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New
Jersey History
Delaware
Indians
The
first people to live on the land now
known as New Jersey were the Delaware
Indians. They lived here
starting at least 10,000 years ago.
Anywhere from 8,000 to 20,000
Delaware Indians lived in the area
when the first Europeans arrived.
Their name means "original
people" or "genuine
people." They spoke an
Algonquian dialect.
Though
they were considered one tribe, the
Delaware Indians didn't act as one
unified group. Instead, they lived
in small communities made up mostly
of extended family members.
The men would hunt or fish during
the day. Depending on the
season they might search for clams
off the Jersey shore or hunt in the
woods. The women worked in the
gardens. They grew squash,
beans, sweet potatoes, and corn.
When
the first explorers came, the
Delaware Indians lived in parts of
Delaware, New Jersey, and eastern
Pennsylvania. Europeans called them
the Delaware Indians.
Colonial
Times
Around
1524, Giovanni
de Verrazano became the first
European to explore New Jersey.
He sailed along the coast and
anchored off Sandy Hook. The
colonial history of New Jersey
started after Henry Hudson sailed
through Newark Bay in 1609. Although
Hudson was British, he worked for
the Netherlands, so he claimed the
land for the Dutch. It was
called New Netherlands.
Small
trading colonies sprang up where the
present towns of Hoboken and Jersey
City are located. The Dutch,
Swedes, and Finns were the first
European settlers in New Jersey.
Bergen, founded in 1660, was New
Jersey's first permanent European
settlement.
In
1664 the Dutch lost New Netherlands
when the British took control of the
land and added it to their colonies.
They divided the land in half and
gave control to two proprietors: Sir
George Carteret (who was in
charge of the east side) and Lord
John Berkley (who was in charge
of the west side). The land
was officially named New Jersey
after the Isle of Jersey in the
English Channel. Carteret had been
governor of the Isle of Jersey.
Berkeley
and Carteret sold the land at low
prices and allowed the settlers to
have political and religious
freedom. As a result, New
Jersey was more ethnically diverse
than many other colonies.
Primarily a rural society, the
colony grew to have about 100,000
people.
Eventually,
governing power was transferred back
to England. For many years,
New Jersey shared a royal governor
with New York. The
governorship was finally split in
1738 when New Jersey got its own
governor,
Lewis Morris.
Revolution
In
the years before the Revolution,
anti-British feelings spread
throughout the state. About
one-third of the people living here
supported the rebels, one-third
supported England, and one-third
remained neutral. In 1776 New
Jersey declared itself an
independent state and joined the
colonial side in the Revolutionary
War.
New
Jersey was an important state during
the
Revolutionary War because of its
location near the center of the
thirteen colonies and between New
York City and Philadelphia. Because
of this, more battles were fought in
New Jersey than in any other state.
The Americans and British fought 100
battles, both large and small, here.
Many
people consider the Battle
of Trenton to be the turning
point of the Revolution.
Immediately after winning Trenton, General
George Washington won the battle
of Princeton. Having lost
two battles in a matter of hours,
the British fled New Jersey for New
York. Washington and his troops
spent the rest of the winter in
Morristown, and the United States
was well on its way to victory.
Battle
of Trenton
In
November of 1776 the British gained
control of New Jersey and forced
Washington to flee into
Pennsylvania. They thought no
one would fight during winter, so
the British and Hessian soldiers in
New Jersey divided into camps to
stay until spring. Trenton was
considered the most desirable post,
and it went to the Hessian soldiers
as a reward for their good service.
The Hessians used the Old Barracks
in Trenton as a headquarters.
The
British didn't chase Washington
across the Delaware River because it
was full of blocks of ice that made
it dangerous to cross. The Hessians
didn't patrol along the river
because they thought Washington
couldn't cross back. But in
December, Washington and his men
decided to cross. Washington's
men had to push away blocks of ice
from the boat's path while paddling
hard to fight the strong current.
Once
across, Washington decided to
separate and surprise the Hessians
in Trenton from two sides. The
plan worked, and in the Battle
of Trenton, the patriots
captured 900 prisoners while only
four American soldiers were wounded.
Early
Statehood
In
1787, New Jersey became the third
state to ratify the U.S.
Constitution and the first state
to sign the Bill
of Rights. In 1790,
Trenton officially became the state
capital of New Jersey. William
Livingston became New Jersey's
first state governor.
New
Jersey grew and prospered during the
early 1800s. New factories
sprung up throughout the state.
Paterson became a textile center and
later became known for producing
trains and silk. Trenton
produced clay products, iron, and
steel. Camden, Elizabeth,
Jersey City, Newark, and Passaic all
became major manufacturing centers
in the 1800s.
New
canals and railroads helped industry
grow. Europeans came by the
thousands to New Jersey to work in
the factories.
South
Jersey remained rural for the most
part, growing the crops to feed the
urban areas nearby. Railroads
were important in helping the South
Jersey seashore areas expand.
In 1850, New Jersey's population of
nearly half a million and the
industries in which most of those
people worked were concentrated in
the north.
During
the Civil
War, New Jersey provided 31
regiments (groups of soldiers),
including cavalry (soldiers on
horseback) and infantry (soldiers on
foot). Over 25,000 New Jersey
men fought for the Union, and New
Jersey soldiers participated in
almost every major Eastern battle.
Industry,
Immigrants, and Innovation
After
the Civil War, the industrial
revolution was under way, and New
Jersey continued to grow. More
factories opened, and cities like
Trenton, Newark, Paterson, and
Camden got bigger as immigrants from
Europe came to work in them.
Railroads were laid to connect the
cities and to transport materials.
At
first, most immigrants came from
Ireland and Germany. Later,
people came from Italy and from
countries throughout Eastern Europe.
In 1910 half the state's population
was born or had parents who were
born outside the United States.
As city populations grew, farm
populations shrank.
With
so many people working in factories,
issues like child labor and
protection for workers became
important. The popularity of
these reforms brought
Woodrow Wilson to power as
governor in 1910. He left
office in 1913 to become President
of the United States and is the only
New Jersey governor to become
president. As both governor
and president Wilson supported
welfare reforms to protect workers
and to keep companies from becoming
too big.
The
state's economic expansion had a lot
to do with the genius of its
inventors. Thomas
Edison is probably most famous.
Among his thousands of inventions,
including the light bulb, Edison
helped develop the motion picture
while working in New Jersey.
Fort Lee became the motion picture
capital of the world in the early
1900s. There, Fatty Arbuckle,
Mary Pickford, Pearl White, and
other stars revolutionized
entertainment with their movies.
The
1900s
Between
1900 and 1930, New Jersey's
population more than doubled, and
manufacturing became a $4 billion
industry. Unfortunately, the Great
Depression of the 1930s hit New
Jersey hard, bringing massive
unemployment. The state
rebounded during World
War II in the 1940s as New
Jersey's electronics and chemical
industries began large-scale
operations.
In
the mid-1900s, people began moving
back into the rural areas from the
overcrowded cities. A number of
transportation projects helped
better connect New Jersey. The
New Jersey Turnpike and the Garden
State Parkway opened in the 1950s.
The
history of air travel has close ties
to New Jersey. On May 3, 1919,
the first passenger flight in
American history was flown from New
York to Atlantic City. Today,
New Jersey is home to two
international airports, Newark and
Atlantic City. Newark Airport
expanded its passenger and cargo
services in 1963. In the
1980s, it became one of the world's
busiest airports.
Today
New Jersey is recognized for its
present as well as its past.
While remembering its proud history,
New Jersey will continue to be the
setting for many of the great events
of the future.
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