The Delaware Assembly was ahead of most other states in our fledgling nation, in part because they’d declared independence before anyone else.

Back in June, as you may remember, Delaware declared its independence simultaneously from Britain and from Pennsylvania, of which it was considered a part. (This is why Pennsylvania is the only one of the thirteen colonies to be entirely landlocked, other than the access via the Delaware River.)

So putting a government together would, of course, be the first order of business, and they did manage to do it pretty quickly.

Incidentally, John McKinly was not only the first governor of Delaware, he was the only governor of that state who is foreign-born; McKinly emigrated to America from Ireland when he was a young adult.

Mike mentions that McKinly was captured by the British in 1777, but didn’t have time to add that the following year he was paroled almost a year later in a prisoner exchange that also set William Franklin (Benjamin’s son and the former Royal Governor of New Jersey) free.

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