Tucked in the northern section of Somerset County, New Jersey, the Somerset Hills area has a rich history that Mr. Local History is proud to document. We researched each property before submitting documentation to the State Historic Register. If it meets the criteria, we can nominate it to the National Registry of Historic Places. Take a look at the great historic landmarks of our hometown area.
Bedminster, New Jersey Historic Sites
McDonalds/Kline’s Mills, Klines Mill Road (1)
Bedminster Township, New Jersey
Bedminster Township – 250 Years by Prich Matthews, page 21)
A 19th -20th century “up and down” sawmill was listed on the National and New Jersey Registers of Historic Places in 1986. Privately owned by the estate of John Kean, a forebear of former Bedminster Township Mayor John Kean (and cousin of former New Jersey Governor Tom Kean, the mill is located on the North Branch of the Raritan River where Kline’s Mill Road intersected with River Road before a storm took the bridge out in April 1995. A sawmill is said to have operated on the site as early as 1744. An 1850 map shows the Widow Kline’s gristmill, sawmill, and store. Three generations of the Kline family owned the mill. The mill has a fieldstone foundation, a one-story board-and-batten exterior, and 15-pane single-sash windows.
Jacobus Vanderveer House (2)
Also known as Knox House
Jct. of US 202 and 206, N of River Rd.,
Bedminster Twp., Pluckemin
(added 1995 – Building – #95001137)
Bedminster Township purchased it in 1989, along with 218 acres, with support from the Friends of the Jacobus Vanderveer House and the Bedminster Historical Commission.
With its surrounding acreage, the Jacobus Vanderveer House is the last remaining site in Somerset County associated with the locally prominent Vanderveer family. It is the only structure that remains intact and can be used to interpret the Vanderveer family and local Revolutionary War Activities.
While the period of historical significance is 1772, when the building was first built, the house reached its architectural apex in 1813, immediately after Mary Hardenburgh Vanderveer’s Federal-style additions.
The Jacobus Vanderveer House is the last surviving building associated with the Vanderveers, a family prominent in Bedminster Township history from its earliest settlement through the 19th century.
General Henry Knox and his family lived in the house, which served as his headquarters during the winter of 1778-79, while he commanded the Continental Artillery. The c. 1772 Dutch American core of the Jacobus Vanderveer House is the only known extant building associated with the Pluckemin Encampment of 1778-79, considered the first installation in America to train officers in engineering and artillery.
The interior contains massive exposed beams as well as Federal, Greek Revival, and Victorian woodwork. Bedminster Township owns the house, and its restoration was completed in 2007… more.
Lamington Historic District (A)
The Village is located on Lamington Road (Route 523), three and a half miles west of Bedminster Village, on a north-south route. The name Lamington comes from the Indian word Allametunk, meaning “place of clay.” Lamington is also the name of a village in Scotland. The earliest settlers were Scot-Irish Presbyterians, soon joined by Dutch and German families. It is not known exactly where the first colonists arrived, but the first appeal to the Presbytery of New Brunswick for a preacher was in 1739. Lamington supported the New Jersey Provincial Congress that declared independence from Great Britain on July 2, 1776.
Pluckemin Historic District (B)
The Village of Pluckemin (sometimes spelled Pluckamin in the history books) was known as Bedminstertown before 1755. In fact, historians have found some 28 spellings of Pluckemin.
Some believe the name comes from the word Pluckamin, a dialect form of the Algonquin Indian Putchamin. Some think it came from a village name in Scotland. And others still think the name derived from the Pluckemin Tavern’s early keeper, Jacob Eoff,f who, in luring customers into his premises by nailing a loose horseshoe to the ground on the road outside his tavern, knew the passersby would dismount to grab the shoe, and Eoff would Pluck- em in”.
