Mount Airy | |
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 Daniel Billmeyer House on Germantown Avenue | |
  Mount Airy | |
| Coordinates:40°03′58″N75°11′02″W / 40.066°N 75.184°W /40.066; -75.184 | |
| Country | United States |
| State | Pennsylvania |
| County | Philadelphia County |
| City | Philadelphia |
| ZIP Code | 19119 |
| Area codes | 215, 267, and 445 |
Mount Airy is aneighborhood ofNorthwest Philadelphia in theU.S. state ofPennsylvania.
Mount Airy is bounded on the northwest by theCresheim Valley, which is part ofFairmount Park. Beyond this liesChestnut Hill. On the west side is theWissahickon Gorge, which is also part ofFairmount Park, beyond which liesRoxborough andManayunk.Germantown borders the southeast of Mount Airy, and Stenton Avenue marks the northeast border. Beyond Stenton Avenue isCedarbrook (which is considered to be part of Mount Airy by some) andWest Oak Lane.[citation needed]
The 19119 ZIP code is almost entirely coterminous with the cultural-consensus boundaries of Mount Airy.[1][2][3]
There is no official boundary between Mount Airy andGermantown. The most common consensus is that Johnson Street is the de facto boundary; however, the West Mount Airy Neighbors and East Mount Airy Neighbors organizations consider Washington Lane to be Mount Airy's southern edge.[1] The question is moot, however, as the two neighborhoods blend together very gradually.[citation needed] Historically, the entire area was part of theGerman Township. Many buildings in Mount Airy carry the identity and even the name of Germantown in one way or another. For example, the Unitarian Society of Germantown, the Germantown Jewish Centre, the Germantown Christian Assembly, and the Germantown Montessori School are all in Mount Airy, yet also belong culturally to Germantown. Parts of theBattle of Germantown in 1777 occurred throughout Mount Airy.[1] The special relationship linking the two has its roots in the time before theAct of Consolidation, when Germantown was a borough separate from the City of Philadelphia, and its rural environs were what is now Mount Airy.[1]
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William Allen, a prominent Philadelphia merchant and Chief Justice of theProvince of Pennsylvania, created his summer estate and mansion on Germantown Avenue at Allens Lane in 1750, and the area eventually took the building's name, Mount Airy, as its own.[2][4] Before this, the area which makes up the modern neighborhood of Mount Airy was part of two sections of the original Germantown Township (which covered all of Germantown, Mount Airy, and Chestnut Hill), Cresheim andBeggarstown.
The village orDorfshaft of Krisheim (also known as Cresheim) has its origins in the original land divisions ofGermantown Township in 1689.[5] It was a section of the township that was allotted to a group of original Germantown settlers who acquired rights to land either directly or indirectly from William Penn. It covered the area from Stenton to Wissahickon Avenues and from Mermaid Lane to roughly Sedgwick Street. The name is derived from a town known today asKriegsheim in the Palatine in Germany which was the hometown of a few German Quaker families who had settled in Germantown in the 1680s. Throughout much of the 18th century, this area of Germantown Township was known in the land and tax records as simply Cresheim or Cresham. It was at the beginning of the 19th century that the name Mount Airy began to replace Cresheim.[6]
Beggarstown (also Beggars-town or Beggar Town), an area centered along Germantown Avenue between Gorgas Lane and Cliveden Street, was formed out of the so-called "Sidelands" of Germantown. The Sidelands were a section of Germantown Township that had been set aside so that the owners of lots in the center of Germantown could have access to an equal share of land in the entire village of Germantown section of Germantown Township. The portion from which Beggarstown grew covered the area from Upsal Street to roughly Sedgwick Street, Stenton Avenue, and Wissahickon Avenue. As the Germantown village filled up, settlers began to move northwest along Germantown Avenue. By the 1730s and 1740s, the Sidelands area was subdivided into smaller house lots. An account published in 1770 states that the area received its name as a result of its first resident's begging for money to build his house, which later became the home of the GermantownChurch of the Brethren. The name for this area disappeared by the late 19th century, and it was sometimes called Pelham, Germantown, or Mount Airy.[citation needed]
Much of modern Mount Airy was developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, spreading out fromGermantown Avenue and two railroad lines. Large three-story, gray-stone Victorian, colonial revival, and Norman and Cotswold-style houses and mansions, with stained glass windows and slate roofs, are situated on many of the area's tree-lined streets. They dominated districts like West Mount Airy's Pelham section (a Wendell and Smith development from the 1890s),[7] East Mount Airy's Gowen Avenue (the James Gowen Estate development from the 1880s), Sedgwick Farms (an Ashton S. Tourison development from 1905), and Stenton (a Frank Mauran development from 1905) areas.
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As of theU.S. Census Bureau 2021 American Community Survey, the 19119 which encompasses Mount Airy had 29,206 residents.[8]
Of those residents, 57.4% were Black or African-American, 33.2% White/Caucasian, 2.8% Hispanic, 1.3% Asian, and 5.3% were from other races or from 2 or more races.
