States , predominantly in the Mid-Atlantic region of the nation. They largely descend from the Palatinate region of Germany , and settled in Pennsylvania during the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries. While most were from the Palatinate region of Germany, a lesser number were from other German-speaking areas of Germany and Europe, including Baden-Württemberg , Hesse , Saxony , and Rhineland in Germany, the Netherlands , Switzerland , and the Alsace–Lorraine region of France .
The Pennsylvania Dutch spoke
Palatine German and other
South German dialects , intermixing of Palatine, English, and other German dialects, which formed the
Pennsylvania Dutch language as it is spoken today. (
Full article... )
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Pennsylvania's largest city Philadelphia
Nickname: The Keystone State
Capital: Harrisburg
Largest city: Philadelphia
Total area: 119,283 square kilometers (46,055 square miles)
Population (2000 census): 12,281,054
Date admitted to the Union: December 12, 1787 (2nd )
State symbols
Mountain laurel, Pennsylvania's state flower
Pennsylvania topics
General images
The following are images from various Pennsylvania-related articles on Wikipedia.
Image 3 Shelter House in
Emmaus , constructed in 1734 by
Pennsylvania German settlers, is the oldest continuously occupied building structure in the
Lehigh Valley and one of the oldest in Pennsylvania (from
Pennsylvania )
Image 4 The
Philadelphia Eagles are presented with the
Vince Lombardi Trophy after winning
Super Bowl LII on February 4, 2018 (from
Pennsylvania )
Image 5 An
Amish family riding in a traditional
Amish buggy in
Lancaster County ; Pennsylvania has the largest
Amish population of any state. (from
Pennsylvania )
Image 10 Pennsylvania's unemployment rate between 1976 and 2021
The U.S. unemployment rate during these years
(from
Pennsylvania )
Image 11 The
statue of
Benjamin Franklin on the campus of the
University of Pennsylvania , an
Ivy League institution in
Philadelphia ranked one of world's top universities (from
Pennsylvania )
Image 12 Citizens Bank Park in
South Philadelphia , home of the
Philadelphia Phillies , the oldest continuous same-name, same-city franchise in American professional sports (from
Pennsylvania )
Image 15 Stephen Decatur , a 19th-century
naval commander who served in the
War of 1812 and other engagements (from
History of Pennsylvania )
Image 16 Philadelphia International Airport , the busiest airport in the state and the
21st-busiest airport in the nation with nearly 10 million passengers annually as of 2021 (from
Pennsylvania )
Image 17 The
colonial possessions of
Britain (in pink),
France (in blue), and
Spain (in orange) as of 1750. The French later lost their possessions in
North America to Britain following its defeat in the
French and Indian War , fought from 1754 to 1763 (from
History of Pennsylvania )
Image 18 Dorney Park & Wildwater Kingdom 's
Steel Force and
Thunderhawk roller coasters in
Allentown ; Steel Force is the eighth-longest
steel roller coaster in the world with a first drop of 205 feet (62 m) and a top speed of 75 miles per hour (121 km/h). (from
Pennsylvania )
Image 19 The Birth of Pennsylvania , a portrait of
William Penn (standing with document in hand), who founded the
Province of Pennsylvania in 1681 as a refuge for
Quakers after receiving a royal deed to it from
King Charles II (from
History of Pennsylvania )
Image 20 Köppen climate types in Pennsylvania (from
Pennsylvania )
Image 22 The
Stonycreek Township crash site of
Flight 93 , one of four planes hijacked in the
September 11 attacks ; the site is now a
national memorial . Flight 93 passengers wrestled with
al-Qaeda terrorist hijackers for control of the plane, preventing it from being flown into the
White House or
U.S. Capitol . (from
Pennsylvania )
Image 23 Pat's King of Steaks in
South Philadelphia is widely credited with inventing the
cheesesteak in 1933 (from
Pennsylvania )
Image 26 The
Battle of Gettysburg , fought July 1–3, 1863 in
Gettysburg , was the Civil War's
deadliest battle but also is widely considered the
war's turning point in the
Union's ultimate victory. The battle is depicted in this 1887
Thure de Thulstrup painting,
Battle of Gettysburg . (from
Pennsylvania )
Image 28 On November 19, 1863,
President Abraham Lincoln (center, facing camera) arrived in
Gettysburg and delivered the
Gettysburg Address , considered one of the best-known speeches in American history. (from
Pennsylvania )
Image 29 The
Gettysburg campaign , which culminated in the
Battle of Gettysburg , was a major turning point in the
American Civil War and the war's bloodiest battle with an estimated 46,000 to 51,000 casualties (from
History of Pennsylvania )
Image 30 A map of
New Netherland (in magenta) and
New Sweden (in blue) in the 17th century; New Sweden was later absorbed by New Netherland and then the
British in the
Second Anglo-Dutch War . (from
History of Pennsylvania )
Image 31 Simon Cameron of
Maytown was
Secretary of War and head of Pennsylvania's
Republican Party , whose party machine controlled Pennsylvania into the 20th century. (from
History of Pennsylvania )
Image 32 The locomotive
Tioga in
Philadelphia in 1848; Pennsylvania was an important railroad center throughout the 19th century. (from
History of Pennsylvania )
Image 33 One of only two confirmed photos of
Abraham Lincoln (sitting in center, facing camera, without his traditional top hat) at
Gettysburg a few hours prior to giving the
Gettysburg Address at
Gettysburg National Cemetery on November 19, 1863. The address, which was only 271 words in length, ranks among the most famed speeches in American history. (from
History of Pennsylvania )
Image 35 Pittsburgh Steelers ' fans waving the
Terrible Towel , a tradition that dates back to
1975 (from
Pennsylvania )
Image 37 2020 U.S. presidential election results by county in Pennsylvania
Democratic
Republican
(from
Pennsylvania )
Image 38 Bethlehem Steel in
Bethlehem was one of the world's leading steel manufacturers for most of the 19th and 20th century. In 1982, however, it discontinued most of its operations, declared bankruptcy in 2001, and was dissolved in 2003. (from
Pennsylvania )
Image 39 Ethnic origins of Pennsylvanians (from
Pennsylvania )
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