Essex County, NJ
Krueger-Scott Mansion
The mansion was built in 1888 by Gottfried Krueger (1837–1926), founder of Newark’s Gottfried Krueger Brewing Company and owner of several other breweries. The construction cost at the time was $250,000. The mansion was sold to the Valley of Newark Scottish Rite Freemasons in 1926 for $100,000. A 700-seat auditorium was added to the mansion to accommodate for various meetings. The mansion was purchased in 1958 by Louise Scott for $85,000. Scott operated a beauty school out of the first floor of the mansion while keeping the upper levels as her private residence. The mansion was added to the New Jersey Register of Historic Places and the National Register of Historic places in 1972. Scott died in 1982 and ownership of the mansion passed to the city of Newark. In 1991, the New Jersey Historic Trust funded a bond for $625,812 to stabilize the exterior of the building.
http://njlivingcolor.org/essex_county
New Jersey Historical Soceity
The New Jersey Historical Society is a state-wide, private, non profit historical museum, library, and archives dedicated to collecting, preserving, and interpreting the rich and intricate political, social, cultural and economic history of New Jersey to the broadest possible audiences. Founded in 1845, we are the oldest cultural institution in the state. Through exhibitions, publications, and programming, we examine who and what we are, what it means to live and work in New Jersey, what contributes to New Jersey’s distinct identity, and what are the unique contributions New Jerseyans make to the region and the country.
Through the history of New Jersey – a quintessentially American place – the Historical Society promotes exploration of our cultures, past and present. As we challenge and inspire people to grow as learners and thinkers, we strive to make a difference in their lives.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crane_House_and_Museum
Crane House and Museum
The Crane House was built by Israel Crane in 1796 on Old Road (now Glen Ridge Avenue) in Cranetown, which is now the southern part of the Township of Montclair, New Jersey. The house stayed in the Crane family until 1920, when it was purchased by the YWCA. The YWCA used the house for offices, dormitories and as a social center for African American women and girls for 45 years. In 1965, the house faced the prospect of demolition. Local residents committed to its preservation organized and the house was moved from Old Road to 110 Orange Road, its current address. The Crane House is one of the few remaining federal mansions in northern New Jersey. It currently operates as the Crane House and Museum, which is open to the public. The Crane House and Museum neighbors two other buildings with historic significance: the Clark House, which houses the Albert Payson Terhune library, and the Nathaniel Crane House, which houses a General Store collection, schoolroom, and gift shop. These buildings are also owned by the Montclair Historical Society.
Israel Crane (b. 1774) was a direct descendant of the Crane family, which founded Cranetown in 1694. He was an enterprising businessman, successful in several industries including cider, cotton and wool production. In 1801, he and a partner leased a site in Paterson, New Jersey for one for one of the first mills to use the power of the Passaic River. In 1806, Crane organized a group to build the Newark-Pompton Turnpike, an industrial toll road of which he later became the sole owner. It was a direct route from Newark, New Jersey to outlying areas, including Cranetown. Today, Bloomfield Avenue, which runs West from Newark through the Township of Montclair into Verona, New Jersey, is part of the original Newark-Pompton Turnpike. Another section has evolved into Route 23, which extends to Port Jervis.
http://www.oldnewark.com/hospitals/kenney.htm
Kenney Memorial Hospital
Born into humble beginnings in the rural South, Dr. John A. Kenney may have been one of the most influential African American physicians of the twentieth century. As founder, Associate Editor for 8 years, and Editor-in-Chief for 32 years of the Journal of the National Medical Association, he brought the writings and voices of African American medical professionals to life. Through his vision, courage, and hardiness, Dr. Kenney was a major contributor to the creation and development of African American organized medicine, the founding of African American hospitals, and the training and employment of African American nurses. Clearly, he was a symbol of leadership in medicine.
In 1923, Dr. Kenney risked his life against the Ku Klux Klan so that African Americans would have the opportunity to run the Tuskegee Veterans Administration Hospital–a newly built facility for African American World War I veterans. It was this stance that forced him to flee Tuskegee, AL for Newark, NJ.
Now, in over 20 years of medical practice, for the first time, he was without a hospital, i.e., he and his African American clientele were not welcome in the hospitals in Newark. Out of exigency Dr. Kenney built his own hospital–Kenney Memorial Hospital–and paid for it with his own money. The hospital opened its doors on September 1, 1927 at 132 West Kinney Street, Newark, NJ. This hospital, for many years, was the only hospital that African Americans in New Jersey had access as physicians, interns and nursing trainees, and patients.
Dr. Kenney had the unique distinction of developing two important hospitals in different regions, and separated by a thousand miles. The other hospital was the John A. Andrew Memorial Hospital, Tuskegee, AL.
When confronted with discord over the conversion of his private hospital in Newark to a community hospital, he stunned representatives of both opposing hospital committees by donating the hospital to the African American community of New Jersey on Christmas Eve 1934. Dr. Kenney once wrote, “despise not the day of small beginnings”. More than 50 years have elapsed since Dr. Kenney’s passing. Who would have thought that those 30 hospital beds on West Kinney Street would have so much meaning today?
The historic site that was once Kenney Memorial Hospital is now New Salem Baptist Church.
