Revolt and execution: the little known Pompton Mutiny

We've shared many aspects about the many heroic, though lesser-known aspects of New Jersey's Revolutionary War history. We've visited places where patriotic militias turned back the British, and other sites where the locals put up a good fight but ended up losing their homes. And we've marveled at the tenacity of the men who endured the terrible winter of 1779-1780 in the rough log huts of the Jockey Hollow encampment, surviving despite minimal rations, ragged clothing and, in many cases, without even the most rudimentary of footwear.

More than two centuries later, it's easy to look upon the hardships and the outcome of the war, and assume that the men of Washington's army were some sort of saints who endured in the knowledge that they would emerge victorious. Grade school history books do nothing to tarnish that assumption, but we're talking about very human people put into an extraordinarily awful situation. The conditions were enough to try anyone's patience, and, in fact, some were stretched to their breaking points. Adding insult to injury, many hadn't been paid in quite some time, and newer recruits were getting more generous bounties than longstanding soldiers had gotten when they enlisted.

By January 1781, the troops of the Pennsylvania Line of the Continental Army had had enough. Believing their three-year hitch was up, they left their Jockey Hollow camp to air their grievances with the commonwealth's Supreme Executive Council (effectively the group acting as governor). Long story short, the two sides ultimately agreed that the longer-serving soldiers would be discharged and allowed to reenlist, thus receiving the more generous bounty. One might say they were rewarded for severe insubordination, not something that military leadership would generally want to encourage.

A few small markers at Jockey Hollow offer brief mentions of the Pennsylvania Line mutiny, but the New Jersey mutiny -- and there was one -- is a little harder to find.

The exact location is in question, but you can learn about it on Newark-Pompton Turnpike in Riverdale, from a marker across the road from the grade school. Ivan found it: a small sign about the size of a "no parking" warning, that's labeled "Pompton Mutiny."

Encamped near Federal Hill overlooking present day Passaic County, the soldiers of the New Jersey Line were just as destitute as their Pennsylvania brethren -- poorly clothed and malnourished. And like their cohorts, about 200 of the Jerseymen set off to air their grievances to the state government in Trenton. Hearing of the Pennsylvanians' success along the way, these new mutineers soon returned to Pompton, hoping for a similar outcome. Receiving none, they revolted again a few days later.

This mutiny would end much differently. Once he received word of the revolt from camp commander Colonel Israel Shreve, General George Washington took quick and decisive action. A wave of mutinies would destroy the Continental Army even as Congress was working to resolve longstanding pay issues. Maintaining order was essential to a strong military, and an early example had to be set. He sent General Robert Howe and 500 troops south from West Point to quell the disturbance, with no allowances for negotiation. To further emphasize the seriousness of his intent, Washington ordered, "If you succeed in compelling the revolted troops to a surrender you will instantly execute a few of the most active and most incendiary leaders."

That's exactly what happened on January 27, 1781. After surrounding the mutinous bunch and finding no further resistance, Howe selected about a dozen of the mutineers as a firing squad to execute their ringleaders, Sergeants David Gilmore and John Tuttle.

In a letter to New Jersey Governor William Livingston, Washington portrayed the executions as an inevitable step in quelling the revolt:  "The spirit of mutiny seems now to have completely subsided and to have given place to a genuine repentance. This was very far from being the case previous to this step, notwithstanding the apparent submission which the assurances of redress had produced; they still continued insolent and refractory and disobedient to the commands of their officers."

Where, exactly, all of this occurred, is up for conjecture, perhaps fueled by the fact that the area known as Pompton during the revolution has been divided into four separate towns in the years since. Besides the Riverdale sign that caught our attention, another marker on Union Avenue in Bloomingdale claims marks the spot of the execution of two of the mutineers. Some say that the graves of Gilmore and Tuttle are somewhere on Federal Hill, marked only by the piles of stones heaped upon their final resting places.

Forging iron, not fright, on Clinton Road

When talking to folks about Hidden New Jersey, we sometimes get suggestions for stories that are more along the "scary" or "spooky" than the historic or natural. We generally leave those to other websites and publications that have a long history of covering them.

But sometimes, there's a convergence -- a site with scare factor that actually has some history attached.

Mention Clinton Road to a large subset of New Jersey explorers, and you're likely to hear a string of stories about scary goings on and late-night encounters with angry, high-beam flashing pickup trucks and shrouded apparitions that may or may have satanic intent. This sparsely-populated, two-lane road winds through several miles of woods in West Milford, attracting scores of adventure seekers who often stop at a small bridge to throw coins at a spirit who, according to legend, will toss them right back.

Our story isn't about any of that.

Nothing's spooky about
the Clinton Furnace.

A while back, Ivan and I took the right turn off Route 23 North and onto Clinton Road, likely in the search for an interesting bird or two, when we came upon a large pile of stone that had been very purposefully set. This wasn't, as the spooky storytellers would have you believe, a Druid temple. Having seen my share of lime kilns and furnaces, I knew we were onto something very old and very industrial.

Indeed, we'd stumbled on the Clinton Furnace, one of a number of old ironworks scattered in the wilderness of Passaic County and neighboring New York State. Scanning the environment, you can see why William Jackson bought about 1000 acres of land there in 1826 to process iron. Two ponds and the nearby Clinton Falls provided ample water and power to operate his planned sawmill and gristmill, and the surrounding forest contained enough timber to make the charcoal that would keep the furnace running.

According to the Friends of the Long Pond Ironworks, Jackson was unable to finish the project and sold the property to a buyer who flipped it to John Winslow and Freeman Wood, the partnership that completed construction in 1833. They operated it as the Clinton Ironworks for three years before selling it to a new owner who ran it sporadically for another year, finally abandoning it in favor of a forge. These being the times before coal was a viable fuel option, it appears that they'd exhausted the local supply of wood for charcoal, forcing the closure of the perpetually hungry furnace. The remaining forge continued operation for about 15 years before it was finally abandoned in 1852, and the property became part of the Pequannock Watershed in 1900, serving as part of the water supply for the city of Newark ever since.  

Clinton Furnace stands today as one of the best preserved ironworks of its kind in northern New Jersey, especially given its location along of the region's most storied "spooky" roads. Patrols from the Newark Watershed Commission have likely discouraged vandals from mischief on the structure, or maybe the tales of satanic rites in the area have put the fear into anyone who might have been inclined to harm the furnace. However, what we see today is just the bottom of the structure; originally an additional 11 feet of brickwork loomed above. 

Our visit elicited nothing but history, but I'd be remiss if I didn't share a postscript on the "spooky" aspects of Clinton Road:

During one of our birding ventures in Sussex County, we crossed paths with a birder who told us he lives just off of Clinton Road. He's very familiar with the legends surrounding the area, particularly the one about the spirit of a small boy who lives under the bridge and tosses back coins thrown to him. Holding up his rather pricey binoculars, the birder noted that over the years, collecting all of those coins has been a rather lucrative hobby for him. Moral of the story: if you've ever been one of those coin throwers, you can rest easy knowing that your pocket change has gone to a good cause.

