[4] The lands that constitute present-day Schuylkill County were acquired by William Penn's proprietors in a treaty executed August 22, 1749, with representatives of the Six Nations and the Delaware, Shamokin, and Shawnee tribes, who received 500 pounds in "lawful money of Pennsylvania".

In 1754, present-day Schuylkill, Berks, Dauphin, Lebanon, and Lehigh counties were settled by German immigrants.

In 1846, the state legislature passed an Act that was approved by Governor Francis R. Shunk on March 13, submitting the question to the voters.

The change was desired principally because the railroad and canal connections with Orwigsburg were problematic while Pottsville had facilities and was within easy access from all parts of the county.

[9] In 1812, George Shoemaker and Necho Allen discovered stone coal at Centerville in Schuylkill County, and personally delivered some of it to Philadelphia.

Most of the experiments failed, and Shoemaker was nearly run out of town and called an imposter but Mellon and Bishop of Delaware County successfully used it in their rolling mill.

When other rolling mills also adopted the use of coal as fuel, a large industrial market and demand developed.

These discoveries brought excitement and speculation; lands were bought and sold; roads were laid out in the forest, mines were opened and railroads projected, and innumerable town plots planned.

In these years, coal mining operations in the Schuylkill region were conducted with economy, and relatively little capital was required.

Consumption of coal along the Schuylkill above Philadelphia in 1839 was 30,290 tons when Pottsville, the first anthracite furnace in the United States, became operational.

[11] The numerous jobs in the mining industry comprised a catalyst for mass immigration to Schuylkill County from the British Isles and Europe in the 19th and 20th centuries.

Such industries included manufacturing of explosives, metal screens, pump components, piping, and timber for support.

Beginning with the Irish immigration in the 1840s, which was fueled by the Great Famine and followed the end of the Civil War, immigrants from Eastern Europe, including Poles, Hungarians, Lithuanians, Slovaks, Rusyns, Ukrainians, and Belarusians (which were usually known as Ruthenians), often from the Austro-Hungarian monarchy, settled in Schuylkill County and labored in the county coal mines.

Frustration with Bruno family's control of the school board and other local offices had been growing for years.

In the fertile agricultural valleys (not underlain with coal) between the Blue Mountain range in the south to near the Susquehanna River to the north, generations of farming families have helped feed their neighbors in the mines, on the rails, on the canals, and in the towns within and surrounding the county.

After then, more highly mechanized small farms combined livestock and crop production for new, mainly local and regional markets.

Chartered in 1831, tracks were laid from the flats in Schuylkill Haven along the river through Cressona and Minersville to Tremont.

[citation needed] At one point in the 19th century, the largest railyard and roundhouse in the world was located at Mill Creek between Pottsville and St. Clair.

Since the early 21st century, Schuylkill County has decreased its use of coal power and become a major producer of renewable energy.

[25] Another textile giant, John E. Morgan Knitting Mills, began manufacturing in 1945 in Tamaqua, eventually becoming the largest employer in the county in the between 1970 and 1980.

[26] In addition there were numerous smaller shops all over the county, doing subcontract work for major manufacturers all over the nation.

As a consequence of the Great Depression, garment manufacturers began to look for people willing to work at lower wages outside of New York City, the center of the industry.

As a result, like other portions of the Poconos, eastern Schuylkill has experienced an influx of people from New York City and New Jersey who commute into Manhattan each day.

The Civil Division processes real estate and property paperwork, as well as issue firearms permits.

The Criminal Division is responsible for the security of the courthouses, as well as the transportation of prisoners to and from court hearings and to other correctional facilities.

The Sheriff's Department provides all facets of security for the County courthouse and makes arrests inside the courthouse for various offenses including possession of weapons and controlled substances as well as the arrest of disorderly persons and other violations of the Pennsylvania Crimes Code Title 18.

When requested by other police agencies, the Sheriff's Department performs patrol duties in various communities within Schuylkill county and provides support to other Police agencies during major incidents, search warrant executions, arrest warrant operations, special events and in various other capacities.

This GOP resurgence has been followed by the subsequent election of Donald Trump in 2016, where he received 69% of the area's popular vote to Hillary Clinton's 26.7%.

[44][45] School districts include:[47] Under Pennsylvania law, there are four types of incorporated municipalities: cities, boroughs, townships, and, in at most two cases, towns.

The following cities, boroughs and townships are located in Schuylkill County: Census-designated places are unincorporated communities designated by the U.S. Census Bureau for the purposes of compiling demographic data.