Paulette Horton has just completed a book called, “Death in 60 Days: Who silenced Booker T. Washington”. In it she states that there was a conspiracy in his death and that Booker T. Washington was assassinated. Dr. Kenney was Booker T. Washington’s physician. His name was forged on the death certificate.
http://www.newarkhistory.com/broadway.html
Ahavas Shalom
At 145 Broadway, we come to Ahavas Shalom, the oldest synagogue remaining in Newark.
The North Ward was never a Jewish center, so the survival of this synagogue is not something one would have predicted fifty years ago. Basically, this congregation owes its longevity its proximity to Forest Hill and the fact that the North Ward “tipped” more slowly than predominantly Jewish areas like Weequahic, Clinton Hill, and the Third Ward. A little luck probably hasn’t hurt either.
Ahavas Shalom, whose name means “Love of Peace” (the same thing as “Oheb Shalom”), was organized in 1905. Originally, the congregation met in a little white frame house next door to the present building. This modest, but fine, synagogue building was constructed in 1924. It has a 1200 sq ft main sanctuary with a 135 year old ark (chamber for torahs) that was originally made for a New York congregation. The second floor used to be the Hebrew school, but now it is just vacant space waiting to possibly be turned into the Jewish Museum of New Jersey.
Members of Ahavas Shalom say that their synagogue has recovered from the time when closing was a possibility. The congregation is racially and geographically diverse. In 1997 Ahavas Shalom had its first Bar Mitzvah in twenty-seven years. Now there are several baby namings every year.
http://www.newarkhistory.com/broadway.html
Clinton Memorial AME Zion
This is the Clinton Memorial AME Zion Church, the oldest black congregation in Newark, going back to 1822. The Clinton Memorial church was founded by Christopher Rush, one of the first six missionaries of the black Methodist movement. The Clinton Memorial congregation spent its first few years in a building on Academy Street.
As a denomination, the AME (African Methodist Episcopal) Zion church was founded in 1796 when black Methodists in New York left the parent church over racism. The leader of the AME Zion church at mid-19th century was Bishop J.J. Clinton, after whom this church is named. The African Methodist Episcopal church (AME) church, without the “Zion,” has an identical origin, except that it was founded in Philadelphia.
The Clinton Memorial AME Zion Church made history again in 1999, when it elected the first female pastor in AME Zion history, Rev. Frances Murray-Williams.
The actual Victorian gothic church building dates from 1874. Designed by William Appleton Potter, it was originally the Belleville Avenue Congregational Church. Since 1986 this building has been on the National Register of Historic Places.
The Clinton Memorial AME Zion Church has been here since 1930.
http://www.newarkhistory.com/broadway.html
Mutual Benefit Insurance Corporation
This building, at 300 Broadway, was the headquarters of the Mutual Benefit Insurance Corporation from 1927 to 1957 and then the home of Essex Catholic from 1957 to 1979.
The Mutual Benefit corporation was one of Newark’s oldest insurance companies,
Like the New Jersey Historical Society, this building was designed by Wilson C. Ely of Ely & Ely. The building cost well over $6,000,000 to build, but it was barely worth $3,500,000 thirty years later. In choosing such an august edifice, the Mutual Benefit company was trying to demonstrate seriousness and stability to prospective customers.
By the 1950s this building was considered obsolete by the Mutual Benefit corporation. The company seriously considered leaving Newark for the suburbs. Mutual Benefit’s possible departure caused great consternation in Newark, as the company paid millions of dollars a year in property taxes and fees. Enticing the Mutual Benefit corporation to stay in Newark, and to build a new headquarters on Broad Street, was probably the greatest accomplishment of the 1950s’ New Newark Movement.
The Mutual Benefit company vacated this building in 1957. Thereafter this was the home of Essex Catholic High School. Following its students, Essex Catholic left in Newark in 1979 for East Orange.
Today this building houses two nursing homes, one for AIDS patients and another for the general elderly.
http://www.newarkhistory.com/broadway.html
Rutgers School of Pharmacy
This castle used to be the home of the Rutgers School of Pharmacy. Sadly, along with the Rutgers library school, the Rutgers School of Pharmacy left Newark for New Brunswick decades ago.
On November 3, 1961 the gym here was the site of a fiery debate on the subject of integration between Malcolm X and William Neal Brown, a Rutgers sociology professor.
http://stjamesame.org/355073.ihtml
St. James A.M.E. Church
Rev. C. Birch on Green Street in Newark, New Jersey organized St. James, originally known as Bethel AME Church, in 1842. It was disbanded for a brief period, but was reorganized shortly thereafter under a new name… St. James AME Church. After settling temporarily in a variety of places the trustees finally secured a building on Union Street and remained there until 1945.
On January 1, 1945, the present church was purchased under the leadership of Rev. Mansfield P. Jackson for $35,000. Several bidders offered larger amounts for the building, but the original owners, Old First Presbyterian Church, chose the congregation that it felt would keep the church as well as help the community. The St. James Congregation held their first worship service on January 7, 1945. Dedication services were held on January 14, 1945. The mortgage was paid in full on December 20, 1945 and was burned on January 13, 1946.
In the latter half of the 20th century, the following ministers have served as pastor of St. James: 1950 – Rev. Eustace L. Blake, 1966 – Rev. D. McNeil Owens, 1979 – Rev. L. Sylvester Odom, 1979 – Rev. Vernon R. Byrd. Rev. Byrd was the first pastor from St. James to be elevated to the office of bishop. In 1984 Rev. Byrd was consecrated the 105th bishop of the AME Church.
