Mercer Area District was created at the end of 1981 with the merger of the Lenape Trail, Stony Brook, and Sanhican districts. Lenape Trail was Ewing Township. Sanhican District was the city of Trenton. Stony Brook represented the Princeton and Pennington Areas. Consolidation of the smaller areas provided considerable cost savings to the Council. At the same time an Exploring District was established, overlapping the Mercer Area District, with both traditional and Career Education Exploring (now known as Learning for Life).

This patch was first distributed in the early 1980s.