Welcome to the Mr. Local History Project
“A 501c3 Non-Profit Dedicated to Preserving and Promoting Jersey History with a Social Twist”
The Mr. Local History Project is about bringing New Jersey’s past into the present through the stories of real places, real people, and real communities. Focused especially on New Jersey history, the project celebrates local history in a way that feels personal, engaging, and relevant, not something locked away in textbooks, but history that lives where we live. As we head into 2026, the 250th anniversary of the United States, Mr. Local History is turning history into a shared experience. With a social twist, this is about connecting online and in the community, sharing memories, spotlighting hometown stories, and honoring New Jersey’s outsized role in America’s founding. It is history you can explore, share, and be part of together.
Today in America’s History (We Update Every Day)
- 1789: The United States Department of War is established.
- 1794: U.S. President George Washington invokes the Militia Acts of 1792 to suppress the Whiskey Rebellion in western Pennsylvania.
- 1909: Alice Huyler Ramsey and three friends become the first women to complete a transcontinental auto trip, taking 59 days to travel from New York, New York to San Francisco, California.
- 1927: The Peace Bridge opens between Fort Erie, Ontario and Buffalo, New York.
- 1942: World War II: The Battle of Guadalcanal begins as the United States Marines initiate the first American offensive of the war with landings on Guadalcanal and Tulagi in the Solomon Islands.
- 1964: Vietnam War: The U.S. Congress passes the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution giving U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson broad war powers to deal with North Vietnamese attacks on American forces.
- 1978: U.S. President Jimmy Carter declares a federal emergency at Love Canal due to toxic waste that had been disposed of negligently.
- 1987: Cold War: Lynne Cox becomes the first person to swim from the United States to the Soviet Union, crossing the Bering Strait from Little Diomede Island in Alaska to Big Diomede in the Soviet Union.
- 1989: U.S. Congressman Mickey Leland (D-TX) and 15 others die in a plane crash in Ethiopia.
- 1998: Bombings at United States embassies in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania and Nairobi, Kenya kill approximately 212 people.
What Can You Do Today to Celebrate America’s 250th?
Our Readers’ Top 10 MLH Posts this Week
Latest Posts
Looking Back at Millington’s Clover Hill Swim Club
Views: 87 Clover Hill Swimming ClubA Beloved Summer Retreat That Changed New Jersey History PREVIEW RELEASE: For those who subscribe to early releases of Mr Local History Research. Additional updates will be provided as we receive answers to our research…
Reggie’s Playland Farm: A Forgotten Jazz Club and Mill Ridge Swim Club in Millington, NJ
Views: 260 Our story begins as we were researching another story tied to swim clubs in New Jersey’s Basking Ridge area, and we were preparing a story about Millington’s Clover Hill Swim Club. A fun story you can read later,…
Windsurfing On the Columbia River Gorge in the 80s
Views: 641 Before kiteboarding, before wing foiling, and before extreme sports filled television screens, there was windsurfing, and nowhere captured its spirit quite like the Columbia River Gorge. Throughout the 1980s, this remarkable corridor between Oregon and Washington became the…
Remembering the Columbia River Gorge’s Wind Ranch in the 80s
Views: 1,296 Ah, who remembers the Wind Ranch in Bingen, Washington? Just across the bridge from Hood River was a place, no, an iconic place, that remains now only in my memory. This post is more of a community plea…
The Missing Cemetery of the Basking Ridge Continental Army Hospital
Views: 187 For decades, visitors to Jockey Hollow believed they were standing beside the burial ground of Continental soldiers who died during the terrible winter of 1779–1780. However, archaeological investigations found no human remains, and the National Park Service now…
History Helps Realtors Sell Real Estate
Views: 4,121 Realtors’ History Guide to Selling Basking Ridge, Bernardsville, Bedminster and the Rest of the Somerset Hills, New Jersey It probably comes as no surprise that realtors have a fairly easy time selling homes in Bernards Township and the…
Homer’s The Odyssey & The Gods Told This Time By Christopher Nolan
Views: 442 At Mr. Local History, we believe history is at its best when it connects people. That’s why our motto is “History with a social twist.” Every place has a story, every family has a connection, and every generation…
A Tiny Roadside Cemetery in Basking Ridge
Views: 501 Isn’t it strange that you might drive by something 1,000s of times and never notice something….until you do. This is one of those stories. Just to the south of the former Millington quarry entrance on Stonehouse Road sits…
The Wedding Heard Round the Colonies: Lord Stirling, Washington & New Jersey’s Most Famous Revolutionary War Wedding
Views: 549 Commemorating the 247th Anniversary of the Wedding Heard ‘Round the ColoniesJuly 27, 1779 – July 27, 2026 July 27, 1779Basking Ridge’s Biggest Event – Kitty Stirling’s Wedding On July 27, 1779, the Revolutionary War was entering one of…
MLH Housing Development History Series
Views: 149 Every neighborhood, subdivision, shopping center, office park, and apartment complex has a story long before the first shovel ever touched the ground. The Development History Series explores how today’s communities came to be, tracing the land from its…
History of Housing Developments in Bernards Township
Views: 14,560 Bernards Township has a long history of being a sleepy rural town. Then, the US built the Lyons VA, and everything changed as the population grew. Then AT&T came to town in the 1970s, and everything AGAIN started…
MLH Loves To See The Public Engaged….. The Latest Comments
Facebook Post 2019 – BINGEN BART’S WIND REPORT – conversation #53, recorded in Bart’s Vervloet’s office. Columbia Gorge Wind &…
Thanks for writing. All of our magazines have been in a “digital-only” format since we started creating the online magazine…
I’ve spent some recent hours reading your Middlebrook and Morristown sections. I enjoyed them very much and would like to…
Meryl Streep indeed also lived in Madison, New Jersey on Valley Rd, as shown by the 1950 census, for apparently…
Good morning! On the Westfield lost businesses list there seem to be two missing 🙂 same building next to team…
Thanks for sharing this. I always pass that Cemetery and didn’t realize someone was actually buried there. I thought it…
The Vail family was scattered all around the Morristown/Plainfield/Somerville area, and we are all related. When I was a kid,…
My grandfather set the stone for Schmid Park on Pond Hill Road. He worked at the quarry when they had…
I grew up in Summit. We went to the Springfield WD. I graduated Summit HS in 1975. Before they tore…
Our Summer 2026 Magazine is HERE!
Full of great local Jersey History to keep you on the edge of your history seat.
Special Edition – America’s 250th The SEMI-QUIN-CENTENNIAL is HERE!
See our special digital magazine. Full of great local Jersey History.
I remember when Robbie Naish won the pro-am one year, and it was sponsored by Yamaha (88 or 89 maybe?).…