New Castle

Formed August 8, 1683 (2^nd county)

New Castle County (570,721), Wilmington (70,893)

A glass and concrete and red brick Modern style building is the courthouse.  It was built in 2002 as the latest replacement courthouse (others were built in 1914 and 1881.)  New Castle was the original county seat with a 1732 courthouse.  The courthouse is located on King Street between 5^th and 4^th streets.  Interstate Highway 95 is 13 blocks west of the site and United States Highway 13 passes in front of the courthouse.  Buck Simpers and Associates, Grozen Samton, Justice Planning Associates, HLM Design, Inc., and Beyer & Associates are the architects.  An Administrative Center was later created from an existing building.  The county was created on August 8, 1683 from Sussex County as the 2^nd county.  Kent County was later created out of part of New Castle County.  New Castle County was the birthplace of 20 Delaware Governors, John Cook, Nicholas Van Dyke, Thomas Collins, Gunning Bedford, Sr., John Clark, Charles Thomas, Thomas Stockton, John P. Cochran, Robert J. Reynolds, John Hunn, Preston Lea, Robert P. Robinson, C. Douglass Buck, Richard C. McMullen, Walter W. Bacon, David P. Buckson, Pierre S. du Pont IV, Michael N. Castle, Jack A. Markell, and John C. Carney, Jr.  The county is named for the city which was named for the territory in England.  The county seat is named for the Earl of Wilmington.  The center of the county is 17.6 miles Southwest of Wilmington nearer Middletown. 

New Castle County government consists of a sheriff, recorder, and administrator (executive).  It has 13 Levy Court Members (legislative.)  Sixteen Superior Court Judges and Five Common Pleas Judges, clerk, and county attorney serve New Castle County (judicial.)  The county is the northern county of three in the state.  It borders New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Maryland.  The county is surrounded clockwise by Pennsylvania and New Jersey and Kent County and Maryland. 

The area of the county is 494 square miles.  It is 3 out of 3 in the state.  It ranks 1 out of 3 in population in the state.  It has a density of 1155.3 persons per square mile making it 1 out of 3 in the state.  New Castle County has 25.3% of its population in its incorporated areas.  Interstate Highway 95 crosses the county from northeast, Pennsylvania, to west, Maryland.  United States Highway 13 originates in the county and travels south into Kent County.  United States Highway 40 parallels Interstate Highway 95 from New Jersey to Maryland.  United States Highway 202 enters from the north (Pennsylvania) and terminates in Delaware.  United States Highway 301 originates in the county and exits to the southwest into Maryland.  The highest point in Delaware is in the county.  The overall county shape is like a lobster claw.  Wilmington is in the far northeast corner of the county.  Wilmington is the county seat and the largest city.  It is 12.4% of the county population.  The county is in the Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington Metropolitan Statistical Area.