Preakness: more than a horse race in Wayne

Every year on the third Saturday in May, thoroughbred horse racing fans watch the Preakness, the second leg of the famed Triple Crown. That's not to be confused with Preakness, the section of Wayne, but perhaps it should be.

Wayne is well known for mall shopping and sprawling suburbia, and the casual visitor would be excused for thinking that maybe some mid-20th century developer had borrowed the race name to give the area some cachet. You know, "Racetrack Estates at Preakness," or some nonsense like that. I have to admit I figured as much the first time I drove through and saw so many businesses using the label. It took some research to discover that the name, indeed, predates the both the race and European settlement in the area.

Preakness Stables was established in 1865 by Massachusetts businessman Milton Sandford, who'd made a fortune as a defense contractor during the Civil War. Like many well-heeled gentlemen, he used his riches to join the racing set, purchasing substantial acreage at what's now the corner of Valley Road and Preakness Avenue. Convenient to his New York offices and a recently built racetrack in Paterson, the land soon was the home of stables, a blacksmith shop and a three-quarter mile track. Sandford borrowed the Lenape name for the community, which has alternately been stated as "Proquales" (quail woods) or "Parekuis" (young buck), depending on the source.

Sandford also called one of his thoroughbreds Preakness, though the horse had been born elsewhere. Perhaps he was looking to build awareness of his new venture; if so his strategy was a good one. The four-legged Preakness made a stunning debut, winning the inaugural run of the Dinner Party Stakes at Pimlico in 1870. Now known as the Dixie Stakes, the race was, at the time, among the richest events of its kind in horse racing. Preakness went on to an impressive career, racing until the age of eight.

To honor the winner of its first race, the Pimlico track inaugurated the Preakness Stakes, with the first running in 1873. Interestingly, if you check out the race website, you'll find plenty of history about Pimlico, but nothing about the origin of the race name. If you happen to watch the race this Saturday, let me know if there's any mention.

Oh, and according to Wayne historians, all those sportscasters have been pronouncing the name wrong. Rather than "preek-ness," it's "preak-ness," with the first syllable rhyming with "brake."

The Botto house: uniting the workers of Paterson

It’s hard to imagine, but an unassuming century-old house in a cramped Haledon neighborhood was once the epicenter of a broad movement to improve industrial working conditions. The Botto house at 83 Norwood Street is now the home of the National Labor Museum, memorializing its role in the 1913 Paterson Silk Strike. On my recent visit I learned why silk workers stopped work and why Haledon became the nexus of the labor movement.

The Botto house on Norwood Street in Haledon

When I walked up to the porch and through the front door, I was struck by how cozy and welcoming the house is. Its original owners, Pietro and Maria Botto, were skilled silk workers who came to the United States from northern Italy in the 1890s. First settling in Union City, they bought five 25x100 lots in Haledon in 1908 to build their own house. The structure consisted of a ground floor with bedrooms, a parlor, kitchen, dining room and bathroom as well as a central hall. Upstairs, two railroad-style flats of three rooms and bathroom each were constructed to provide the family with rental income. A door at the front end of the upstairs hallway led outside to a porch that afforded a nice view of then-undeveloped land. The backyard included an arbor for grapes, plus a chicken coop, pigeon cage and rabbit hutch for meat and eggs.

While Maria inspected silk at home, Pietro worked in the Paterson mills, which were easily accessible via the Belmont Avenue trolley a few blocks from the family's house. The factory environment was a new experience for him, as most European weavers owned their own looms and consider themselves to be craftsmen rather than factory workers. 

The porch where labor organizers spoke to crowds
as large as 20,000

Labor unrest had a long history in Paterson, with strikes occurring as far back as the early 1800s. When mill owners converted to high-speed power looms in the late 1800s, they sought to increase productivity by having employees manage two of the new looms rather than just one. In 1913, the workers walked out when owners sought to double production once again, expecting weavers to manage four looms rather than two. The strikers called for improved conditions, an eight hour work day and an end to child labor. More than 23,000 employees left the factories, including broadloom and ribbon weavers, and dyers.

If all of this was happening in Paterson, why, then did Haledon play such a vital role in the strike? Over time, Silk City had become increasingly more hostile to worker protests, with the police becoming more allied with the mill owners. The mayor forbade the strikers from assembling within city limits, and the police were poised to enforce his will with violence, if necessary.

Haledon, however, was a far friendlier environment. Its mayor, William Bruekmann, was sympathetic to the mill workers, and the town had but one police officer, who was described by one newspaper account as “a slip of a man.” The strikers had already committed to a non-violent work action, and Haledon seemed to be an ideal place to gather.

Striking workers brought
their message to New York
through a pageant at Madison
Square Garden

Already familiar with labor struggles from his youth in Italy, Pietro Botto invited the strike organizers to hold rallies at his home. The house’s upstairs balcony made a great platform, and the land beyond was a natural amphitheater. Strikers could easily travel from Paterson on the trolley for the weekly rallies. The strike became a cause celebre for Greenwich Village intellectuals and union organizers. Speakers like Upton Sinclair, Big Bill Haywood, Carlo Tresca and Elizabeth Gurley Flynn gave rousing speeches before crowds of up to 20,000 supporters, speaking in German and Italian as well as English. The gatherings often took a festive air as singers and musicians performed between speeches.

After five months, the workers went back to the mills, lacking the funding to support their families any further. Though the manufacturers denied their demands for an eight-hour work day, they agreed to limit the workers to two looms. The strikers had achieved a great deal, nonetheless: they proved that non-violence and a democratic approach to labor organizing could bring them the visibility and progress they sought.

There’s a lot more to the story than we have room to spare. The American Labor Museum is holding a series of events to recognize the 100th anniversary of the strike, the perfect time to learn about this fascinating element of our immigrant and labor history. Check the museum's website for details.

It's Spring-time in Haledon!

I was on my way into Haledon when I came upon a sign for the National Spring Company. It seemed a little odd there would be a water spring in such a highly-developed area, but, well, I was driving along the ridge of the Watchung Mountains. There's a wooded area at the peak, so maybe there's a geologic reason the water would be better there than somewhere else.

My destination was the Botto House, now home to the National Labor Museum. I've meant to get there for a while, but the timing never seems to work out. Somehow I screwed up again and it wasn't open, so I found myself knocking around as I considered my next destination.

Then at the corner of Tilt Street and Southside Avenue, I saw something very out of place in a residential neighborhood: a white cinder block building set within a grassy park. It had what appeared to be two spigots and a trough, as well as a couple of official-looking signs. To me it looked like a larger version of those old milk-dispensing machines I vaguely remember from my childhood.

Of course, I needed to check it out. What I found was the Tilt Street spring house, owned by the Borough of Haledon.

The mention of a spring house usually brings up the vision of a little shack in the woods, or maybe in the back field of a farm, but here was one in the middle of a tightly-developed area. The signs outlined the operating hours (7:30 a.m. to 8 p.m.) and restrictions (four gallons, drawn into one gallon containers). It didn't look particularly hygienic, but then it didn't look all that grody, either. And of course, there were no handles to the faucets. To control access, those would be issued by the borough to residents.

