Swatara Gap is a

water gap A water gap is a gap that flowing water has carved through a mountain range or mountain ridge and that still carries water today. Such gaps that no longer carry water currents are called wind gaps. Water gaps and wind gaps often offer a pract ...

through Blue Mountain formed by the

Swatara Creek Swatara Creek (nicknamed the Swatty) is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map accessed August 8, 2011 tributary of the Susquehanna River in east-central Pennsylvania in the United S ...

Lebanon County, Pennsylvania Lebanon County ( ; ) is a county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States. As of the 2020 census, the population was 143,257. Its county seat is the city of Lebanon. It lies 72 miles northwest of Philadelphia, which is the nearest m ...

. PA Route 72 as well as

Interstate 81 Interstate 81 (I-81) is a north–south (physically northeast–southwest) Interstate Highway in the eastern part of the United States. Its southern terminus is at Interstate 40, I-40 in Dandridge, Tennessee, Dandridge, Tennessee; its nort ...

pass through the gap. The

Appalachian Trail The Appalachian Trail, also called the A.T., is a hiking trail in the Eastern United States, extending almost between Springer Mountain in Georgia and Mount Katahdin in Maine, and passing through 14 states.Gailey, Chris (2006)"Appalachian Tra ...

passes through the gap over the

Waterville Bridge The Waterville Bridge is a lenticular truss bridge designed and manufactured by the Berlin Iron Bridge Co. It was built in 1890. It was relocated from Waterville, Pennsylvania, Waterville, Lycoming County, Pennsylvania, to Swatara State Park in ...

in Swatara State Park. The area was a

fossil A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserve ...

collecting site. "Swatara" comes from a

Susquehannock The Susquehannock, also known as the Conestoga, Minquas, and Andaste, were an Iroquoian Peoples, Iroquoian people who lived in the lower Susquehanna River watershed in what is now Pennsylvania. Their name means “people of the muddy river.” T ...

word, ''Swahadowry'' or ''Schaha-dawa'', which means "where we feed on eels". Ancient Native Americans built dozens of eel-

weir A weir or low-head dam is a barrier across the width of a river that alters the flow characteristics of water and usually results in a change in the height of the water level. Weirs are also used to control the flow of water for outlets of l ...

s, V-shaped rock barriers designed to funnel eels to facilitate capture, on the

Susquehanna River The Susquehanna River ( ; Unami language, Lenape: ) is a major river located in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic region of the United States, crossing three lower Northeastern United States, Northeast states (New York, Pennsylvani ...

and its tributaries.William Henry Egle, ''History of the Counties of Dauphin and Lebanon: in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania; Biographical and Genealogical,'' Philadelphia: Everts and Peck, 1883
/ref> File:Waterville Bridge, Swatara Gap, PA - Appalachian Trail crossing.jpg,

crossing

on the

References

Water gaps of Pennsylvania Landforms of Lebanon County, Pennsylvania Geology of Pennsylvania {{LebanonCountyPA-geo-stub

See also

References