German Lutherans came to Pluckemin in the early 1700’s. As early as 1715, they built a log church on Pigtail Mountain, East of the Village off Mount Prospect Road and above Washington Valley Road. It was called Im Geberge (On the Mountain). The site and its cemetery were in the news in November 1998 when an article in the Bernardsville News reported that Toll Brothers, the Developer of The Hills Development, found more than two dozen bodies in a cemetery (now up to 66). The builder exhumed the remains and relocated them to a single grave in the Presbyterian Church on Pluckemin. While the headstones were moved to the Oldwick Lutheran Church, historians hope to place the original headstones at the single grave in Pluckemin.
The original tavern was owned by German Jacob Eoff, who purchased 500 acres from the original Peapack Patent and John Johnstone’s estate; he came to Pluckemin Village and established a tavern in 1750 (on the corner where the current A & P resides). Eoff’s farmhouse was North of the Village where the current King’s Super Market stands.
The Pluckemin Encampment on Schley Mountain, where Colonial militia trained on artillery equipment, and the 1751 House are two reminders of the Township’s involvement in the Revolutionary War.
Historical sites include the 1751 House (Jacob Eoff’s daughter who married John Boylan. The red building stands today at the Courtyard at Pluckemin.
General George Washington’s headquarters were in Pluckemin (Fenner House) on January 4, 1777, after the Battle of Princeton. Notable people there were Dr. Benjamin Rush and Generals Henry Knox, Nathaniel Greene, and John Sullivan. Legend has it that during the stopover, an officer rode his horse up the stairs to the second floor and back down. A horse’s shoe indentation was said to have been visible on the stair steps.
After the Battle of Princeton, thirteen officers were quartered in the Fenner House. Over two hundred British soldiers were imprisoned at St. Paul’s Lutheran Church. Washington attended funeral services on January 5, 1777, for Capt. William Leslie (a British soldier and friend of Dr. Benjamin Rush).
Washington and his wife stayed at the Fenner house in February 1779 after the French Alliance Ball that commemorated the first anniversary of the alliance of the King of France with the American Colonies. The house was demolished in 1942. The Daughters of the American Revolution placed a stone at the site, now home to Clerio Fine Food and Catering. In 1988, a replica “Fenner House” was built in 1988 by L.G. Construction Company. Marra Advertising presently occupies the building.
Another site is the Jacobus Vanderveer House, which was bought in 1743 for 439 acres just North of Pluckemin. On the estate, his son Jacobus II built the house where General Henry Knox would live during the winter and Spring of late 1778 through mid-1779.
The Pluckemin Archaeological Project (by Clifford Sekel, 1970s) gives a rare account of the beginning and end of General Knox’s artillery encampment, known today as the country’s first “West Point.” The Continental artillery park was located at Pluckemin, New Jersey, several miles North of the infantry camps. There, the artillerists built barracks for almost 1000 men and established a depot, repair facilities, and an academy for artillery officers. The Army abandoned this encampment in June 1779.
In the 1980s, Rutgers University archaeological excavations exposed the remains of the “Artillery Park” and recovered thousands of artifacts. For additional info on the Pluckemin Archaeological Project, Click Here.
Two artifacts found at Pluckemin have changed the view of the early American flag and its use by the Continental Army. These decorative belt tips probably adorned the ends of officers’ “over the shoulder” leather sword belts. Each belt tip is hand-engraved and bears almost identical designs of a cannon, flag staff, and flag, a motif very similar to that found on American artillery buttons of the period. These belt tips had never been seen before, and their use by the American Army was previously unknown. What made them even more spectacular was that they showed a new orientation of the stars on the American flag: five stars over three stars, over five stars.
The colonial flavor of Pluckemin Village is typical for this area of the state. George Washington may not have slept here, but he and his troops most certainly marched through Bedminster.
Pottersville Village Historic District (C)
Pottersville owes its early settlement and later development to the Lamington River, which powered early mills and manufacturing. The river separates two townships and two counties, Bedminster in Somerset to the East, and Tewksbury in Hunterdon to the west.
