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Originally published in 1939
Some of this information may no longer be current and in that case is presented for historical interest only.
Edited by GET NJ, COPYRIGHT 2003
At 30.3 miles, at the Rahway cloverleaf intersection, US 9 (see Tour 18)
branches (L) from US 1.
Between this point and Trenton the highway is through woodlands and
farm country. State police, wearing French blue coats and dark blue trousers with a broad gold stripe, patrol the road, using automobiles as well as
motorcycles.
At 33.6 miles (R) is ROOSEVELT PARK, a tract of 192 acres that is the
first unit of the Middlesex County park system. Men employed by the
ERA and the WPA set to work on a small wilderness of marsh and
underbrush and made a park, well landscaped and equipped with all facilities for picnickers. Over the hill is an artificial lake, and within the
park are the new MIDDLESEX COUNTY TUBERCULOSIS HOSPITAL, a hand-somely designed building erected with PWA funds (see Tour 8), and the
KIDDIE KEEP-WELL CAMP, where undernourished children are given summer vacations.
The highway rolls with scarcely a curve through somewhat undulating
country. For 5 miles the road was paralleled until 1937 by the rusty rails
of what used to be a high-speed electric line between Elizabeth and New
Brunswick. Electric cars gave way to a small motorbus, equipped with steel
flanges on the tires, which made one trip as far as Bonhamtown junction
once a week. At this point the flanges were removed, the bus driven off
the rails and turned around, and the flanges replaced. Weeks passed without any passengers being carried; the sole purpose of the run was to hold
the franchise.
At 35.3 miles is the junction with a concrete and asphalt road.
Left on this road in BONHAMTOWN, 0.8 miles (80 alt., 800 pop.), country
village with two small churches, a school, and a general store, on a winding main
street. The settlement dates far back into the Colonial period, and was the scene of
skirmishes during the Revolutionary War. It is the site of the U. S. Army's RARITAN
ARSENAL (not open to public), a large depot for the storage and distribution of
ordnance material. In the magazine area can be stored enough ammunition to supply
a field army for more than 30 days. The cost of plant and equipment on this 2,200-acre tract was $14,000,000; the value of material in storage is about $240,000,000.
PISCATAWAY, 3.5 m. (120 alt., 2,011 pop.), has a few modern business buildings scattered along its main thoroughfare. By far the most interesting and attractive structure in the community is ST. JAMES' EPISCOPAL CHURCH (L), a glistening
white building, almost square, with four large pillars and a tiny steeple. This edifice, the third built by a parish organized in 1714, was consecrated in 1837. It is a
reproduction of the church destroyed by a tornado in 1835 that tossed the pulpit
away. The original bell, brought from England in 1702, still hangs in the belfry.
Curious inscriptions are found on the stones in the adjoining graveyard. One, dated
into the Raritan River, which carried it to the shore of Staten Island, 1 5 miles
1693, tells of twin boys who skipped Sunday service to gather mushrooms in the
woods. The mushrooms were, as the epitaph has it, "poyseond." Another tombstone
is that of Harper, reputedly an atheist, who had obtained the deed to his new brick
house on the day of the 1835 tornado. Celebrating his acquisition at the village
tavern, he ran out into the road when the windstorm struck the town and defied
God to kill him. Hardly had the blasphemous words left his lips, so the story
goes, when the church roof blew off and a flying timber crushed him to death.
At 3.7 m. this side road rejoins US 1.
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