There were 12,564 households. 50.5% of households were married couples living together, 21.2% had a female householder, 7.2% had a male householder, and 21.1% were non-families. The average household size was 2.3.
Of Mount Airy's residents, 19.5% were under the age of 18 and 19% were 65 years and over. The median age was 42 years. 54.4% of residents were female. 45.6% of residents were male.
The median household income was $72,685 and the per capita income was $48,997.
The area is recognized by manycivil rights groups as one of the first successfullyintegrated neighborhoods in America.[9][10] Mount Airy residents organized to resistblockbusting,panic selling, andredlining, especially during the period from the late 1950s to the early 1970s when those practices were prevalent.[11][12] It continues to be a well-blended neighborhood and was cited inOprah Winfrey'sO magazine for its racial diversity and neighborhood appeal. The community has also been recognized byU.S. News & World Report for racial harmony and balance.[13]
TheSchool District of Philadelphia operates area public schools. Zoned K–5 schools serving sections of Mt. Airy include the Eleanor C. Emlen School. Zoned K–8 schools serving sections of Mt. Airy include Charles W. Henry School, Henry H. Houston School, and the Anna L. Lingelbach School.[14] Residents assigned to Henry, Houston, and/or Lingelbach are also zoned toRoxborough High School;[15] they were previously zoned toGermantown High School.[16] Other nearby schools include Academy for the Middle Years, Parkway High School, andMartin Luther King High School.[14]
West Oak Lane Charter School and Wissahickon Charter School are two Mt. Airy area K–8 charter schools. Charter schools in nearby Germantown include Imani Education Circle Charter School (K–8), Germantown Settlement Charter School (5–8), Renaissance Charter School (6–8), and Delaware Valley Charter High School (9–12).[14]
Private schools in Mount Airy include Blair Christian Academy (PreK–12), Revival Hill Christian High School (9–12), Islamic Day School of Philadelphia (PreK–5), Waldorf School of Philadelphia (PreK–8), Project Learn School (K–8), Classroom on Carpenter Lane (K–2), and Holy Cross School (K–8), a parochial school. Private schools in nearbyGermantown include theGreen Tree School (special education, ages 6–21),Germantown Friends School (K–-12),William Penn Charter School (K–12),Greene Street Friends School (K–8), and thePennsylvania School for the Deaf (ages 3–17).
Universities and colleges close to Mount Airy includeArcadia University,Chestnut Hill College,La Salle University, TheLutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia,Thomas Jefferson University, andSaint Joseph's University.[14]
Free Library of Philadelphia operates the Lovett Square Branch at 6945 Germantown Avenue.[17]
TwoSEPTA Regional Rail lines connect the neighborhood toCenter City. TheChestnut Hill West Line runs through West Mount Airy with stops atUpsal,Carpenter, andAllen Lane stations and theChestnut Hill East Line runs through East Mount Airy with stops atMount Airy,Sedgwick, andStenton stations.
The neighborhood is also served by bus routes 18,23 (formerly a trolley line),53 (formerly a trolley line), 51, and 71.
In 2011,The New York Times described the influx of new businesses to Mount Airy as a "cultural revival" buoyed by "the neighborhood's reasonable housing costs and relatively safe streets."[18] In 2013,CNNMoney named Mount Airy one of America's top ten best big-city neighborhoods.[19]
The political tone of the neighborhood is predominantly progressive.[18] One prominent Mount Airy politician is former Republican mayoral candidateSam Katz.
There are three Jewish congregations in Mount Airy (Germantown Jewish Centre, P'nai Or Jewish Renewal Congregation of Philadelphia, andChabad-Lubovitch of Northwest Philadelphia) and the national office of the Jewish organization The Shalom Center.[20]
AHare Krishna community is located on West Allens Lane.[21]
Mount Airy's main commercial district lies along stone-pavedGermantown Avenue, which also serves as the boundary between East and West Mount Airy. The neighborhood has a variety of independent shops, restaurants, art galleries, clothing stores, coffee shops, agastropub, wine bar, fitness centers, and professional offices. Mt. Airy also has two tentedfarmers' markets.[22] TheSedgwick Theater, notable for its art deco style, has been a cultural center in the past, and now houses the Quintessence Theatre Group.[23][24][25]
TheWeavers Way Co-op, a long-runningco-op grocery store in West Mount Airy,[26] also manages two working farms, works with local schools, and provides fresh food to a shelter.[27]
In 2006, Mt. Airy was recognized by local government andmovement leaders as having a significant number of lesbian households,[28] similarly to how views were contemporaneously changing regarding theEast Passyunk Crossing neighborhood, as it was dubbed by some as Philadelphia's "NewGayborhood" by around the same time period.[29][30][31]
pastorius.and another account that appears in the "Grund und Lager Buch" translated by Learned on p. 137.
{{cite news}}:Missing or empty|title= (help)) or simply "Mount Airy" around 1820 (Marriage notice for "Miss Ann Gorgas, of Mount Airy, Germantown"The American Daily Advertiser. February 17, 1818.{{cite news}}:Missing or empty|title= (help)).
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