When I looked into the history of Haledon a little, the presence of the spring house and National Spring made a little more sense. Founded in 1908, the borough was originally part of the now-defunct Manchester Township, and developers promoted the community's fresh air and good water as compelling reasons to settle. Despite the proximity to Paterson, it was a clean, peaceful respite from the city's noise and congestion.

The Belmont Avenue trolley offered convenient access to the mills, attracting many of the skilled workers who were immigrating from Europe to work in the silk industry (and leading to the Botto House's role in the Paterson silk strike of 1913, but that's a story for another day). Land along the flatter part of town was separated into 25x100 foot lots, providing a respite from congested city living. Larger tracts farther up the mountain were developed with villas for the wealthy. The estate of Garret Hobart, U.S. Vice President under McKinley, was in Haledon and eventually became part of William Paterson University.

So... what of the spring? There's basically nothing about it on the borough website, beyond a 2007 notification of the presence of coliform bacteria at a testing of the spring. You'd have to wonder about the continued purity of the water, given how built out the area is. Most springs are within a large buffer area of undeveloped land, and even a well known natural spring in Essex County's South Mountain Reservation has been closed off due to concerns about water quality.

 Anybody know what's become of the Tilt Street spring?

Entrepreneurial pluck: Dr. Rose Faughnan and Passaic Private Hospital

Long-time readers might remember our article on Dr. Rose Faughnan, the Ellis Island physician who was, herself, a classic example of the American immigrant success story. The daughter of Irish immigrants who came to the United States during the Potato Famine, she wasn't the only child in her family to achieve professional success. Among her siblings were a doctor, a lawyer and a teacher, demonstrating how quickly a family could rise to high achievement here.

A few weeks after we published the story, a Faughnan family member contacted me to share additional information on her remarkable aunt, whom the family calls Dr. Rose. It turns out that after leaving Ellis Island, she took a somewhat entrepreneurial approach to practicing medicine.

Courtesy Rose F. Stuart

It wasn't easy for women doctors to find jobs in the early 20th century, and many found civil service work in institutions like the Public Health Service or city or state governments. Even there they might find bias against them, both institutional and from colleagues. At the time, women were not eligible to take the exam to earn a commission from the PHS, so they were effectively restricted from hospital duty. Instead, they would be relegated to doing the initial exams on immigrants, determining which ones needed further examination before being allowed to enter the country. These ‘six second exams’ were necessary and important but less desirable as a work assignment, given the rigor of seeing as many as a few thousand people a day for a cursory look.

As I found from later research, Dr. Rose had been deemed "feministic" by one of her Ellis Island supervisors, likely because she wanted more challenging work. She resigned from the PHS in 1922 and continued her studies at the New York Lying-In Hospital, now the obstetrics and gynecology department of Weill Cornell Medical Center.

Like many strong-minded people before and since, Dr. Rose apparently decided to create her own career path, rather than relying on another employer. After leaving the Lying-In, she started a private hospital in Harrison but was soon persuaded by several patients to move her practice to Passaic. The community’s needs were acute: while the population was growing, only two general hospitals were available to serve residents there.

Dr. Rose bought a large house on High Street in Passaic and renovated it for use as a 12-bed hospital. Originally taking the overflow from Passaic General and St. Mary’s Hospitals, the facility was open to all physicians, with nurses on duty 24 hours a day. Eventually, as Passaic Beth Israel opened and the other hospitals expanded, Passaic Private focused more on maternity and chronic cases. A 1940 advertisement in the Passaic Medical Society Journal described the facility as “Ideal facilities for the care of invalids, chronic and convalescent cases, medical or surgical. Home cooking. Private, semi-private and ward cases. No contagious or tubercular cases accepted. Under State License.”

I haven’t been able to trace the fate of Passaic Private past that 1940 advertisement, though the Passaic city historian confirmed that the building itself was still there as recently as ten years ago. Dr. Rose died in 1947, with no mention of the hospital in her obituary in the Journal of the American Medical Association. I went to check out the property and found an empty, grassy lot. The only evidence of the building’s past existence is a stub of walkway that might have led to the front door.

It seems that the legacy of Dr. Rose’s work in Passaic is invisible to those who don’t know her story, but it’s no doubt evident in the lives she improved through her care, and the descendants of those she treated.

Cut it out! The big scissors of Paterson

Paterson is known as Silk City for good reason: at one point, two-thirds of the nation's silk output came from the city's 175 silk mills, which employed over 20,000 people.

The giant scissors of Paterson have absolutely nothing to do with that. Well, except that they're now displayed in the Passaic County Museum at Lambert Castle, the former home of silk magnate Catholina Lambert. Ivan and I found them not long after we discovered the world's largest spoon collection.

The story goes like this: like many employees, teachers in Paterson's school system wanted to know when the 'big boss' might come by to check on their work. Given that they were assigned to their particular rooms, it wasn't easy for them to communicate when classes were in session. Children would go unsupervised if one teacher went to tell another that the superintendent of schools was in the building, and that certainly wouldn't reflect well on them if the principal (or, God forbid, the superintendent) happened to notice. Thus, they had to find a way of getting the message around quickly. AND they had to do it in a way that didn't sound like "Act busy... the boss is coming!"

The big scissors!

A brilliant teacher came up with the perfect idea. You probably had a teacher or two who'd always be borrowing things from his or her colleagues, using students as the messengers. I can remember being sent to the next classroom to ask the teacher if he had some extra oaktag because Mrs. So-and-so had come up one sheet short for the class project. It happened often enough (more with some teachers than with others) that seeing a kid go from one classroom to the next was unremarkable and wouldn't be questioned.

Of course, you couldn't send a student to the next classroom to tell the teacher that Superintendent Wilson was in the building, but you also didn't want to send her with a request for something the teacher might have had available. The requested item had to be unusual enough to warrant asking a few teachers, but not so odd that it would raise suspicion.

It's apparently not known who came upon them as the perfect request, but the teachers agreed that if one of them saw the superintendent in the building, she'd send a student to the next room for the big scissors. That next teacher would say she didn't have them and send the child on to another teacher in the 'hopes' he'd have them on hand. In this very innocent way, the whole faculty would be alerted, and the principal and students would be none the wiser.

We also don't know if Superintendent John Wilson ever got word of the big, constantly-missing scissors during his visits, but they made a special appearance at his retirement dinner in 1944. Teachers presented him with a large wooden pair of shears and let him in on the secret. He must have been amused by the gag; he kept the prop and later donated it to the Passaic County Historical Society as an example of life in Paterson's school system.

The pen is mightier than the developer: the story of Fred Ferber

This weekend's search for winter finches brought us into Passaic County's more wooded spots, particularly the Pequannock watershed. Crossbills and evening grosbeaks look to coniferous trees for food, so the evergreen groves surrounding the Newark reservoir seemed the logical place for us to get a good look. The plan was to stop, look and listen: stop at a given stand of appropriate trees, walk a little along the road and into the forest, look for activity, and listen for the calls of our target species.

