Historic Quaker Houses of Philadelphia

The Evans House
322 Delancey Street
Built: 1786

Above: The Evans House, built by Quaker house carpenter Jonathan Evans, Jr. for his family. Image source: Lee J. Stoltzfus.

  Jonathan Evans, Jr. (1759 - 1839), was a grandson of Welsh immigrants who arrived in Pennsylvania in 1698. He married Hannah Bacon in 1786. The couple had seven children.
Evans was a house carpenter in Philadelphia, and he built this house for his family. He became a leader in the Quaker community where he was involved in the Orthodox / Hicksite separation of 1827. During that time of schism numerous Quaker conferences were held here in this house.

Above: Image source: The Colonial Homes of Philadelphia, Eberlein and Lippincott, 1912, Internet Archive.

 Jonathan Evans: Jailed by Patriots during the Revolutionary War
For his Quaker Anti-war Faith:

Above: Text image source: The Colonial Homes of Philadelphia, Eberlein and Lippincott, 1912, Internet Archive.

 Johnathan Evans Became a Devout Quaker
After Reading No Cross No Crown by William Penn.
Penn and Evans were Both Jailed for their Quaker Faith:

Image source: Above left: Library of Congress, Lithograph by Albert Rosenthal, 1925. Above right: Peter Harrington London.

  Above: This is a portrait of William Penn at age 22. Two years later, in 1669, he wrote No Cross, no Crown, while imprisoned in the Tower of London for defying the Church of England by promoting his Quaker faith. In this landmark book Penn cites more than 60 authors whose quotations he had memorized.
Penn was jailed in an unheated cell for eight months because of his defiance of the Anglican establishment. He wrote, “My prison shall be my grave before I will budge a jot: for I owe my conscience to no mortal man.” Quote source: Hans Fantel, William Penn: Apostle of Dissent.
Jonathan Evans, the Philadelphia house carpenter, also was imprisoned for his Quaker faith. Pennsylvania patriots imprisoned him for being an anti-war conscientious objector during the Revolutionary War. Evans knew he was following in the footsteps of William Penn.

 House Carpenter Jonathan Evan’s Plain Quaker Houses
and his Family’s Plain Quaker Furniture:

Above: Text image source: The Colonial Homes of Philadelphia, Eberlein and Lippincott, 1912, Internet Archive.

 The Evans House Description
Philadelphia Register of Historic Places:

 The Evans House
In a 1935 Article by Horace Mather Lippincott:

Image source: Above left: Jstor, Above right: Penn Libraries

Horace Mather Lippincott was a renowned Quaker editor and historian at the University of Pennsylvania. He graduated from Penn in 1897 and was an active member of the Green Street Monthly Meeting. He later was with the Abington Monthly Meeting,
Lippincott’s writing focuses on Philadelphia's history and Quaker heritage. His works include:

  • The Colonial Homes of Philadelphia and Its Neighborhood (1912)

  • A Portraiture of the People Called Quakers (1915)

  • George Washington and the University of Pennsylvania (1916)

  • Early Philadelphia, Its People, Life, and Progress (1917)

  • The University of Pennsylvania, Franklin’s College (1919)

  • An Account of the People Called Quakers in Germantown, Philadelphia (1923)

  • Some Old Quaker Houses in the Philadelphia Neighborhood (1935)

 Links: