Union City, NJ

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

History

Early history and civic boundaries

Sign marking Union City’s southern border with Jersey City.

The area of what is today Union City was originally inhabited by the Munsee-speaking branch of Lenni-Lenape Native Americans, who wandered into the vast woodland area encountered by Henry Hudson during the voyages he conducted from 1609-1610 for the Dutch, who later claimed the area (which included the future New York City) and named it New Netherland. The portion of that land that included the future Hudson County was purchased from the Hackensack branch of the Lenni-Lenape in 1658 by New Netherland colony Director-General Peter Stuyvesant, and became part of Pavonia, New Netherland.  The boundaries of the purchase are described in the deed preserved in the New York State Archives, as well as the medium of exchange: “80 fathoms of wampum, 20 fathoms of cloth, 12 brass kettles, 6 guns, one double brass kettle, 2 blankets, and one half barrel of strong beer.”

The relationship between the early Dutch settlers and the Natives was marked by frequent armed conflict over land claims. As a result, in 1660, Peter Stuyvesant ordered the building of a fortified village called Bergen. It was the first permanent European settlement in New Jersey, located in what is now the Journal Square area of Jersey City near Academy Street.  In 1664 the British captured New Netherland from the Dutch, at which point the boundaries of Bergen Township encompassed what is now known as Hudson County. North of this was the unpopulated Bergen Woods, which would later be claimed by settlers, after whom a number of Union City streets today are named, including Sipp Street, Brown Street, Golden Lane, Tournade Street and Kerrigan Avenue, which is named after J. Kerrigan, the owner of Kerrigan Farm, who donated the land for Saint Michael’s Monastery.

The area that would one day be Union City, however, remained sparsely populated until the early 19th century. The British granted Bergen a new town charter in 1668. In 1682 they created Bergen County, which they so named to honor their Dutch predecessors. That county comprised all of present day Hudson, Bergen and Passaic Counties. Sparsely inhabited during the 17th and 18th centuries, the southeast section of Bergen County had grown by the early 19th century to the point where it was deemed necessary to designate it a separate county. The New Jersey legislature created Hudson County in 1840, and in 1843, it was divided into two townships: Old Bergen Township (which eventually became Jersey City) and North Bergen Township, which was gradually separated into Hudson County’s present day municipalities: Hoboken in 1849, Weehawken and Guttenberg in 1859, and Union Township in 1861. Union Township itself developed into West Hoboken in 1861, and Union Township on March 29, 1864.  Union Township, or simply Union, was formed through the merger of a number of villages, such as Dalleytown, Bucks Corners and Coxs Corners. The largest of these villages, Union Hill, became the colloquial name for the merged town of Union itself. The northern section of Union Township was later incorporated as West New York in 1898.  Union City was incorporated on June 1, 1925 by merging the two towns of West Hoboken and Union Hill. The name of one of the city’s schools, Union Hill Middle School, recalls the former town.

Immigration and industry

Embroidery and lace exhibit at Union City’s Park Performing Arts Center.

In the 18th century, Dutch and English merchants first settled the area. Later, German immigrants immigrated from Manhattan. Irish, Polish, Armenians, Syrians, eastern European Jews and Italians followed.  In 1851, Germans moved across the Hudson River from New York City in search of affordable land and open space. During the Civil War a military installation, Camp Yates, covered an area now bounded by Bergenline and Palisade Avenues from 22nd to 32nd Street. Germans began to settle what would become Union Hill in 1851, and some descendants of the immigrants of this period live in the city today.  Although the area’s diversity was represented by the more than nineteen nationalities that made their home in the Dardanelles (a five block area of Central Avenue from 23rd Street to 27th Street, from the mid-19th century to the early 20th century, German Americans and Dutch dominated the area. Along with Swiss and Austrian immigrants, they founded the European-style lace making industries for which they were famous. The introduction of Schiffli lace machines in Hudson County made Union City the “embroidery capital of the United States”. The trademark of that industry is on the Union City Seal, though foreign competition and austere prevailing fashions led to the decline of embroidery and other industries in the area by the late 1990s.

As immigration to the area progressed throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, Belgian, Armenian, Greek, Chinese, Jewish and Russian people found a home in the area,though its domination by Germans by the turn of the 20th century was reflected in the fact that the minutes of town meetings were recorded in German.  By this time, the area was witnessing a period of urbanization, as an extensive trolley system was developed by the North Hudson County Railway, spurred by both electrification in 1890 and the arrival of Irish and Italian immigrants, which dominated the city until the late 1960s. Successive waves of immigrants from Eastern Europe, the Near East and Latin America contributed to the embroidery industry in subsequent years. “The Cultural Thread”/”El Hilo”, an exhibit highlighting this industry, is on display at Union City’s Park Performing Arts Center.

The town famous for being the home of the rowdy Hudson Burlesque.  Vaudeville and burlesque were theatre staples in Union City, with performers such as Harry Houdini and Fred Astaire making appearances locally.  Union City was also for a time the home to the headquarters of sports publisher Joe Weider.

The first Cubans immigrated to Union City from New York City in the 1940s, having been attracted to the city in search of work after hearing of its famed embroidery factories. A majority of these Cubans hailed from small towns or cities, particularly Villa Clara Province in central Cuba.  After World War II, veterans relocated to Bergen County, causing a short-lived decline in the population.  By the late 1960s when the city was predominantly Italian,  it was settled by a large migration of Cuban refugees fleeing Fidel Castro‘s regime, making Union City for many years the city with the largest Cuban population in the U.S. after Miami, hence its nickname, “Havana on the Hudson.”  Following the Mariel boatlift in 1980, 10,000 Cubans settled in New Jersey, leading to a second wave of Cubans to Union City, which totaled 15,000 by 1994.  The city, as well as neighboring towns such as West New York, has experienced a profound cultural impact as a result of this, as seen in such aspects of local culture as its cuisine, fashion, music, entertainment and cigar-making.

Census Bureau map of Union City, New Jersey