By the time John Diffenderfer arrived in Philadelphia from the Palatinate region of Europe (modern western Germany) in 1727, William Penn’s invitation to those seeking religious freedom was already a few decades old. Nevertheless, by 1728 Diffenderfer and his family settled in the wooded countryside, near what would become New Holland, Lancaster County. Other German farmers that followed Diffenderfer were spread thinly across the countryside of northern Lancaster County. When the county was created in 1729, from a slice of Chester County, the area around present-day New Holland, was named Earl Township.