William Willet is said to have been the first settler at the village site in the early 1750s. His home was on the west side just below the falls. On the west side, he established a feed and flour mill and a fulling mill at an upper site. Both mills operated during the Revolution and sold goods to the Continental Army. As Continental currency depreciated, Willet declared bankruptcy and sold his mills to the Potter Family (Col. Samuel Potter), naming them Potter’s Mills. Samuel’s grandson, Sering Potter, built a new four-mill in 1840 on the site of the destroyed one. When a post office was established, the Village became Pottersville, and Potter became the first Postmaster. But even the Potter family struggled, went bankrupt in early 1878, and was forced to sell all the mills and assets.
The railroad reached Pottersville in 1889 with passenger and freight service. Known for growing and shipping peaches, the town built the Parkside Hotel in 1889, built by Henry “Whiskey Hank” Flemming, a local distiller. In 1892, he sold the hotel to Ellis Sutton, who renamed it Hotel Sutton. The railroad station was at the back of the Hotel. When the railroad closed in 1912, the hotel closed too. The early dream of Pottersville as an ever-booming, river-driven manufacturing center never materialized. It has become a quiet residential community with only a few local services. (excerpts from Bedminster Township – 250 Years by Prich Matthews)
Bernards Township, New Jersey Historic Sites
The Brick Academy (3)
Basking Ridge Classical School (added 1976 – Building #76001185)
Also known as The Academy, The Brick Academy
Most Significant Person: Robert Finley.
15 West Oak Street, Basking Ridge section of Bernards Township
The 1809 Federal-style Brick Academy, located in the center of Basking Ridge, has been a boys’ private preparatory school, a public school, a meeting hall for several fraternal and benevolent organizations, and the Bernards Township municipal building.
Alward Homestead / Alward Farmhouse/Chimney Ash Farm (4)
40 Mount Airy Rd, Basking Ridge, NJ
(aka Chimney Ash Farm)
Alward Farmhouse (added 1986 to the National Register – Building – #86000388)
Also known as Chimney Ash Farm, 40 Mt. Airy Rd., Basking Ridge. Built by Henry Alward.
Henry Alward, son of Henry Alward and Mary Cox, married Osee Pennington, daughter of John Pennington and Osee Doty Pennington.
Basking Ridge Presbyterian Church (5)
6 West Oak Street, Basking Ridge (added 1974 – Building #74001190) 6 E. Oak St., Basking Ridge.
The Basking Ridge Presbyterian Church, built before 1720, stands alongside one of the oldest white oaks in the Western Hemisphere, estimated to be more than 600 years old. Both General Washington and Lafayette are known to have met under the giant oak, and Colonial troops often stopped here to rest. About 35 Revolutionary War soldiers are buried in the well-preserved graveyard under the tree adjoining the church.
The video below is a great historic piece honoring the sermon of the late Dr. Robert Finley, an early Basking Ridge Presbyterian Church pastor. Listen as Pastor Jones recreates this great sermon.
Historical Essay- The Presbyterian Church, Basking Ridge, NJ – A History 1717-1968 by Dorothy Loa McFadden, Mildred Van Dyke, and Eileen Luz Johnston.
Own a piece of local history. The Basking Ridge Presbyterian Church at the iconic Basking Ridge Oak Tree, part of the New Jersey Historic Cat’s Meow wooden collectible series.
Coffee House, (6) (aka 1804 House)
Coffee House (added 1977 – Building #77000906) 214 N. Maple Ave., Basking Ridge.
The Coffee House on North Maple, built in 1804, is a New Jersey frame farmhouse. It served as a residence and crossroads tavern and was a center of activity and entertainment for local farms and communities in the early 19th century.
Winner of the 2005 local Historic Preservation Award
Kennedy Martin Stelle Farmstead (7)
Kennedy–Martin–Stelle Farmstead (added 2004 – District #03000868)
450 King George Rd., Bernards Township (Basking Ridge)
The historic Kennedy-Martin-Stelle Farmstead, a National Register site located at 450 King George Road in Bernards Township, is being preserved and operated by the Friends of the Kennedy-Martin-Stelle Farmstead.