Our luck wasn't really holding as we seemed to be hitting our second consecutive weekend of dry birding, but we couldn't complain about the terrain or the scenery. Walking about five feet into a grove of towering pines, I was overwhelmed by the sheer number of trees as much as I was by their size. I've been to redwood forests in Northern California, and these weren't the same, yet they were more impressive in their own way. Because they're smaller in girth, I guess, they can grow more densely packed together, leaving the visitor with a feeling of walking among the legs of a crowd of very tall people. We heard little to no bird chatter, only the slight creaking of an older tree whose top was swaying in the breeze above. Underbrush was sparse, but several young Charlie Brown-type pines stood knee or waist high, waiting for their time in the sun.

Still, no birds of note. Maybe the finches just weren't buying what these evergreens had to offer. After several stops, Ivan suggested we could try something a little different. He knew of an area nearby that had once been the estate of Fred Ferber, the inventor of the ballpoint pen. It's unoccupied and overgrown now, but there might be traces of human habitation on the property, which is now part of Wawayanda State Park. Wait: the guy who invented the ballpoint lived in New Jersey? This was a new one on me. We had to check it out.

A few twists and turns brought us past a few houses and up an incline to a small, rustic parking lot. Another path the width of a road was off to one side and blocked to traffic by a gate. Old utility poles ran alongside the broad path for as far as I could see from the lot. That was our route to the site of Ferber's house, Ivan told me, toeing the ground in front of us to show me the remnants of macadam that must have been part of the driveway.

We walked along the path a bit, musing over whether the utility lines were still in service. Then we came upon a point where they'd fallen to the ground, perhaps in the most recent storm. A little farther along, the lines terminated at a final pole – either that or they were buried underground.

Reaching the top of a gentle hill, we found a clearing large enough for a house, but alas, nothing that could be construed as having been part of a dwelling. Ivan saw what looked to be a slab of molded concrete in a ravine below, but on further inspection we determined it was just a large rock.

What else could have been here? We saw a parting in a stand of rhododendrons nearby, so that seemed to be just as good a place as any to explore. What we found was pretty cool: a little bit of marshy area, fed by small streams that were crossed with stepping stones to ease a hiker's passage. Surely someone had put a lot of thought into this layout.

On getting home, I took to the internet to discover more of the story. Ferber emigrated from Austria in 1931, marrying Hedwig, a German immigrant, a few years later. Described by his wife as a dreamer, Ferber bounced from job to job but eventually found success as the inventor of a low-cost ballpoint pen. His Englewood-based Ferber Pen Company earned him a fortune that allowed him to take a run at his ultimate dream: preserving nature in the increasingly urbanizing Northeast corridor.

Buying a large expanse in West Milford, he later gave half his land to the state for the creation of Wawayanda State Park. Stories vary on how Fred and Hedwig ended up running an animal sanctuary, but it seems that they started feeding the wildlife, likely attracting more deer, bears and other creatures to the property than normally would have stopped by on their own.

According to a 1969 article in Life magazine, Ferber created a non-profit organization called Sussex Woodlands, which bought 3000 acres of land near Bearfort Mountain. National Audubon reportedly endorsed his plans for hiking trails and a conservation center, giving further weight to his presentations to universities and foundations he hoped would buy into his vision.

Apparently none did. Two years later, The New York Times reported that Ferber was attempting to sell the property to the state for $1.5 million to cover his back mortgage and property tax payments. Developers had offered him $4 million, but he stood firm on his dream, even when foreclosure and a sheriff’s auction were imminent. The state had insufficient Green Acres funding to purchase the land, but the bank and towns of Vernon and West Milford were reportedly willing to work with the state to ensure the tract’s preservation. However, a later Times article reports that a group of unnamed Bergen County preservationists stepped forward to pay the back taxes when foreclosure appeared unavoidable.

Anyone familiar with land battles, particularly those involving environmentally sensitive areas, can guess that this took quite some time to work out. Eventually the state secured the land, minus 212 acres where the Ferbers continued to live until their deaths in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The most recent development I can find is that a widowed Hedwig was trying to figure out a way to keep their animal sanctuary running after her death.

I’m certain there’s a lot more to the story of Fred Ferber. For one thing, after selling his land to the state, he staked a claim to mine gold and silver on the property, though metallurgists confirmed he’d have to process over 6000 tons of local stone to garner one ounce of gold. Why would an environmentalist want to despoil pristine land with a mining operation? And I haven’t seen anything about the fate of the Ferber house itself. Could it be that we didn’t see signs of it because we were looking in the wrong place? Perhaps it’s still standing and occupied somewhere nearby. You have to love a good mystery.

Robert Erskine, Ringwood and the West Point chain

We're rather accustomed to finding unusual things on our journeys, but I'm still tickled when a random discovery unexpectedly links up with something I'd seen long ago. Most recently, it wasn't just a link: it was a chain.

The roots of the story are in a trip I made awhile ago to Constitution Island in the Hudson River. While I was there, I learned that the American forces tried a number of approaches to prevent the British Navy from advancing on strategically-important rivers. For example, not far from Fort Mercer on the Delaware, they modified a French system called chevaux-de-frise. It was conceptually the same as those spikes used in toll lanes and parking garages to prevent drivers from backing up in key areas (you know… the ones that puncture your tires if you go in the wrong direction). American General Robert Erskine devised a nautical version that, once sunk across the river, would wreak havoc on the hulls of any ships that dared to cross.

While these spikes were used in the Hudson, the Americans added another blocking mechanism for good measure. Fearing that the British would attempt to sail upriver from their stronghold in Manhattan, they placed a massive chain across the river between West Point and Constitution Island. That portion of the river was already difficult to navigate by ship, and the theory was that slowing traffic even further would provide additional time for the Americans to fire on their opponents from the elevated West Point vantage. From 1778 to 1782, the chain was set out in the spring to block passage, and then removed in the fall to prevent damage from ice in the winter.

Ultimately, the British never tried to get past the chain, though Benedict Arnold reportedly had claimed it could be breached. Some of the massive links were saved, though others were melted down for salvage. I saw a bunch during my visit to Constitution Island, where the anchor point and a short length are preserved near the dock.

What does this have to do with New Jersey? Consider that Washington and his military leadership relied on the state’s significant iron mines and forges for weapons and ammunition, earning the state the sobriquet of Arsenal of the Revolution. The chain had to be made somewhere, and it only made sense that it came from here.

Thing is, while I was fairly certain of that, I wasn’t sure exactly where it was made or where it ended up. Someone had told Ivan that a length of the chain was being used as a decorative border in front of a building near the Wayne/Paterson border, but when we checked it out, I saw that the links were very different from those I'd seen near the Hudson.

