Hopewell Valley History Project
Preserving Our History
So what’s up with all these menus – I thought we were doing history here? Well, yes, the History Project is collecting and sharing materials from Hopewell’s past, but there’s also the future history to think of – preserving the history of our own time for the next generations. == View 2000s Hopewell Menus in … Continue reading History on the Menu – Future History
Here are two student typography projects done in 1919 and 1920, including a poster for a game between Princeton High School and Hopewell High School. These were done by Royal Carroll, who was in 9th grade at the time at Princeton High School. Royal lived on the family farm east of Rocky Hill, and married … Continue reading Learning Your Letters – School Signs
Updated 2/14/24 – Thanks to multiple commentators on Facebook. The late 1800s and early 1900s saw the beginnings of personal photography, with local drugstores selling photo postcards and photo enthusiasts carrying box cameras that used glass plate negatives. So if a group of young people in Hopewell wanted to take some fun pictures, their version … Continue reading Hopewell Rocks
The Pennington Presbyterian Church at South Main Street and East Delaware Avenue traces its history back to 1709, when the farming families of present-day Lawrenceville, Trenton, Ewing, Pennington, and Hopewell requested the services of a minister from the newly-created Presbytery of Philadelphia. This was only one year after the 1708 first recorded European settlement in … Continue reading Pennington Presbyterian Church Anniversary Booklets
The January updates to the History Project featured information on automobile travel in the early 1900s – maps, travel guides, and cars – plus a video of the 1984 Pennington Memorial Day parade. (See Site Updates for more.) By the numbers, we finished the month with 319 files in the Archives, including 157 documents and … Continue reading January 2024 Update – Automobile Travel
The A.L.A. Automobile Green Book Official Touring Guide is an early version of what we now know as AAA tour guides, with maps, travel information, and directions. These were published from c. 1920 through the 1940s and apparently into the 1950s. This 1924 Volume 2 had 924 pages in small type with turn-by-turn directions for … Continue reading 1924 A.L.A. Automobile Green Book
Here are three maps that continue the story of the development of the Hopewell Valley road network. The 1920s N. J. State Road Maps show the original route of our Route 31 (previously Route 69) – directly through downtown Pennington and then forking at Marshall’s Corner. The 1962 Hopewell Township Road Map then shows roads … Continue reading 1920s and 1962 Hopewell Road Maps
by Douglas Dixon Here are some highlights of the 2023 additions to the History Project site, with links to more information, plus associated documents, maps, photos, and videos. The purpose of the Hopewell Valley History Project is assemble an archive of reference material in local history, shared online in digital and searchable formats for education … Continue reading Hopewell History Project – 2023 Highlights
The December updates to the History Project featured research on the Brick Farm Market building, the Old School Baptist Church, and 1960s area maps, plus large photo collections from several contributors on St. Michael’s Orphanage, from the Hopewell Business Association, and of Titusville and Washington Crossing postcards. (See Site Updates for more.) By the numbers, … Continue reading December 2023 Update – Brick Farm Market & St. Michael’s
Remember the good old days when our Route 31 was known as Route 69 – and the exciting new proposed route of I-95 was planned to be routed north up the Hopewell Valley through Mt. Rose? These Esso maps from 1961 and 1969 tell the story of those “interesting” days. There are two extracts from … Continue reading 1960s Hopewell Maps with Route 69 and I-95