Lord Stirling Manor (8)
Site: 96 Lord Stirling Road, Bernards Twp. Note: The House is no longer standing.
Lord Stirling, a Major General in the Continental Army, moved to his country
manor at Basking Ridge in 1768, where he raised flax, apples, and bred horses. The estate also included a three-story brick dwelling, stables, a coach house, and other outbuildings.
Only two small brick outbuildings, dating from the early 19th century, remain. Archaeological investigations are underway, and plans are in place to restore the outbuildings. The site hosts an annual 1770s festival in October. (See Events).
Lord Stirling achieved the rank of Major General; he was born in 1726 and died in 1783. He is buried in Albany, NY, at the Albany Rural Cemetery.
Notable tidbits about William Alexander (Lord Stirling:
Stirling was noted as one of General Washington's most trusted military leaders in the Continental Army.
The town of Stirling NJ is named after him.
He never was officially given the title of Lord by the House of Lords in England.
General Lord Stirling was the presiding Judge at the Court Martial of General Charles Lee after the battle of Monmouth. General Lee was famous in Basking Ridge for being captured by the British at the Widow White's Tavern on December 13, 1776. Lee was declared Guilty, confirmed by Congress and subsequently stripped from his rank.
Alexander was involved heavily in the slave trade in his years before the revolution.
Stirling had a number of bouts with Bankruptcy before, during, and after the Revolutionary war.(Source – William Alexander, Lord Stirling by Paul David Nelson -1987 ISBN: 0817302832 )
Lyons Train Station (9)
Lyons Road, the Lyons section of Bernards Township
A one-story Tudor Revival-style structure built in 1931 was designed by noted architect D.T. Mack.
One of the stops on what was once known as the “Millionaires Express”.
The Boudinot Southard Ross Estate (13)
(Pronounced Boo -Din-know)
Placed on the New Jersey and National Registers of Historic Places September 11, 2009, and December 18, 2009, respectively.
The fifty-acre Boudinot-Southard-Ross property, which borders the Basking Ridge Country Club and Lord Stirling Park, has three historic buildings: a house, barn, and outbuilding. Elias Boudinot built the original house in 1777, which retains some early details. The property is surrounded by preserved open space and offers wonderful panoramic views.
Franklin Corners Historic District (D)
(470 acres, 11 buildings)
Franklin Corners Historic District (added 1975 – District #75001159)
N of Bernardsville on Hardscrabble and Childs Rds. and U.S. 202, Bernardsville
Entered in the State Register
December 12, 1974
(ID #2472)
Entered in the National Register
May 12, 1975
(NR Reference #75001159)
Samuel Johnson House
Van Dorn’s Mill
Franklin Corner School
The Grain House
Mr. Local History wrote a detailed story about the historic district – Click Here
Liberty Corner Historic District (E)
(added 1991 – District #91001477)- Also known as Liberty Corner
Roughly, jct. of Church St. and Valley and Lyons Rds., and area W and SW, Bernards Township, Liberty Corner
1722 – John Annin, officially known as John Johnston of Annandale, Scotland, arrives in Bernards and takes title to 1,000 acres. The settlement was known as Annin’s Corner.
In 1766, William Annin, son of John Annin, built an old stone house with rocks from the neighboring quarry. The blocks bear theinitials, “W.A.” and “H.S.M.”, along with the date, indicating the Builder (William Annin) and the mason (Hugh Sunderland).
The name was changed from Annin’s Corner to Liberty Corner sometime during the American Revolution. However, the area was also mentioned as Bullion’s Tavern during the war.
While the Annin stone house was destroyed, it stood just across from the present-day English Farm, the site of the Rochambeau Revolutionary trail through Liberty Corner (See Events), in August 1781, when the area was called Bullion’s Tavern (for the tavern located in the center of town). Additional Photos and maps are in the Photo archive section.