A pre-hurricane visit to Ringwood Manor helped to solve the mystery. The Manor, of course, was home to General Erskine, Washington’s chief geographer and surveyor during the war, as well as the operator of the Long Pond Ironworks. His mansion is fronted by several impressive examples of American military history, including the cannon used on the main deck of the U.S.S. Constitution during the War of 1812, and a mortar used during the Civil War. They're both lined up against a massive 25-link length of chain and an anvil. No markers are there to explain the significance of the ironwork, and if you didn’t know better, you’d probably write off the chain as a coarse border or maybe a length that had once tethered an anchor to a ship. I immediately had my suspicions about its provenance, and a bit of research proved it out: it's part of the Hudson chain, come to rest where it was manufactured.

Thing is, when I looked into the history of the Hudson chain a little more deeply, it seems to have many fathers and many origins. Some will tell you that the entire chain was fabricated in New York State, while others will state that various lengths were made in different places and then assembled near West Point. I've also found a reputable source that asserts that the entire thing was made at Erskine's iron works.

What's the real story? I think you know where I stand on the issue, and I'm pretty confident I'm right. I'm not a metallurgist or an expert on 18th century ironworks, but to me, the Ringwood Manor chain looks a heck of a lot like the Constitution Island chain.

Dey Mansion - Washington slept here, too

One of these days I'm going to put together a "Washington slept here" map of all of the locations where the General stayed in New Jersey during the Revolutionary War. Some say that he spent more time in the state than anywhere else during the fight for independence, and if our recent travels are any indication, that assertion is totally correct.

Dey Mansion in Wayne is a case in point. An impressive brick Georgian mansion with Dutch influences, the home was Washington's headquarters for much of the months of July, October and November 1780. To put that into context, the first stay was just a few weeks after the battles of Connecticut Farms and Springfield which, repelled the British from capturing the General at Morristown. The second stay was just after Major General Benedict Arnold and his accomplice Major John Andre were revealed to be traitors.

When we visited the Hermitage a few weeks ago, we learned that Theodosia Prevost offered her home as a battle headquarters in the hopes of currying favor with Continental military leaders. That led me to wonder how the Dey mansion came to host Washington. Was the family sympathetic to the cause, or did they have more pragmatic reasons for offering up their house?

Family background indicates the former. The Dey family had been in North America for well over a century before the Revolution. Dirck Janszen Siecken Dey came to New Amsterdam from the Netherlands around 1641 as part of the Dutch West Indies Company, and his descendants arrived in the Preakness Valley of New Jersey in the early 1700s. The mansion we see in Wayne was built sometime between 1745 and 1775, either by Theunis Dey or his father, who was named Dirck, like the original New World settler.

Theunis was a prominent citizen, acting as a freeholder in what was a much larger Bergen County, representing the county in the State Assembly, and serving as a trustee of the very young Queen's College (or as we know it now, Rutgers University). He was also a colonel in the Bergen County militia, and thus was in close contact with military leaders, including the Commander in Chief himself. Not far from the Passaic Falls, the mansion's location was deemed a suitable place for Washington to both set up headquarters and be sheltered from repeated British kidnap attempts.

Ivan and I visited the mansion on a hot, sunny day, and the docent warned us that the house was warm and stuffy, so we'd be skipping the third floor portion of the tour (they'll be adding climate control later this year during a major restoration effort). I rationalized that we'd get a sense of the conditions during Washington's stay, without the heavy uniforms, of course.

The mansion is laid out in classic Georgian fashion, with each floor boasting a generous center hall and two decent-sized rooms on each side. However, the Dutch influence is revealed in the placement of the stairs, which start at the back-end of the house and rise to the top of the next floor, all concealed from view. After Ivan noted that the stairs seemed especially sturdy and level, the docent explained that one of the Deys was an accomplished carpenter who'd made sure to use strong oak beams to support the floors.

Washington and his staff used two rooms on each floor, leaving Theunis Dey and likely more than a dozen family members to the remaining two. The center halls on both floors are wide enough to serve as rooms themselves, and likely were used as dining areas. Though bathing and toilet facilities were understandably not part of the layout, it's not hard to imagine a modern-day family living there comfortably.

While there are no artifacts used by Washington himself, the furniture, housewares and personal items reflect the items that were likely in the house during his stay. It's not hard to imagine various officers gathering in the downstairs sitting rooms, reading dispatches that had just been delivered by couriers at the side door of the house. Our docent noted that the General had written prodigiously during his stay, penning nearly 600 pages of correspondence and orders.

It's a bit more challenging to visualize how the Dey family managed with so many guests and so much activity going on around them. On one hand, it must have been exciting to host Washington and other luminaries like the Marquis de Lafayette and Alexander Hamilton. On the other hand, the presence of even the quietest of houseguests can grow tedious the longer they're around. Battle for independence or not, some folks wouldn't be very well suited to give up half their house to a bunch of relative strangers.

Regardless, our visit exposed us to another dimension of life in New Jersey during wartime and the various machinations Washington went through to avoid capture. It's really fascinating how the more I wander around the state, the more complex and interesting our role in the Revolution becomes.

One more non-historic note: admission to the Dey Mansion is a more than fair $1 per person. Yes, a Washington will get you in to see Washington's headquarters. It's a real bargain! Be sure to check it out before it closes for renovation in the fall.

A cranky Patersonian changes the world of art

New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art contains one of the world's finest and most diverse collections, thanks in large part to a cranky, uncharitable Paterson industrialist. By most accounts, the guy didn't even care that much about art.

If you visit the Met and read the small placards next to the works on display, chances are you'll frequently see the words "Rogers Fund" as the funding source. That's referring to Jacob Rogers, the aforementioned curmudgeon. The son of Rogers Locomotive Works' founder Thomas Rogers, he became the manufacturing concern's president upon his father's death in 1856. The company was the largest of five locomotive manufacturers in Paterson, turning out a new railroad engine every two days.

While Jacob Rogers was among the wealthiest men in the city, there's no trace of his generosity anywhere in Paterson. In fact, he seemed to enjoy turning down requests for donations and small favors. Young boys who asked if they could use a portion of his land for a ballfield were told he'd lease them the land for $2000 per month -- after they erected a $5000 fence around it. Even when he chose to give funds to a worthy cause, the donations could end at any time. A representative from a local hospital suggested that Rogers might be able to afford a monthly gift of more than the $100 he had been sending; the stipend was quickly and permanently stopped.

Much of this behavior stemmed from restrictions the Paterson city government had put on Rogers' business, primarily forbidding the company from starting any of its locomotives within the city. Undoubtedly this meant having to use protracted and expensive means of moving product out of the factory to customers. Rather than seeking a mutually satisfying compromise, Rogers instead held a grudge against the city to his dying day.

That's a good explanation for why there are no grand tributes to Rogers' largess in Paterson, but how does he become one of the Met's most influential donors? It seems that his contrariness is a major factor. He'd read about a wealthy man who'd died in the Midwest in the 1880s, leaving his entire estate to a group of educational institutions. The man's family contested the will, but it held up in court.

Rogers, a lifelong bachelor, didn't believe in inheritance and saw an opportunity in the Midwestern man's approach. He became a member of the Met, delivering his $10 membership fee to the museum director each year. He asked about the institution's management structure and finances, and though he mentioned he'd be addressing the Met in his will, the director didn't think much of it. It seems that the only times Rogers visited the museum were to deliver his annual dues -- not exactly the type of member one would expect more than a couple thousand dollars from after death. Apparently the Met management was unaware he was a wealthy locomotive magnate. They just thought he was an unusual man who was curious about where his membership money was going.

