The Important Facts About William Penn

William Penn is known, of course, as the founder of Pennsylvania. He is also known as a famous Quaker and for his Great Treaty wit hthe Delaware. What is known however, is often obscured by myth. For example, Penn did not name his colony after himself(as he feared would be assumed), but after his recently departed father. He had wanted to call the colony New Wales or Sylvania but King Charles II intervened, suggesting instead Pennsylvania. It was the father after all, who left Penn his wealth, including the King's debt to him- which Charles II paid in full with a hefty chunk of New World land. Also, Penn only became a Quaker in his twenties, shortly after posing for his only painted portrait-the one with the lad in a full suit of armor. Peace-loving indeed. Yet peace is what he was loved and memorialized for, especially for his treaty with the Leni Leanpe(Delaware). "I desire to gain your Love and Friendship by a kind, Just and Peaceable life" he wrote to them from England. And he followed up with that desire with his "holy experiment".