Basking Ridge Historic District
ID 2469- Area between North and South Finley, North and South Maple Aves., Lewis, West Craig, and Oak Street. DOE- 8/18/1994
Bernardsville, New Jersey Historic Sites
Bernardsville Train Station
US
US Route 202 (10)
One of the stops on what was once known as the “Millionaires Express”.
John Parker Tavern (The Old Bernardsville Library)
2 Morristown Road (11), Bernardsville, New Jersey
The gray building that housed the Bernardsville Public Library for over ninety years was originally called the Vealtown Tavern and later the John Parker Tavern. Constructed in the 1700s, the tavern was a stopover for the weary and thirsty, an inn for passersby, and, as lore tells, served officers and men of the Continental Army; it also has a ghost story.
Reynolds – Scherman House
71 Hardscrabble Rd, Bernardsville, New Jersey(12)
(National and State Historical Listing added 1989 – Building – #89000298)
The Stone House was built around 1770 and was reportedly used as a commissary for Washington’s Colonial Troops during the American Revolution. The Hoffman building, located in the foothills of the Highlands, now houses the Scherman Hoffman Wildlife Sanctuary offices.
Originally built as a barn, the structure was converted into a residence in the early 1800s. The property, structures, and land are now on the New Jersey and National Registers of Historic Places. Although the home was a private residence, it was carefully restored with authentic period materials.
Architect, builder, or engineer: Unknown
Architectural Style: Early Republic, Colonial Revival
Historic Person: Scherman, Harry
The Scherman-Hoffman Wildlife Sanctuary, located in Bernardsville, Basking Ridge, and Harding Township, NJ, began with Mr. and Mrs. Harry Scherman’s 1965 donation of 125 acres to the New Jersey Audubon Society. Later, in 1973 and 1975, Mr. G. Frederick Hoffman donated parcels of land. The Hoffman estate house and caretaker’s house were added to the Sanctuary in 1981, when Mr. Hoffman died. This completed what is now the Scherman-Hoffman Wildlife Sanctuary, 276 acres of woodland, field, and floodplain habitat supporting over 200 species of wildlife over the course of a year.
Born in Montreal, Canada, in 1887, Harry Scherman was a highly resourceful marketer and a devout reader. He believed he could effectively market a love of reading and book ownership to the “general reader,” an audience often neglected in the book publishing industry at the time. Scherman’s first book marketing scheme involved a partnership with Whitman Candy, in which a box of candy and a small leather-bound book were wedded into one package. These classic works, which he called the Little Leather Library, eventually sold over thirty million copies.
Scherman’s ultimate goal was to create an effective way to distribute books at scale through mail order. By the 1920s, direct-mail marketing had proven successful in other industries, but no one had figured out how to market books this way. The difficulty was in applying a blanket marketing approach to a group of unique titles with different topics and different audiences. Scherman’s solution was to promote the idea of the “new book” as a commodity that was worthy of ownership solely because of its newness. His approach focused attention on consumers owning and benefiting from these new objects, rather than on the objects’ unique qualities. In 1926, Scherman’s idea came to fruition, and with an initial investment of $40,000 from Scherman and his two partners, the Book-of-the-Month Club was born.
Olcott Historic District
Just North of Route 202/206 in Bernardsville, New Jersey
(Green area)
Olcott Avenue is named after Frederick Pepoon Olcott (1841-1909), a Bernardsville mountain colony resident who was President of the Central Trust Company in New York, which later merged with JP Morgan. Olcott owned a Bernardsville estate that included the Somerset Hills Country Club.
In 1905, resident Frederick P. Olcott bought twenty-seven acres of what was then known as the Wolfe tract, now Olcott Avenue, for $10,000. He built the present stone nine-room Olcott Building for about $100,000 and donated the property to the Bernards Township school district (Bernardsville was still part of Bernards Twp until 1924).