Rogers' seeming obscurity at the museum ended with his death in 1901. Other than small inheritances to a few of his nephews, he left the entirety of his estate -- liquidated property and all -- to the Met. The $5 million was the first gift over $1 million the struggling museum had ever received. Rogers stipulated that his bequest was to be invested and the principal left untouched; the museum was allowed to spend only the income. Unlike other donors, however, he set no boundaries on the types of art the institution could purchase with the proceeds of his gift. As the museum's then director Luigi Palma di Cesnola said of New York millionaires at the time, "They will give money for buying collections, and for building purposes, because both remain visible monuments of their generosity, while endowment funds are invisible and remain unknown to the general public."

Since then, the income from Rogers' gift has funded the museum's productive archaeological expeditions in Egypt as well as the acquisition of legendary works by Rembrandt, Velasquez and other acclaimed artists. The principal continues to grow and earn, ensuring that a Patersonian known in life as tightfisted and mean will, nonetheless, endure as an example of generosity.

A day in the park with Lad, a dog

In a park on a quiet, wooded hillside on Pompton Lake, there's a small sign that says, simply, "Lad." Not far away, there's an engraved stone embedded in the ground, which goes a little farther: "LAD. Thoroughbred in body and soul. 1902-1918."

Not far from that marker, there are stones with other names, plus a small kennel. What happened here, and why the focus on dogs?

Terhune Park in Wayne is, in fact, the estate of Albert Payson Terhune and his wife Anice. Readers of early 20th century literature may be familiar with the "Lad, A Dog" book series, or perhaps the movie that was made from the original book in the early 1960s. Albert was a dog lover and breeder of rough collies and had tried without success to find a market for the stories he wrote about his dogs. That changed when the normally aloof Lad finally took a liking to a family friend who was also an editor for Redbook magazine. Fictionalized accounts of the dog's exploits were eventually published there, the Saturday Evening Post and in other periodicals, building a huge following. In those days, reading was one of the few forms of entertainment in the home, so writers and publishers alike could profit handsomely from serialized stories featuring popular characters. 

Known as Sunnybank, the Terhune estate eventually became home to at least eight collies and a cat, and the Terhunes' love of animals even extended to frogs and goldfish they named and kept in a pond near the kennel. Lad, however, was the rock star of the family. Profits from his stories were donated to the Red Cross and the Blue Cross, earning him medals from both organizations. In the years following his death, thousands of loyal fans continued to visit his grave.

The house itself no longer stands, having been victim to abandonment following Mrs. Terhune's death in 1964. Much of the estate was sold to developers, but Wayne Township condemned a 10 acre portion for use as a passive recreation park.

Ivan and I found Sunnybank to be a calming, pastoral setting when we visited a few weeks ago, and it seemed that the other visitors there at the time did, too. There are no ball fields or playgrounds there, just a few park benches and a gazebo near the lake, making it a perfect setting for quiet contemplation. Sitting there, overlooking the water, one could easily imagine the Terhunes enjoying a nice afternoon outside with the dogs.

Finding the Station Agent in Newfoundland

One of my favorite New Jersey-based movies is The Station Agent, a quiet independent movie made eight or nine years ago. Some of the early scenes are in Hoboken, but the lion's share of the movie was shot and based in Newfoundland, Passaic County. Without giving up too much of the plot, the primary character inherits an old train depot in Newfoundland and relocates there. The place looks very remote, and the depot was obviously standing unused for many years, weatherbeaten and with peeling paint. A few aging train cars sit unused on a nearby siding.

This, of course, is just the kind of thing I look for, so a couple of years ago I took a drive to find the old depot and get a few snapshots.

Newfoundland had long had a special place in my mind, though I'd never actually been there. My Girl Scout troop used to make the long trip to Camp Lou Henry Hoover on Swartswood Lake, and enroute, we'd pass signs for Newfoundland. At the time I had no idea there was an actual community by that name in New Jersey, and I'd joke that we'd somehow reached the Canadian border. Poor joke, I know. I was that kind of kid.

My adult trip to Newfoundland brought me up Route 23, through Wayne and Lincoln Park and northward. Eventually the commercial establishments on the road got fewer and farther between, and the Newark Reservoir came into view. Then I started seeing signs for Newfoundland, and the real search began.

Given how quiet and peaceful the depot's environs seemed in the film, I assumed I'd be wandering around backroads for a good hour or so, but I found the depot very quickly. It's actually just a few hundred yards in from the highway! 

It's also very nicely kept and well maintained with fresh paint and, when I was there, some of those nice house banners. Apparently someone either lives there or uses it as an office, but they keep up the railroad spirit by leaving the "NEWFOUNDLAND" sign on the building for the trains that once stopped there. When I watched the movie on DVD later on, I discovered that the producers had had to rough up the station's exterior a bit before shooting. For once, then, something looks better in real life than it does in the movies. 

Penn Station eagles come to roost in the Highlands

Several eagles from New York left Manhattan in 1963, taking a strange migration to places far afield. Some roosted and remain in the same locations to this day. Others have disappeared, never to be seen again, despite the fact they weigh well over two tons. (Yes, when these eagles sit around the house, they sit around the house.)

Two are located in Ringwood, guarding the entrance to Skylands Manor, which is where Ivan and I found them this past weekend. Gotta love it when our interests converge.

Why are these raptors so darn big? Some odd breed? Perhaps escapees from an updated Jurassic Park?

Not quite. The Skylands eagles are among the last remnants of the old New York Pennsylvania Station, which was demolished in 1963 to make way for the new Madison Square Garden. The passageways and corridors beneath the Garden are still considered Penn Station, of course, but they're in no way equivalent to the grand marble structure that once stood there.  Based on the Roman baths of Caracalla, the old station stood majestically on Seventh Avenue at 34th Street, with 14 large marble eagles and a host of smaller ones perched high above at strategic positions.

When the original station was pulled down, the Pennsylvania Railroad was inundated with requests for the eagles. Two found homes in front of the new Penn Station, but no markers explain their history, leaving me to wonder if anyone makes the connection. Another is at Cooper Union in Lower Manhattan. Others are at train stations, and four even grace a bridge in Philadelphia.

All of the large 14 are accounted for, according to this informative website, but the eight smaller ones, well, no-one is sure where they are, apparently. These aren't the only vestiges of the old Penn Station to rest in New Jersey. Some of the other statuary atop the station were rescued from a landfill and brought to Ringwood State Forest. I seem to recall seeing them there several years ago, still resting in pieces waiting to be reassembled, but now they're being kept at a New Jersey Transit training facility in Newark, as reported on this website.

