Elizabeth Shipley

(According to http://www.brandywinevillage.org/1730.html ):

Although the family of Tyman Stidham, a Swedish colonist, ran the first mill on the Brandywine, before 1687 the site of Brandywine Village is attributed to Elizabeth Levis Shipley. In the early 1730s she was said to have dreamed about a ford on a creek where its rapids suddenly became calm offering a perfect location for milling and transportation. Upon finding the ford existed on the Brandywine Creek as it reached the low coastal plain close to the Christina River , the family made the important decision to move from Pennsylvania to settle in the just forming town of Willingtown , now Wilmington , Delaware . The transportation of wheat, the main crop of Pennsylvania farmers, was expensive over inland routes. William Shipley reasoned if wheat was brought to a location near the Christina River to be milled, the flour could be transported by ship with greater ease to Philadelphia and European markets.