New Jersey

The Wildwoods: 1920-1970 follows a path of progress and preservation in a beach community situated along the Atlantic Ocean in historic Cape May County.

Starting out in the 1920s, vintage postcards illustrate this shore town's transformation from a sleepy seaside resort into a summer vacation hot spot. Look through a window into the past and see Zaberer's Restaurant in North Wildwood, the Starlight Ballroom on the boardwalk, and the Wingate Motel in the center of Wildwood.

Explore the town of Westfield and embrace the thriving suburban community, rich in history, culture, and civic pride.

Located just 22 miles outside of New York City, it is affectionately known as ""Colonial Westfield."" In 1720, the ""West Fields"" of Elizabeth Town were settled by English immigrants. During the Revolutionary War, several altercations with the Red Coats took place here. Not only did George Washington stop in Westfield during the Revolutionary War, but it is believed he slept at the home of one of the town's forefathers. After the advent of the railroad in mid-1800s, the small but productive farming village gradually developed into the attractive upscale community it is today. Known for its high standards in education, emphasis on the arts, and religious and civic institutions, Westfield is one of the few suburban towns in New Jersey that continues to maintain an active downtown shopping area, complete with a major department store. With approximately 50 restaurants, it draws visitors from all over the state.

From North American Phalanx and Scobeyville to the now suburbanized Colts Neck, this visual history documents the fascinating history of this Monmouth County township.

Colts Neck, the Monmouth County township known by that name only since 1962, has witnessed a rapid pace of change in its recent past. The once-rural community has been adapting to suburbanization but longtime residents yearn to preserve memories of the municipality's heritage, and in particular, recollections of two well-known communities. Colts Neck's North American Phalanx was one of America's best-known, nineteenth-century cooperative communities, and as such has garnered the interest of philosophers and social scientists. In a completely different historical vein, Colts Neck embraces Scobeyville, widely known as the home of Laird's. Synonymous with New Jersey distilling, Laird's has produced the Apple Jack beverage for many years.

Built in 1974 in New Jersey, Great Adventure was the larger-than-life dream of a larger-than-life personality, Warner LeRoy.

The consummate showman, LeRoy had visions of a fantasy world of rides, shows, and animals in a beautiful and unspoiled woodland setting. In 1977, Great Adventure became a member of the Six Flags family of theme parks and has continued to grow ever since, with bigger and better attractions added each season. Six Flags Great Adventure revisits some of the park's past attractions, like the Garden of Marvels, Big Balloon, and Super Teepee, and illustrates the park's evolution into a state-of-the-art theme park enjoyed by a new generation of guests.

Join author Joan Williams as she takes you on a journey into Morristown, New Jersey's past and brings it back to life as it was.

For many Americans, Morristown evokes pictures of ragged troops huddled in log huts, shivering in the bitter cold of winter--but there is more to the history of the town than its important role in the Revolutionary War. By the early 19th century, Morristown was a thriving community, whose growth was accelerated by such projects as the Morris Canal and the railroad. It was finally incorporated in 1865 and the city attracted wealthy New Yorkers who built magnificent mansions, many of which can still be seen today. In 1878, the Library and Lyceum opened, bringing art and culture to the booming town. Immigrants were also attracted to Morristown and the Association of Work Among the Italians was founded in 1898 (later renamed Neighborhood House as the ethnic population diversified further), which instructed the new immigrants in English and provided services for their children.

The 20th century saw many changes. The first trolley rumbled around the Green in 1909, and motor cars soon appeared on the streets. Young men and women went off to two world wars to serve (and many to die for) their country. With the 1960s came urban renewal. As many old buildings were destroyed, corporations took the place of many of the large mansions and new highways were developed. Yet, still, in the quiet back streets, and among some of the old buildings, a hint of the past can still be seen. This piece will delight young and old, visitor and resident alike.

Although the industry is all but gone today, New Jersey was once the hub of diner manufacturing, making mobile eateries that fed hungry Americans all over.

The silver Airstreams and neon signs of the classic American diner brighten New Jersey's highways and Main Streets but the intrinsic role they have played in the state's culture and industry for more than one hundred years is much more than eggs-over-easy and coffee. Diners are the state's ultimate gathering places--at any moment, high school students, CEOs, construction workers and tourists might be found at a counter chatting with the waitresses and line cooks. Locals yearn for lost favorites like the Excellent Diner and Prout's Diner and still gather at beloved haunts like the Bendix and Tick Tock Diners. Author Michael C. Gabriele offers this delicious history--collected from interviews with owners, patrons and experts--and indulges in many fond memories of classic New Jersey eateries.

The US Coast Guard Training Center at Cape May tells the story of the Center from Navy Section Base 9 to the only recruit training center in the US.

Commissioned as Navy Section Base 9 in 1917, the US Coast Guard Training Center at Cape May stands on the site of a former amusement park that bordered the Atlantic Ocean a few miles east of Cape May in southern New Jersey. Dirigibles, submarines, and minesweepers were based here during World War I. Because of its proximity to the ocean and Delaware Bay, the base was used by Coast Guard patrol boats and cutters to chase rumrunners during Prohibition in the 1920s. An airfield was established adjacent to the base in 1926, and in 1940, both combined to become Naval Air Station Cape May. The station protected the coast line from German U-boats during World War II. The Coast Guard took over the facility in 1946, and in 1948, the base became the only recruit training center in the country, today graduating more than 4,000 recruits per year.

