About 40 people attended the first part of the 250 Celebration for Northern Lehigh, which was History Day at the Vigilant Fire Company in Slatington.

The first speaker was Lynn Otto, captain of the 1st Battalion of the Pennsylvania Regiment. He presented a PowerPoint on “Forts of the Blue Mountains.” Why the forts? At the time of the French and Indian War, the Blue Mountains marked the actual settlement line of British colonists.

The reason for the forts was to stop the flow of Indians and French into the valleys south of the Blue Mountains after British Maj. Gen. Edward Braddock’s defeat in 1755.

In 1756, there were 17 forts in Pennsylvania. Conrad Weiser was given the task of building the forts along the Blue Mountains and commanding the troops to man and patrol them.

The forts were poorly built so not very successful for protection. Over 600 soldiers’ bodies were never found after skirmishes. The forts would rot and fall away. In a two-year period from 1756 to 1758, there were 200 documented cases of settlers being killed. In the same time frame, four Native Americans were killed by soldiers.

Christine Applegate of the Museum of Indian Culture spoke about the Lenape Indians.

After William Penn arrived from England in 1681 he founded the province of Pennsylvania. He granted property to the Lenape Indians. It was important to him that they be treated fairly. Penn traded with the Indians for lumber, furs and land. The Indians wanted firearms. The Lenape were systematically pushed out of their ancestral homelands of New Jersey, Delaware and eastern Pennsylvania.

The Beaver wars lasted for 90 years, and was part of the American Indian Wars. It was a war that pushed the Indians further away from their homes. The English and the French wanted the furs. After Penn died, his sons took over, but did not “treat the Indians fairly” like their father had.

The Walking Purchase in 1737 was a fraudulent land deal between the sons of William Penn, resulting in the loss of nearly 1,200,000 acres of land for the Lenape Indians.

Thomas Penn hired very fast runners to run for a day and a half to measure how much land would be claimed. It was supposed to be a “walk.” The Indians did not have a strong government to fight for their rights.

There were many little villages with populations of between 50 to 100 people. The Europeans wanted beaver fur, and tobacco was in high demand from the Indians. Oftentimes, Indian children were taken to ensure new settlers got what they wanted.