Portal:Pennsylvania/Selected Biography/5

William Penn (October 14, 1644 – July 30, 1718) was founder and "Absolute Proprietor" of the Province of Pennsylvania, the English, North American colony and the future U.S. state of Pennsylvania. He was known as an early champion of democracy and religious freedom and famous for his treaty with the Lenape Indians. Well ahead of his time, Penn wrote and urged for a Union of all the English colonies in what was to become the United States of America. The democratic principles that he set forth in the Pennsylvania Frame of Government served as an inspiration for the United States Constitution. As a pacifist Quaker, Penn considered the problems of war and peace deeply, and included a plan for a United States of Europe, "European Dyet, Parliament or Estates," in his voluminous writings.

Penn was born in London in 1644, the son of Admiral Sir William Penn and Margaret Jasper, the daughter of a Rotterdam merchant. His father served in the Royal Navy (controlled by parliament) during the English Civil War and was rewarded by Oliver Cromwell with estates in Ireland. Later, though, his father took part in the restoration of Charles II and was knighted by him. Penn was educated at Chigwell School, by private tutors in Ireland and then at Christ Church, Oxford. (Read more...)