Brick shells of Bancroft Mills rise quietly here along Brandywine Creek, marking your path through Wilmington. This site grew from one of the earliest and most famous mills near the city into the largest and longest-running complex along the Brandywine. An English immigrant, Joseph Bancroft (1803–1874), established the mill in 1831; it was rebuilt after an 1839 flood and expanded several times, including a large 1895 expansion.
By 1880 the operation was already the largest cotton finishing mill in the United States. In the 1880s Joseph’s son, Samuel Bancroft, took control; Samuel was publisher of the Wilmington newspaper Every Evening and a major philanthropist. His collection of pre-Raphaelite paintings later formed the basis of the Delaware Art Museum.
Another brother, William Poole Bancroft, donated nearby land to start Wilmington’s extensive park system, and his donation for a public library is considered the beginning of the Wilmington Public Library. You can still feel the weight of those decades here, the layers of rebuilding, growth, and family influence. Picture Joseph Bancroft's mill rebuilt after the 1839 flood, and follow Brandywine Creek as it once carried both waterpower and industry through this place.