About the Hopewell History Map

The Hopewell History Map provides an interactive map-based interface for exploring information and images on historical properties in Hopewell Borough. The Map is built on the familiar Google Maps platform, and so has the usual map controls (map type, zoom, pan), plus additional historical property annotations displayed as street numbers and thumbnail images.

== Explore the Hopewell History Map (separate site) ==

As of the end of 2020, the History Map covered 775 addresses in all of Hopewell Borough, with information on over 100 historic places, and over 1360 images of properties, historical and current-day, buildings and streetscapes. These include over 660 current-day images of all the properties in the historic district. This is a work in progress, designed to be open for adding additional historical information and images. Comments welcome.

Browse Map Addresses and Property Images

Browse local addresses on the Map, and view associated images of the properties (as available).

Explore Local History

Dig further into local history information, and display properties by date.

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Panels and Controls

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The Hopewell History Map is designed to be used in standard Web browsers (e.g., Firefox, Chrome, Safari, Edge, and Internet Explorer). It works on both computer displays and on mobile tablet devices. The display automatically simplifies for smaller windows and smartphone screens.

The History Map has a standard window layout with Map, Image, and Places panels. It defaults to just showing the Map and Image panels; use the menu to also show the Places panel. The interface also reduces automatically show to only the Map and Image panel on smaller window sizes and screens (smartphones).

Window Panels

• Map Panel (top) – Standard Google map with Google Points of Interest icons, with added historical annotations (street numbers).
• Image Panel (bottom right) – Displays information about the selected property, plus slide show of associated images (if any). Click the property information caption for links to property documents, and to view the images full size.
• Places Panel (bottom left) – Table of street addresses of all properties in Hopewell Borough, with additional information including historic name / date, historic sources, Block / Lot numbers, Latitude/Longitude, and the number of associated images and documents (if any) .
• Menu button (top left) – Click for options and links.

Map Panel

Standard Google Map, annotated with historical information (street numbers) for all Hopewell Borough properties

• “Hw” Marker – Click to re-center and re-zoom the map to the default position.
  • (Always visible – The street address numbers are only displayed when zoomed in within the town.)
• Properties – Red and blue street numbers
  • [Desktop] Hover to display abbreviated address and historical information.
  • Click to display additional information (in Map pop-up, Image and Places panels).
  • Historical places (blue numbers, “^” prefix) – Displays additional information.
  • Sites with imagery (house “⌂” icon) – Displays images in the Image panel.
  • Sites with documents (square “□” icon) – Click link in Image panel caption drop-down.
• Google Points of Interest (names and icons) – Click to display info.
• Google Property Information – Double click on map background to display info.
  • Draws a marker with pop-up at the nearest property found.
  • Draws a yellow rectangle around the associated property bounds (if found).

Image Panel

Displays information about the selected property, with associated images (if any)

• Displays associated property images and information (when street number has house icon “⌂”).
• Caption shows information (top left)
  • Lists property address, plus property historic name and date (“aka” – if any), and date and description of the current image (“Img” – if any).
  • Click to drop down for more information on the property, including Block/Lot and associated documents (also see the Address panel for additional information).
  • Click the Document link to view the associated 1985 Historical Site Survey in a separate window (street number has square icon “□”).
  • Click the Image link (“Full Img”) to open a separate History Map window to view the image full size. (In a full-size window, click the Image link (“Orig Img”) to display the original image file.)
• Use the sequence and zoom buttons at the bottom to step through the images and pan / zoom in the current image.
  • Click the sequence buttons (bottom right) to step to Previous/Next or First/Last image in the sequence.
  • Click the zoom buttons (bottom left) to zoom In/Out, zoom back to the full Home view, and enlarge/shrink to the Full Image. Also use the standard mouse controls (desktop – click / drag / mouse wheel) or touch controls (mobile – drag, pinch).
  • Image caption displays image count (e.g., “[2 / 3]” for second of three images).

Places Panel

Table of all properties in Hopewell Borough, listed by street address, with columns containing additional information.

• Click a row to display the selected property on the Map and Image panel.
• Click in the column headers to sort ascending/descending.
• Click the menu in the column headers to filter the column values (press and hold on mobile devices). For example, in the Date column, enter “1” to select only the rows containing any historical properties (i.e., with an 1800’s or 1900’s date).
• Columns include historic Date (can be circa or by) and Description, Sources for historic information (see below), number of Images and Documents (if any), Block/Lot numbers, Old Block/Lot numbers (for Hopewell Borough pre 1994), and GPS Lat/Long. “Tax” is the tax address of the property (if different from the street address).

Menu

Click the Menu button (top right in header) for display options and links.