Many Americans are familiar with Thomas Edison's "invention factory" in Menlo Park, where he patented the phonograph, the light bulb and more than one thousand other items. Yet many other ideas have grown in the Garden State, too.

New Jerseyans brought sound and music to movies and built the very first drive-in theater. In addition to the first cultivated blueberry, tasty treats like ice cream cones and M&Ms are also Jersey natives. Iconic aspects of American life, like the batting cage, catcher's mask and even professional baseball itself, started in New Jersey. Life would be a lot harder without the vacuum cleaner, plastic and Band-Aids, and many important advances in medicine and surgery were also developed here. Join author Linda Barth as she explores groundbreaking, useful, fun and even silly inventions and their New Jersey roots.

The valley's streets and roads of today follow the trails once used by the Lenape Indians who peacefully ceded their claims to the land as the Dutch and English settlers arrived.

The new settlers were eager to clear this fertile land for their farms and villages. These roads also follow the same routes used by General George Washington as he led his weary, freezing soldiers to Morristown after the crossing of the Delaware and the victory at the Battle of Princeton during the American Revolution.

The Millstone Valley Scenic Byway, which is a central feature of the Crossroads of the American Revolution National Heritage Area, makes history come alive through a charming glimpse of the rural past surviving in the heart of America's most densely populated state.

Over 200 historic photographs and fascinating text combine to create an illustrated history of New Jersey's thirty-eight lighthouses and forty-one life-saving stations.

From the seventeenth to the twentieth century, New Jersey's low-lying, sandy coast has been the site of thousands of shipwrecks as ships bound for New York City or Philadelphia foundered on its offshore shoals. As coastal and international trade dramatically increased after the War of 1812, the federal government was forced to increase safety aids to mariners. To ensure their safe passage, a series of lighthouses was built and the U.S. Life-Saving Service was created. More than two centuries of the history of New Jersey's treacherous coast are preserved in Guarding New Jersey's Shore: Lighthouses and Life-Saving Stations. Gathered from a wide array of sources, more than 200 historic photographs and fascinating, documented text combine to create the only illustrated history of the state's thirty-eight lighthouses and forty-one life-saving stations. Sandy Hook, built in 1764, is the nation's oldest operating lighthouse. Navesink's Twin Lights was the first lighthouse to use electricity and was the home of Marconi's early radio experiments. From the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor, which once served as a lighthouse, to Cape May Point, and up the Delaware Bay and River, the fascinating story of protecting mariners from perils ""Down the Shore"" is presented and preserved in Guarding New Jersey's Shore: Lighthouses and Life-Saving Stations.

Scattered throughout New Jersey are remnants of history that are being reclaimed by nature or destroyed by vandals. Author and photographer, Kathleen Butler, takes the reader on a journey back through time to rediscover the little-known history of these forgotten places. Most are deep in the woods of New Jersey; one is only known to the author and is exclusive to this book.

Discover ruins from iron-making industries, mills, the railroad, and more. Some of the ruins are from industries that were at their peak, but fell hard when the market was no longer in their favor. They ultimately abandoned their businesses, or they rediscovered another market and moved elsewhere. Some companies tried to establish themselves only to find that the area was not suitable, leaving their failed community behind, or simply went bankrupt. Now, nature is taking over, and soon, these abandoned ruins will disappear forever.

Drawing on rarely seen photographs and other materials from the Teaneck Public Library and private collections, author Jay Levin chronicles the intriguing history of Teaneck.

Originally inhabited by the Lenni-Lenape Indians and settled by the Dutch, Teaneck has come to embody the American experience. Created in 1895 from the vast, wooded estate of its most eminent citizen, William Walter Phelps, the bucolic township along the Hackensack River boomed in the 1920s, its population quadrupling during construction of the nearby George Washington Bridge to New York City. Developers could not put up homes fast enough in a suburb offering beauty, location, and every convenience. It is a community of myriad distinctions: exemplar of successful municipal management, "model town" deemed worthy of emulation, college town, and, in the 1960s, the first majority-white community in the United States to voluntarily integrate its school system.

This history celebrates the fascinating process of research and development at the Princeton, NJ lab with stunning photographs selected from thirty thousand stills in RCA's collections.

Color television, transistors, lasers, digital memory, computers, liquid-crystal displays, medical electronics, and digital video-these technologies define modern civilization. This visual history tells the story of invention or innovation at this Princeton, New Jersey research facility.The center's engineers, physicists, chemists, technicians, and shop workers developed radar, sonar, and TV-guided missiles during World War II. In 1951, RCA renamed the labs for its visionary leader, David Sarnoff, and the center continued its groundbreaking work for RCA's product divisions and patent-licensing department. General Electric bought RCA in 1986 and donated the David Sarnoff Research Center to SRI International, a nonprofit research institute. Ten years later, the center became Sarnoff Corporation, a company that provides innovative client solutions, licenses patents, starts companies, and sells products. Masterfully framed and lighted, these rare images reflect American confidence in the promise of technology at its twentieth-century peak and illustrate a sometimes unusual world within a social life of awards, gardens, picnics, and sports teams.

Have you ever driven past an abandoned building and wondered why it was there and what it looks like inside? Perhaps you were curious about its history and how the property ended up neglected. Join author Alex Gulino on her journey throughout New Jersey, the Garden State, as she explores these forgotten properties and documents their decay.

Garden State of Decay: Discarded New Jersey offers insight on the history and the current state of these defunct properties through poignant photographs. From Gothic churches in busy cities to forgotten aircraft in rural fields, observe the decomposition documented in these pages. See the beauty in decay that lives on in quiet desperation.