Other, less artistically-important pieces of the Penn Station facade remain in the same less noble resting places they were carted to nearly 50 years ago. Intrepid writer and explorer Robert Sullivan wrote about his own search for Penn Station in New Jersey in his informative and entertaining book The Meadowlands. He tells the story a lot better than I ever could, but he ultimately found several Penn columns in a truck yard off Penhorn Creek in Secaucus. It is true, it seems: whatever you can think of is or was, at some point, carted to the Meadowlands. Anyone else getting the idea for a Hidden New Jersey trip to Secaucus?

With this many spoons, there should be plenty of ice cream

Did you know that Paterson is home to the world's largest collection of spoons?

You read that right: the world's largest assembly of collectible spoons is housed in Paterson. I know! I had no idea, either, until Ivan and I visited Lambert Castle on Garret Mountain. We were there to check out the Civil War exhibit and while orienting us, the front desk volunteer happened to mention it. How could I have not known about this?

Just a small bit of the world's largest
spoon collection

How does the world's largest collection of spoons end up in Paterson? Pretty simple -- its original owner, Bertha Schaefer Koempel, started the hobby during her childhood in the city. Born in 1882, she'd amassed more than 5400 spoons (and a few matching forks) before she died in 1966. Friends and family members would give her souvenir spoons from their travels, and she knew some well-traveled folks. By the time she died, every state in the Union was represented in the collection, as well as a majority of of the world's nations.

Definitely nothing like the cheesy tin commemorative utensils I remember seeing at souvenir stands in my youth, these spoons are amazingly detailed and beautiful in their own right. Most of those on display right now are lovely silver with nice designs and paintings on them, representing local scenes or noted personalities. Some are even enameled in jewel tones. Others have interesting add-ons like the mummy 'entombed' in a compartment in an Egyptian spoon.

Mrs. Koempel donated the spoons to the Passaic County Historical Society in 1967, and with the exception of a few years during Lambert Castle's renovation, they've been on display there ever since. Only about 250 of the spoons are out at any given time, but the museum plans to rotate the collection occasionally so that all are eventually available for public viewing.

The Civil War gets real this weekend in Passaic County

Considering that no Civil War battle was fought in New Jersey, I've often found it difficult to relate to the conflict the way I do to the Revolutionary War. Battles for independence were fought not far from my grammar school, and I learned the names of local residents who participated, but I had no similar reference point for the War Between the States. That changed this weekend, when I discovered the stories of a handful of New Jerseyans who'd left Passaic County for the war, some never to return.

A treasure trove of locally-significant Civil War artifacts has been lurking in Paterson, deep within the archives of the Passaic County Historical Society at Lambert Castle. The donations of county residents whose ancestors fought in the War, they're available for view at the Castle over the next few days as part of the 150th anniversary of the war.

Honoring Passaic County's Civil War Veterans is a small but significant collection of uniforms, weaponry, documents, photos and artwork reflecting the four year conflict. Not only does it include battle gear, it features General Ulysses S. Grant's death mask and lapel ribbons marking the mourning period after President Abraham Lincoln's assassination. Visitors with local roots can also review a roster of Passaic County residents who served in the war to see if their ancestors took part.

Most movingly from my perspective, many of the articles in the collection are traced directly back to a local resident who fought in the war. Battle becomes so much less abstract when you can relate it to someone who may have walked the exact Paterson streets you did earlier in the day. Looking at the uniforms arrayed in the exhibit, it's not hard to imagine a local soldier stopping by to pick up his jacket before going off to war. It led me to wonder what led them to enlist and their impressions of their experiences. Why, for example, was a Paterson grocer so moved by the cause that he sold his business and actively recruited scores of men to join him in battle? A reproduction broadside advertisement tells you some of Hugh Irish's motivation and practically shouts his patriotism... and you can read it for yourself at Lambert Castle.

The exhibit closes on Sunday October 2, and Civil War reenactors from the Second Rhode Island Volunteers will be camping on the castle grounds. Stop by and check it out!

Long Pond Ironworks: walking through a century in an hour or so

Long Pond Ironworks Historic District is literally hidden from the average motorist driving by on Greenwood Lake Turnpike in Hewitt. From the road you can see a restored building that held the old country store, plus a Victorian-era church and an aging house or two, but even more is obscured until you get out of the car, grab a map and walk the path back into the woods. As you leave the highway behind, you'll be walking into a mine area that dates back to the 1760s.

Before we even get into what's there, I've got to mention that on our visit, there was more interpretive literature outside the closed visitor center than you'd get at most museums that were open and staffed. I found no less than four separate leaflets packed with information from the Friends of Long Pond Ironworks. They've done a fine job of research and restoration, but for the quickest overview on a first visit, it's probably best to consult the eight-panel self-guided tour document. It contains a nicely drawn and labeled map that separates the area into seven briefly-described areas.

The original mine and ironworks at Long Pond were established in 1767 by Peter Hasenclever, a German working on behalf of a British company. When operating under Robert Erskine in the 1770's, Long Pond supplied the Continental Army with iron products. Eventually, the property came under the ownership of Cooper and Hewitt, which built new furnaces and continued the proud tradition of supplying American troops, this time for the Union cause during the Civil War. The furnaces finally stopped producing in 1882 as the iron industry moved westward.

A walk around the property reveals structures built at different points of the ironworks' history, from a stone double house all the way to the Victorian church. If you look really carefully through some overgrowth, you'll also see the remains of an arts-and-crafts style house just off the road. The visitors center map shows the location of most, if not all of the buildings, but as you walk around, you'll see that while some of them are in relatively good shape (i.e. they look like buildings), others are mostly just foundations or crumbling stone walls. Ivan had been there many years ago and commented that a lot of work had been done on the property over the years to stabilize what was still there. All of the windows were boarded over, with fake window panes painted on them so that from a distance (and with bad vision), one might even think the real windows were still there.

Besides the living quarters and company store, the historical society is working to recreate the waterwheels that used the Wanaque River to power the blast furnaces back in the day. According to the map, these are the only surviving waterwheels from the region's iron industry.

Hasenclever and the host of other ironmasters who succeeded him lived in the nearby Ringwood Manor, which still welcomes visitors today. The Long Pond property and the manor were once linked by a well-traveled road, now a several miles-long hiking path dotted with interpretive wayside signs. Note, however, that a portion of the path near Peters Mine is closed.

Long Pond has some potential as a birding spot, both from the woods and the nearby Monksville Reservoir. Our mid-summer, midday visit didn't result in many finds, though we may have seen an elusive green heron.

If you choose to check out the area, be sure to stop by the visitors center to pick up the previously-mentioned literature and look in on the small but informative museum display. Browsing for a few minutes will give you a good idea of the area's history, and an appreciation for the work the that was done there by the ironworks' staff and the volunteers that strive to bring their story back to life.

Greenwood Lake Airport: not quite history, but nearby

I'm always amused by the international road signs that point the direction to airports in remote areas. Usually, they depict a silhouette of a jet and are supplemented by a small sign showing the name of the airfield in question. Mostly, the fields are essentially airstrips with a bit of tarmac, a wind sock and a small office, and maybe a snack bar or restaurant. One or two might have a long enough runway to serve as a last-chance landing spot for a smaller passenger jet, but nothing along the lines of an airbus.