This building served as the first high school in Bernards Township and also housed Bernardsville’s elementary grades. Architect Henry Janeway Hardenbergh designed the building. Lincoln said Hardenbergh also designed the Plaza Hotel, the Waldorf Hotel, and the Dakota Apartments in New York City.
While the Olcott Avenue School is but one historic structure within Bernardsville’s first historic district area, the area’s appeal and historic significance remember the story of the rise of the middle Class in Bernardsville and how this particular location impacted the entire region, including the downtown, Little Italy, and even the Mountain Colony areas.
Click here to read memorable and historic moments and commentary from the Historic District Nomination Forms submitted to the New Jersey Historic Preservation Office.
Morristown National Historical Park – NJ Brigade (F)
When soldiers first arrived in Jockey Hollow for their winter encampment, they had no choice but to sleep out in the open in the snow. Wagons with tents arrived a few days later than the soldiers. Soldiers remained in the tents until the wooden huts were completed. The soldier huts used at Jockey Hollow were fourteen feet by sixteen feet and housed twelve men.
General Washington ordered that enlisted men’s huts were to be built first. Therefore, Officers’ huts were not built and completed until all the enlisted men were settled in huts. It took most of the soldiers about two to three weeks to build their huts. Most enlisted men in the Continental Army were poor and lower-class. Many of these men were not even born in America.
Dunster Squib House
The Dunster–Squibb House, an early-19th-century Bernardsville farmhouse later transformed by pharmaceutical heir Charles F. Squibb into his Colonial Revival country home known as “The Orchard,” was listed on the New Jersey Register of Historic Places on October 16, 2013, and on the National Register of Historic Places on December 18, 2013.
The Dunster–Squibb House at 189 Mine Brook Road in Bernardsville tells the story of the town’s transformation from a rural farming community into the Somerset Hills country-estate era. The surviving 3.9 acres were once part of Oliver Dunster’s 120-acre farm; the house developed during the Dunster family’s 19th-century ownership before pharmaceutical heir Charles F. Squibb, son of Squibb pharmaceutical founder Edward R. Squibb, acquired the property in the late 1890s. Squibb substantially remodeled the old farmhouse into a Colonial Revival/Craftsman country residence known as “The Orchard.” After financial setbacks forced him to give up his larger neighboring estate, Welwood, in 1914, Squibb and his family moved into The Orchard. Squibb descendants remained associated with the property until 2008, when Bernardsville Borough purchased it for preservation.
Far Hills, New Jersey Historic Sites
Far Hills Train Station
One of the stops on what was once known as the “Millionaires Express”.
Alexander and James Linn Homestead
Alexander and James Linn Homestead
Mine Brook Rd (22) Rt. 202/Mine Brook Rd., between Sunnybranch Rd. and Lake Rd., (Just North of the Far Hills Train Station, Far Hills) Also Known as Linn House or Linnfields, Mayfields
Linn, Alexander and James(son), Homestead (added 1988 – Building – #88002057)
Built in the mid-1700s by Alexander Linn, it later became the home of his son James. Alexander was a Judge of the Court of Common Pleas and a Member of the Provincial Congress of New Jersey in 1776; during the Revolutionary War served as captain in the Somerset County Militia in 1776.
LINN, James, a U.S. Senator from New Jersey; born in Bedminster Township, Somerset County, N. J., in 1749; pursued preparatory studies and graduated from Princeton College in 1769; studied law; was admitted to the bar in 1772 and commenced practice in Trenton, N. J.; returned to Somerset County, N. J. James served as a Major in the Somerset County Militia during the Revolutionary War under Lord Stirling (from Basking Ridge).
Significant Year: 1850, 1750
Peapack & Gladstone, New Jersey Historic Sites
1701 – The “Peapack Patent” of 1701 transferred lands from 24 proprietors of East Jersey to George Willocks and John Johnstone.
On June 6, 1912, Peapack and Gladstone set off from Bedminster Township and incorporated as two independent boroughs.
