New Jersey - Tidbits of History

Header image from National Park Service, New Jersey Pinelands National Reserve, New Lisbon, New Jersey.

New Jersey was the 3rd state to ratify the Constitution. It became a state on Dec. 18, 1787.

Bird: Willow Goldfinch or American Goldfinch

These are active and acrobatic little finches that cling to weeds and seed socks, and sometimes mill about in large numbers at feeders or on the ground beneath them. Goldfinches fly with a bouncy, undulating pattern and often call in flight, drawing attention to themselves. The American goldfinch is gregarious during the non-breeding season, when it is often found in large flocks, usually with other finches. The social hierarchy, measured by how many aggressive encounters are won by each individual, tends towards the male being dominant in the non-breeding season. During the breeding season, this finch lives in loose colonies. While the nest is being constructed, the male will act aggressively toward other males who intrude into his territory, driving them away, and the female reacts in the same way toward other females. This aggressiveness subsides once the eggs have been laid. State bird of Washington, Iowa, and New Jersey.

Flower: Wood Violet

Violets typically have heart-shaped leaves. Their surface is either smooth or covered with fine hairs, depending on the species. Violet flowers symbolize delicate love, affection, modesty, faith, nobility, intuition and dignity. The meaning of the violet changes depending on the color of the flower and the person the flower is sent to. Blue violet flowers symbolizes love and faithfulness, white violets represent purity and chastity, and yellow violets symbolize high worth and goodness. One quirk of some Violets is the elusive scent of their flowers; along with terpenes, a major component of the scent is a ketone compound called ionone, which temporarily de-sensitizes the receptors of the nose, thus preventing any further scent being detected from the flower until the nerves recover.

Tree: Northern Red Oak

It is also the state tree of New Jersey and the provincial tree of Prince Edward Island. The northern red oak is one of the most important oaks for timber production in North America. Quality red oak is of high value as lumber and veneer, while defective logs are used as firewood. Other related oaks are also cut and marketed as red oak, although their wood is not always of as high a quality. These include eastern black oak, scarlet oak, pin oak, Shumard oak, southern red oak and other species in the red oak group. Construction uses include flooring, veneer, interior trim, and furniture. It is also used for lumber, railroad ties, and fence posts.

Red oak wood grain is so open that smoke can be blown through it from end-grain to end-grain on a flat-sawn board. For this reason, it is subject to moisture infiltration and is unsuitable for outdoor uses such as boat-building or exterior trim.
The northern red oak is named for the reddish color of the wood, though the fall foliage can also be a brilliant red. The acorns, leaves, and seedlings of northern red oak provide food for a huge array of wildlife including many species of birds, deer, elk, bear, squirrels, rabbits, and rodents.

An important source of hardwood lumber, the coarse-grained wood of the northern red oak tree is hard, strong, heavy, and durable. Red oak wood has been used to make railroad ties, fence posts, furniture, flooring, and for many other uses (it is also an excellent firewood).

State Quarter
From theus50.com

The New Jersey quarter, depicts General George Washington and members of the Colonial Army crossing the Delaware River en route to very important victories during the Revolutionary War. The design is based on the 1851 painting by Emmanuel Leutze, “Washington Crossing the Delaware,” which currently hangs in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.

It was a cold Christmas night in 1776 and the Delaware River was frozen in many places. General George Washington calculated the enemy would not be expecting an assault in this kind of weather. He and his soldiers courageously crossed the Delaware River into Trenton, NJ. Using surprise as their greatest weapon, Washington’s army captured over 900 prisoners and secured the town. Later that night, his army continued towards Princeton, NJ, again taking the enemy by surprise. These two victories proved very important to his army as they gave the soldiers courage, hope, and newfound confidence. The ammunition, food and other supplies confiscated from their captives also helped them survive the brutal winter of 1777.

Capital: Trenton, New Jersey

Nickname: Garden State
Motto: Liberty and prosperity

Origin of name: From the Channel Isle of Jersey.

New Jersey Facts and Trivia

New Jersey was governed as two distinct provinces, East and West Jersey, for 28 years between 1674 and 1702; at times it was part of the Province of New York or the Dominion of New England.

Home of Princeton University, founded in 1746.

Beautiful Long Beach Island was home to a bloody massacre back in 1782. A British vessel ran aground near Barnegat City and was captured by patriot militiamen under Captain Andrew Steelman. That night, while sleeping on the beach, Steelman and his men were massacred by Tory raiders led by John Bacon.

The famous duel between Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton took place on July 11, 1804 in Weehawken, New Jersey.

The first baseball game was played in Hoboken in 1846.

In order to meet the increasing demand for his wire rope, John Roebling opened a factory in Trenton, New Jersey in 1848. John Roebling, along with his two sons, Washington and Ferdinand, built a suspension bridge across the gorge of the Niagara River. They then built the Brooklyn Bridge plus many other suspension bridges in the United States.

Modern paleontology, the science of studying dinosaur fossils, began in 1858 with the discovery of the first nearly complete skeleton of a dinosaur in Haddonfield, New Jersey. The Hadrosaurus is the official New Jersey state dinosaur.

1876 – Thomas Edison opened his famous lab in Menlo Park.

Salt water taffy’s origins can be traced to Atlantic City in 1883.

Ellis Island opened in 1892 as an immigrant inspection station. It was long considered to be a part of New York but a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in 1998 found that most of the island is in New Jersey.