We saw one of these signs on our recent travels through mine country in the northwest portion of the state, and the accompanying name raised my enthusiasm level. "Greenwood Lake Airport!" I exclaimed. "That's where the first air mail was sent from!" Or something like that. Naturally, we had to check it out.

Following the road signs, we found our way to a small airstrip with a couple dozen small planes tied down on the tarmac, plus a small restaurant and office which has a 'Rent a Wreck' banner up. Oh, and the fuselage and wings of a Lockheed Constellation emerging from the building. It looked promising, but we couldn't find any markers or signs telling the story. Perhaps someone inside would know. 

Well, I was wrong on both counts, as we found out from an employee inside, and from subsequent research. It wasn't the first airmail, nor was it from the airport itself. Rather, it was in 1936 that a stamp collector and American Rocket Society member named F.W. Kessler combined his passions to form the Rocket Airplane Corporation of America. He wanted to fly mail from New York into New Jersey by rocket plane, and he chose to attempt it from the shores of Greenwood Lake. While he found a way to sell inflated postage for 6000 letters to cover the cost of his experiment, it didn't quite work. Instead, the rocket tore the plane's wings loose before it reached its intended destination. As one observer was heard to say, "a husky man could have heaved that ship across the state line."

According to the airport employee, photos and the story of the launch are preserved at the West Milford A&P; we checked later and couldn't find the store, let alone the photos.

That's not to say there's nothing of interest at Greenwood Lake Airport. The partial Lockheed is open and available for a quick view. While they've taken the seats out in favor of high-top cocktail tables, the airport has installed several informative signs that relate the history of the Constellation model, including its storied history as Eisenhower's plane of choice. The cockpit is also still intact, complete with pilots' jackets draped across the seat backs. You can also step outside the forward door to a deck overlooking the runway, which could be a lot of fun if pilots are practicing their touch-and-gos.

According to their website, the airport will also host an airshow in late August, complete with World War II historians and 40's-era reenactors. No word on whether anyone will try to recreate the rocket mail experiment, but for airplane enthusiasts, it could be a lot of fun.

Fall for America's industrial history in Paterson

Another ‘hidden in plain sight’ New Jersey notable is America’s first planned industrial community. Combine one of the state’s grittiest cities with the second largest waterfall in the eastern United States, and you’ve got a fascinating story with roots in the American Revolution. We talked about it a little in an earlier post on Garret Mountain, but the city deserves a post all its own.

Alexander Hamilton first conceived the city while accompanying General George Washington through New Jersey during the war. As legend has it, the pair stopped for lunch at the base of a magnificent waterfall, where Hamilton saw the possibilities for hydropower to run machinery. Counter to Thomas Jefferson, who saw America's future as largely agrarian, Hamilton believed that the country's best chance for economic independence was through industry. If we could manufacture our own products, from our own resources, we'd have little need for imports from our former European rulers. With others who felt likewise, he was instrumental in the creation of the Society for the Establishment of Useful Manufactures, or SUM, which then built Paterson's industry starting in 1792.

Through a clever system of raceways, the Great Falls of the nearby Passaic River provided hydropower to run mills and factory turbines. Eventually, the city became home to the Colt gunworks, the Rogers Locomotive works, and a variety of textile mills. In fact, Paterson was known for a long time as Silk City due to the strength of that industry within the city. Thomas Edison located one of his Illuminating factories there, as did the Wright-Curtiss operation that built the engine for Lindbergh’s storied aircraft, the Spirit of St. Louis.

Over time, the series of water raceways was replaced by a more efficient hydroelectric plant near the falls that continues to serve the local power grid. And as suburbanization populated the area upstream of Paterson, a good portion of the Passaic's water was shunted off for other purposes. Now on most days, the Falls, while still impressive, are but a trickle of what they were over 100 years ago. Check them out after a good rain, especially after Wayne has flooded, and you’ll get a good sense of their full might.

Paterson itself continues as a gritty, working-class city, though much of the industry has left the same as it has in many US cities. A productive artists' colony now makes its home in some of the mill buildings, and there's been some effort to preserve the history that's all around. In fact, Congress voted to fund a management plan for the area, which earlier was designated a National Historical Park. With any luck, that will bring much-needed attention - and tourist dollars - to the city. There are a lot of National Park geeks who would visit a phone booth in a remote corner of Nebraska if it were on the Parks list (I should know… I’m one of them.).

It's really pretty astounding that Paterson hasn't gotten more attention, given its location, Hamilton's involvement, and the impact of its founding on America's economic history. Perhaps the industrial aspect was what held it back as a tourist attraction: how many people make it a point to visit gritty, working-class cities? In an upwardly-mobile, striving culture like ours, how many people want to be reminded that there are people still pushing their way up the ladder? Paterson has long been home to recent immigrants -- people who don't necessarily speak the language, and have different traditions. We all know how that makes some people nervous. Most of all, though, I think people just don't know it's there.

There's a great little welcome center near the Falls, and when I visited, I was welcomed by a city resident who was a wealth of information. He spent about an hour with me, outlining history of Paterson's founding, interesting facts about Alexander Hamilton (i.e. had things gone differently, he might have been our first African American president. Yes, you read that right. His mom was Creole.), the best local restaurants, and American traditions that have their roots in the city. It’s amazing what you can find out, just by running into the right person.

Like standing in the parakeet section at Woolworth's

I'd be remiss if I didn't mention that Cleveland's birthplace was our second stop of the day. We ventured out early (relatively, for me; late for Ivan) to check the progress of spring migration on Garret Mountain.

You'll recall our previous visit to Garret, where we saw but a few birds and even fewer birders. This time could not be more different. The parking lot, while not full by a stretch, held a healthy number of cars sporting various environmental/birding stickers and/or Conserve Wildlife plates. On the way in, we'd already passed a few clusters of optics-sporting strollers, all pointed in the same direction, so it was clear that it would be a productive morning.

This is a yellow throated warbler, which, while yellow like
many of the warblers we saw, is not one of the warblers
we saw.

Indeed, it was. Not far from the park road, near the large pond, we were treated to four different species of warblers - Black and White, Palm, Yellow-Rumped and Pine. Given that they'd likely just flown in, they were treating the trees and brush like the proverbial Turnpike rest area and attacking the food court with gusto. (All together now:  "I just flew in from Central America, and boy are my wings tired!") So focused were they on finding good munchies that they allowed us to get close enough for a good view without binoculars. It was, no joke, reminiscent of the old parakeet aisles at Woolworth's. All that was needed was the display of Hartz Mountain bird food. Much to my regret, I didn't have my camera on hand to capture the scene; these are totally adorable, tiny birds. After a winter of spotting mostly dull-colored species, it was nice to see flashes of bright yellow flitting around the budding greenery.

After this experience I truly understood why birders flock (no pun intended) to Garret in the spring, as a relatively short stroll netted us, conservatively, about a dozen species. In all, with just about two hours of scouting, Ivan picked up something like 30 different kinds of birds, and it's early in the season. You can imagine what kind of results a birder could get in a day later in the spring.