The "Thousand Acre Tract" of land at the confluence of the Delaware and Lehigh Rivers was selected and surveyed in 1736, by Thomas Penn and Benjamin Eastburn. The new town was to be called "Easton" in the new county of "Northampton", after Thomas Penn's wife Juliana Fermor's home estate of Easton-Neston, Northamptonshire, England. On July 8, 1776, the square was the site for one of only three public readings of the Declaration of Independence. This historic event is celebrated each year on Heritage Day.