The first picture postcards in the United States were printed in 1893 and featured color views of Atlantic City.

The first Miss America pageant was held on the Atlantic City boardwalk in September of 1921. The winner was 16-year-old Margaret Gorman of Washington D.C., who took home a $100 prize and a Golden Mermaid trophy. New Jersey is still home to the Miss America pageant held in Atlantic City.

1912 – New Jersey governor Woodrow Wilson was elected the 28th President of the United States.

The first Drive-In Movie theater was opened in Camden in 1933.

The Hindenburg caught fire while trying to land at Lakehurst, New Jersey, and went down in a raging ball of flame. Miraculously, more than half of the airship’s passengers and crew survived. May 6, 1937

The Borough of Roosevelt is the only municipality in New Jersey that is, in its entirety, a registered National Historic Site. It was created as part of Roosevelt’s New Deal as a cooperative project. This experiment in socialism failed during WW II.

There’s still a debate over the fact that who first called New Jersey the Garden State, whether it was Ben Franklin or Abraham Browning, but this is for sure that the phrase was used for the same reason. The state is full of green goodness. New Jersey is a world leader in blueberry and cranberry production too.

New Jersey has the highest population density in the U.S. An average 1,030 people per sq. mi., which is 13 times the national average.

New Jersey has the most diners in the world and is sometimes referred to as the diner capital of the world.

New Jersey has 108 toxic waste dumps, the most in any one state in the nation.

North Jersey is the car theft capital of the world, with more cars stolen in Newark then any other city. Even the 2 largest cities, NYC and LA put together.

New Jersey is the only state in the nation which offers child abuse prevention workshops to every public school.

Sandy Hook is home to New Jersey’s only legal nude beach.

Weird laws in New Jersey:

In New Jersey, you cannot wear a bullet-proof vest while committing a murder.
You cannot buy a car on a Sunday as car dealerships are not allowed to open on Sunday.
You may also not slurp your soup.
Automobiles cannot pass horse-drawn carriages on the street.
If you’ve been convicted of DUI, you are no longer allowed to have custom license plates.
In Trenton, it is against the law to eat pickles on Sunday.

People:

In Show Business

Bud Abbott, comedian
Alan Alda, actor
Jason Alexander, actor
William Count Basie, band leader
Joan Bennett, actress
Robert Blake, actor
Jon Bon Jovi, musician
David Copperfield, magician
Lou Costello, comedian
Tom Cruise, actor

Sandra Dee, actress

Brian DePalma, screenwriter and director
Danny DeVito, actor
Michael Douglas, actor
Kirsten Dunst, actress
John Forsythe, actor
Connie Francis, singer
James Gandolfini, actor
Janeane Garafolo, actress
Savron Glover, choreographer
Lauryn Hill, singer, rapper, songwriter
Whitney Houston, entertainer
Ice-T, rapper
Ernie Kovacs, comedian
Nathan Lane, actor
Frank Langella, actor

Jerry Lewis, comedian, actor

Ray Liotta, actor
Patricia McBride, ballerina
Marilynn McCoo, singer, actress
Frankie Muniz, actor
Ozzie Nelson, band leader, actor
Bebe Neuwirth, actress
Jack Nicholson, actor
Les Paul, guitarist
Joe Pesci, actor
Joe Piscopo, comedian, actor
Paul Robeson, singer, actor
Nelson Riddle, composer, arranger, bandleader
Kelly Ripa, actress, talk show host
Eva Marie Saint, actress
Ruth St. Denis, dancer, choreographer
Roy Schneider, actor, boxer
Paul Simon, singer, songwriter

Frank Sinatra, singer, actor

Kevin Spacey, actor
Bruce Springsteen, musician
Meryl Streep, actress
Loretta Swit, actress
John Travolta, actor
Frankie Vallie, singer, actor
Lee Van Cleef, actor
Sarah Vaughan, singer
Dionne Warwick, actress, singer
Clerow “Flip” Wilson, comedian
Robert Wuhl, actor, comedian

Other:

The only New Jersey born person ever to get elected as president of the United States was (Stephen) Grover Cleveland (1837–1908) However, Cleveland left his birthplace (Caldwell, New Jersey) as a little boy, winning his fame and two terms in the White House (1885–89, 1893–97) as a resident of New York State.
Virginia-born (Thomas) Woodrow Wilson, who attended and taught at Princeton and spent most of his adult life in New Jersey, was elected as governor of New Jersey in 1910 and as president of the United States in 1912
Charles Addams, cartoonist
Edwin Aldrin, astronaut
Judy Blume, author
William J. Brennan, jurist
Aaron Burr, political leader
James Fenimore Cooper, author
Stephen Crane, author
Allen Ginsberg, poet
William Frederick Halsey, Jr., admiral
Franco Harris, football player
Donald Fletcher Holmes, inventor

Derek Jeter, baseball player

Robert Wood Johnson II, cofounder of Johnson & Johnson
Mark Kelly and Scott Kelly, the first sets of twins to have both traveled into space,
Alfred Joyce Kilmer, poet
Alfred C. Kinsey, zoologist
Dorothea Lange, photographer
Anne Morrow Lindbergh, author
Norman Mailer, author
James W. Marshall, discovered gold in California
Shaquille O’Neal, basketball player
Dorothy Parker, author
Zebulon Mongomery Pike, explorer, soldier
Edward J. Rosinski, inventor
Philip Milton Roth, author