Gladstone Train Station
(added 1984 – Building – #84002792)
Main St., Gladstone
Architect, builder, or engineer: Unknown
Architectural Style: Queen Anne
Area of Significance: Transportation, Architecture
Period of Significance: 1875-1899, 1900-1924
Peapack Limestone Kilns
Located on the East side of Main Street in Peapack, the Peapack Limekilns were donated to a local historical society in 1997, when the adjacent property was being developed as a residential subdivision. That society created a pocket park featuring the kilns, dedicated in May 1999, and open to the public. The preserved kilns serve as an important reminder about the agrarian heritage of the Somerset Hills.
A lime kiln operation existed in Peapack as early as 1794. By then, agricultural land in New Jersey was “wearing out,” and farmers used lime as a soil additive to increase crop yields. Many farmers burned limestone in small kilns on their property, but the Peapack kiln was commercial. Lime was also an important ingredient in mortar and whitewash. Lime was also used in the early leather-tanning factory located beside the Peapack River south of the kilns. An 1848 daybook kept by John Stelle, a farmer in southeast Bernards Township, records numerous trips to Peapack for lime during the winter months, when roads were frozen or snow-covered, and the 20-mile round-trip wagon journey was easier than during the warmer months, when mud frequently made roads nearly impassable.
The Peapack area was a good source of limestone, which was quarried nearby well into the 20th century. Workers loaded the quarried limestone into the limekiln from the top, alternating it with layers of fuel, such as charcoal early on and eventually coal. After about 60 hours of burning, workers removed the lime from the kiln floor.
The Peapack kiln consists of two adjacent kilns separated by a vertical joint visible in the stone wall, suggesting they may have been built at different times. The front wall, constructed of hewn stone, is 26′ high and is set into the side of a hill that provided easy access to load the limestone and fuel from the top.
Notable Historic Additions Not on the Registries
English Farm – Bernards Township (Liberty Corner)
Situated in the picturesque and historic Village of Liberty Corner, the working farm has been in the same family since before the Revolutionary War.
In late summer 1781, this farm site was where over 4,000 troops, 1,500 horses, and a herd of over 600 oxen congregated at what was then known as Bullions Tavern (Liberty Corner / Bernards Twp). The site recently commemorated the 225th anniversary of the march of French and continental forces through New Jersey to their victory over the British at the Battle of Yorktown. A reenactment on the English Farm, the actual location of the French campsite, was recently performed, recreating August 29, 1781.
Additional history of the English Farm- Click Here
Natirar – (Kate Macy Ladd) Peapack Gladstone /Far Hills / Bedminster
One of the most famous anagrams (a word spelled backward) in the Somerset Hills is Natirar. Natirar is an anagram of Raritan, the river that runs through the estate.
491 acres – Somerset County, NJ. It was purchased in 2003 for $23 million to create a new park for low-impact recreation such as hiking and biking, with occasional concerts or craft fairs.
The Natirar Mansion sits at the end of a 1.25-mile driveway within a 491-acre estate that occupies portions of three municipalities. (The main buildings and 327 acres are in the Borough of Peapack and Gladstone; 124 acres are in the Borough of Far Hills; 40 acres are in the Township of Bedminster.) The main entrance, once at the Far Hills train station, is now just over the town line, near where Main Street (Peapack Road) crosses the North Branch of the Raritan River and New Jersey Transit’s Peapack Gladstone railroad branch.
British tycoon Sir Richard Branson will transform 80 Acres of the 491-acre estate, The Natirar Mansion, into the Spa at Natirar. Natirar is historically remembered as the estate created by Walter Graeme Ladd (1857-1933) and his wife, Catherine Everit Macy Ladd (1863-1945), who began acquiring estate land in April 1905 and named it Natirar (Raritan backward) for the Raritan River that flows through the property. The estate includes 22 buildings, many historic, six wells, three bridges, three streams, a pond, and woodlands. The 33,33,000-square-footnsion itself, grand as it may be, is sedate and austere.