• Options – Display the Options dialog (see below).
• Show / Hide Places – Display the Places panel, or only the Map and Image panels.
• Help / About the History Map – Show this Help / About page (in a new window).
• Main Hopewell History Project Site – Click to launch the main Hopewell History Project site (in a new window).

Options Dialog

Click Options in the menu to display the Options dialog and change display options. The dialog floats over the window until it is closed, so you can view the results of the changes and also click controls in the panels. (Also adds Date and Then/Now controls on small screens.)

• Places Options
  • Filter Places – By Source – Use the drop-down menu to only show historic properties listed in a specific source document or reference map.  Select “Show All Places” to display all known addresses in the town (the default), or “Show all Historic Places” to display all known historic places.
  • Updates both Map and Places panels, and updates count after Places header.
• Map Options
  • Show Map Place Thumbnails – Check to show the image thumbnail when a property is selected, and for all properties when zoomed in. Uncheck to show only the addresses and not image thumbnails.
  • Show Map Place Popups – Check to show place information pop-ups when addresses are clicked on the Map. Uncheck to not show popups, i.e., when quickly clicking through multiple addresses.
  • Show Google Points of Interest – Check to show Google Maps points of interest icons (default). Uncheck to hide the Google POI markers.
• Help / About the History Map – Click to show this Help / About page (in a new window).
• Main Hopewell History Project Site – Click to launch the main Hopewell Valley History Project site (in a new window).

Historical Sources and Dates

The current list of historical properties on the map (street numbers in blue) is assembled from several sources, including the 1985 Hopewell Borough Cultural Resource Survey (a.k.a. “Site Survey“) and historical books and maps.

Use the Date control to view only the properties that existed as of that date (i.e., found in one or more sources or on one or more maps as of that date). Use the Source Only menu in the Options dialog to view only the properties listed in one specific source.

The date listed for a property is derived from one or more sources, and may be an exact year (if known), or circa an approximate year (“c”), or no later than a specific year (“by” the date of a published book or map).

The historical sources currently used:

• Up to 1875 – Listed in the 1985 Site Survey, covering properties up to 1875
• Up to 1891 – Listed in “Buildings Existing when Boro Incorporated March 1891”, from Hopewell’s Past by Betty Gantz (1987), based on the Fowler 1887 map
• 1897 – Found in the Healthful Historic Hopewell booklet (1897) by Normer Gray
• 1909 – Found in the 1909 Hopewell N.J. booklet by Fry & Whitehead

(These sources also are listed in the “Srcs” column in the Places panel, abbreviated as S/G/H/9.)

The 1985 Site Survey is the definitive N. J. Historic Preservation Office reference, listing historic properties up to 1875. The maps used as the key references for the Site Survey are also listed in the menu (as “SS”); selecting one of these maps will display only the places that the Site Survey identifies as appearing on the corresponding map. (As a result, for example, the 1902 selection does not list any additional properties from after 1875; it only lists the pre-1875 properties in the Site Survey that also appear on the later map.)

The historical maps referenced in the Site Survey (see the Map Digital Archives and Historic Town Maps of Hopewell Borough):

• Otley & Keily, 1849 – Map of Mercer County, N. J.
• Lake & Beers, 1860 – Map of the Vicinity of Phila. and Trenton
• Everts & Stewart, 1875 – Combination Atlas Map of Mercer County, N. J.
• Fowler, 1887 – Hopewell N. J. (Panoramic aerial view)
• Scarlett & Scarlett, 1890 – Fire Map of Mercer County, N. J.
• Sanborn Map Co., 1902 – Fire Insurance Maps of Hopewell, Mercer Co., N. J.

(The full list of reference sources and maps are abbreviated in the “Refs” column in the Places panel, listed in the same order, and abbreviated as the first letter plus the last two digits of the date.)

Standard Google Map Controls

• Map/Satellite Control (top left)
  • Map – Show default Google street map
    • Check Terrain to add terrain background
    • Shows approximate property lines and shapes of buildings (in gray)
    • Annotated with street names (when zoomed in to a few blocks)
    • Annotated with Google Places icons (municipal and businesses, when zoomed in to the town) – click for more information (as stored by Google)
  • Satellite – Show Google satellite aerial view
    • Check Labels to add street and property labels
• Zoom Control (+/-) (bottom left)
  • Click +/- to zoom in and out one step
  • [Desktop] – Use mouse wheel to zoom in/out
  • [Mobile]- Pinch/spread with two fingers to zoom in/out
• Pan
  • [Desktop] – Drag to pan the map in the window
  • [Mobile] – Drag with two fingers

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Updates

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• January 2020 – Image pan/zoom and full-size
• March 2020 – Current-day images of historic district, step by date, then and now
• February 2020 – Current-day images, historic places from 1887 Fowler map
• January 2020 – Property images, Site Surveys, Options (Historic Places)
• 200110 – First prototype Hopewell History Map