8/25/2023 0 Comments Edison township public works![]() Christie Street, on which the Edison Memorial Tower now stands, was the first street to be illuminated by incandescent lamps, and Mrs. These Menlo Park inventions include the phonograph, the electric railway (which incidentally, ran along present day Middlesex Avenue) and the incandescent lamp. While there, Thomas Edison invented items that led to for than 400 patents. The establishment of Thomas Edison's industrial research laboratory - he preferred calling it his "invention factory" - in 1876 brought global fame to the township as it became the site for some of the most innovative research and manufacturing feats in world history. ![]() It is said that he chose the Menlo Park site for his laboratories because it was the highest point along the Pennsylvania Railroad between New York and Philadelphia. One of the many passengers carried on the Pennsylvania line to Edison was Thomas Alva Edison, later to be known as the "Wizard of Menlo Park". By the late 1800's, many residents commuted to jobs in New York and other parts of New Jersey. The church’s tercentennial was celebrated in 1989.Įdison grew in the second half of the 19th century as the attractiveness of the rural landscape became more accessible with the opening of the Pennsylvania Railroad and the Easton and Amboy lines. Through 1875, however, the church was known as the First Baptist Church of Piscataway. Stelton Baptist Church was formed in the spring of 1689, and among its original members was the Stelle family, after whom the Stelton section of Edison is named. It took place at the intersection which is now Oak Tree and Plainfield roads.Įdison is also home to the second oldest Baptist Church in New Jersey and the 10th oldest in the nation. This battle, which is part of the Battle of Short Hills, is known as The Oak Tree Engagement. Washington's troops had taken refuge in the nearby Watchung Mountains. In 1777, the local militia engaged in a battle with British and Hessian troops who were advancing toward Gen. Six British soldiers killed in one of the area's skirmishes are buried in the cemetery at the church. James Episcopal Church building served as a hospital for wounded British soldiers during the war. Revolutionary War skirmishes took place in Bonhamtown, Piscatawaytown and along what is now Woodbridge Avenue. By 1834, the village featured 10 to 12 dwellings, two taverns, a store and a schoolhouse. The hamlet is said to have been the site of an old Native American village and later a Continental Army camp and battleground during the Revolutionary War.Īs early as 1693, Bonhamtown served as the seat of justice for Middlesex and Somerset counties. The Bonhamtown area of Edison, on Old Post Road, is named after Nicholas Bonham, a freeholder from 1682 to 1683. His route was retraced, and special ceremonies were held at the historic St. Old Post Road, the earliest public road in eastern New Jersey, passes through Edison and is said to have been used by President George Washington as he traveled through the state on the way to his inauguration in New York City in April 1789.Ī re-enactment of that journey took place in Edison on April 13, 1989, during the celebration of the bicentennial of Washington's first inauguration. Skull and bone fragments from the Stone Age have been discovered in the Piscatawaytown area, and arrowheads and cooking implements, ascribed to Native Americans living in the area, were found in an archeological dig in the Dismal Swamp. But people have lived in the Edison area since prehistoric times. Many of these names live on in the community in the form of street names and section names. ![]() Its first families included the Dunhams, Martins, Bonhams, Hulls and FitzRandolphs, to whom land grants were given. Edison, formerly known as Raritan Township, was first settled in the late 1600's, when it was part of Woodbridge and Piscataway townships.
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