Kate Macy and Walter Ladd began acquiring property in the Somerset Hills in 1905. Macy was a Quaker heiress to a whaling/oil/shipping fortune; her father’s business partner was John D. Rockefeller. Ladd was an entrepreneur and attorney to John D. Rockefeller. They married in 1883 and rented property in Bernardsville as they acquired small local farmsteads until their estate spread over 1,000 acres throughout Peapack/Gladstone, Far Hills, and Bedminster.
The main entrance lane ambles upward as the stream turns away, then leads through woodland until it emerges on a hilltop, with stone cottages and a stable in view. Then, it swings in front of a small “castle.”
Moroccan (NW Africa) King Hassan II bought the property from the Ladd Estate in 1983, but he never lived there permanently. Somerset County bought Natirar from Hassan II’s son, King Mohammed VI of Morocco, in 2003 for $22 million.
The Branson-Wojtowicz development partnership and its co-applicant, the Somerset County Improvement Authority (SCIA), were seeking Board approval for 143,000 square feet of new construction at the estate. The mansion, two cottages, carriage house, and greenhouse stand on 88 acres that the county leased to Sir Richard Branson, a lease that was later dissolved. Branson is no longer involved in the project. The non-spa area (aka the park), covering about 400+ acres, opened to the public in the Fall of 2006.
Original Architects- Guy Lowell & Henry Hardenberg, who also designed The Plaza Hotel, The Dakota, Manhattan Courthouse, and the Boston Museum of Fine Arts.
USGA Golf Museum – Far Hills
(Actually is in Bernards Township)
The USGA museum is located on a 60-acre estate. The USGA’s Far Hills facility documents the game’s rich history and is home to the country’s most sophisticated and technically advanced golf equipment test facility.
Constructed in 1919, it was built for Thomas Frothingham. In 1926, Thomas Frothingham’s Dogwood estate (now the USGA Golf House Museum) was sold to John Sloan, a prominent furniture retailer, after Frothingham’s bankruptcy as a partner in the investment company Potter Brothers & Company. After a failed suicide attempt, a divorce from his wife, and moving to Mexico to avoid bankruptcy prosecution, Frothingham died in Mexico.
US Equestrian Team Foundation Headquarters – Gladstone
The Hamilton Farm estate is home to the United States Equestrian Team Foundation.
In addition to serving as a training site for horses and riders who compete in Olympic events, it is also the venue for the annual US Equestrian Team Festival of Champions, a four-day horsemanship extravaganza that includes driving, show jumping, and dressage, normally held in the third week of June. The USET is featured in the Peapack Gladstone Historic Barn Tour video below. Take a look.
Essex Hunt Club – Peapack
The Essex Hunt Club is a fox-hunting club that split into two private clubs: Essex Fox Hounds, which still hunts, and the Essex Hunt Club, a winter recreational club on more than 100 acres that uses an ice rink for figure skating and hockey. The Masters of Foxhounds Association of North America is the sanctioning body in the U.S., or the organization called the Essex Fox Hounds, which was spun off from the original Essex Hunt Club.
W. Raymond Cross Estate & Gardens – Bernardsville
Site of the New Jersey Brigade Unit of Morristown National Historical Park, on Old Jockey Hollow Road in Bernardsville, NJ.
The original house, built by John A. Bensel in 1905, formed the centerpiece of his “Queen Anne Farm.” The estate included a carriage house, a five-story stone water tower, and a gate house.
In 1929, W. Redmond Cross purchased the property and renamed it “Hardscrabble House.” His wife, Julia Newbold Cross, was a member of the Royal Horticultural Society for eight years. Mrs. Cross made extensive improvements in the garden with the help of Clarence Fowler, a noted landscape architect. Together, they cultivated an unusual assortment of plants throughout the garden. The house was extensively remodeled in 1940, after Mr. Cross’s death.
The Cross Estate Gardens are a project of the New Jersey Historical Garden Foundation, in cooperation with the National Park Service.