Petrodelphia: America's First Petrochemical Corridor
An educational website about the history of the South Philadelphia refinery complex and the changing landscapes of the lower Schuylkill River.
This project originated in 2020, the year the South Philadelphia refinery complex permanently closed, which also happened to be the year principal investigator Jared Farmer joined the faculty of the University of Pennsylvania. At Penn, Farmer began teaching courses on Pennsylvania fossil fuel history and began doing collaborative research with students. Over time, the primary output of Farmer’s “Petrodelphia” project came into focus: a freely accessible public-facing website for collecting and curating historical sources about the lower Schuylkill River petrochemical corridor, and for sharing scholarship that synthesizes that information. With technical help from the Penn Libraries, Farmer launched this website in 2025, in advance of the US Semiquincentennial (250th anniversary) in Philadelphia.
The deepest purpose of “Petrodelphia” is to inspire and facilitate scholarship, storytelling, and sharing. Many important stories about America’s first petrochemical corridor remain to be told.
Many other people contributed to the creation of this project. View the full list on the project's "Credits" page.
