Lillian Tindall Smith, Georgiana Smith and Bob Bolt are lifetime members of the Hamilton Township Historical Society.
On annual trips each spring to the John Abbott II House in Veterans Park, 3rd graders from township elementary schools get the opportunity to learn what the members of the Hamilton Historical Society already know: history can be fascinating, and there’s plenty of it go around in Hamilton Township.
The Hamilton Township Historical Society, since its formation in the mid-1940s, has been a resource for the community to learn about its significant properties and individuals, among them the John Abbott II House and Kuser Mansion.
And this year, longtime member Tom Glover hopes the society will be focused more than ever on specific Hamilton and Trenton history.
The society’s first 2014 meeting in March was snowed out, so April 7 marked the beginning of a year of monthly Hamilton-specific programs with a presentation of vintage Trenton-area photos by R.C. Maxwell Company.
“As bad as the rain was, we had approaching a full house, maybe 48-50 people there…so our first endeavor as an effort to increase membership and stimulate history of Hamilton was a smashing success,” Glover said.
Glover, 80, is a Hamilton native and its “unofficial historian.” He started to get involved in local history in his late 20s, and in the 1980s was asked to serve as president of the historical society.
He’s been dedicated to collecting history in the forms of old newspaper articles or photos of the area where he grew up, so much so that he has nearly 60 years’ worth of findings, which he also documents on his website, glover320.blogspot.com.
Now, still working at the Hamilton Township Library to page through and scan old issues of Trenton newspapers, Glover is “chest deep in what I love to do.”
But he’d always pushed for that same focus at the historical society—to talk not just about the Revolutionary War era but to delve deeper into the rest of the history of Hamilton’s specific neighborhoods: Groveville, Yardville, Hamilton Square and more.
Now, along with incoming president Dr. Jim Federici, Glover hopes the redesigned programs will be the start of a rejuvenation of the society, with other upcoming programs including “World War II: The Home Front in Hamilton” in May; “Hamilton Township Schools ‘In The Beginning’”; and “Hamilton Potpourri Part Two: Historic Photos and Articles.”
Federici, 71, first got involved in the historical society in 1979 at the suggestion of a friend. At the time, Federici was a history teacher in Hamilton public schools, with a focus on European history and American politics. (Federici is also a former assistant superintendent in the school district.)
He’d moved from Pennsylvania to the White Horse neighborhood of Hamilton in 1965, and upon joining the historical society, thought it was important to start learning about the place where he was living.
“Local history was something I really wanted to become an expert in, and I felt as though over the years I have gained a good solid background with local history,” Federici said.
He turned to some of the historical society’s founders to help with his research efforts, and found some of his best resources were places like the Trentoniana Room at the Trenton Public Library and a book of Hamilton’s history written by Helen Almy West in the 1940s.
Federici quickly began taking on leadership roles in the organization, and to date, has held every position except treasurer. He even got involved with the board of trustees so that he could work with the maintenance and upkeep of the Abbott House.
The Abbott House has always fascinated him, Federici said, because of the story of John Abbott—a simple farmer who had a poignant role in the American Revolution, and yet is unknown to most Americans.
As the Revolution advanced in 1776, state treasurer Samuel Tucker wanted to hide the state’s money, and turned to bachelor John Abbott for help. Abbott hid the money in barrels in his basement under broken dishes and trash, and when British soldiers raided his house, they never found it.
One of the continuing goals of the society is to continue offering tours at the John Abbott II house 10 months of the year, March through December.
Docents are trained in their knowledge of its history, furniture and more. Most members are retired, which gives them the freedom to work as docents and tour guides during school and work hours. Even Federici is one of the docents, after getting involved a few years ago. And since the ’80s, the society has given school tours to third grade students from all 17 Hamilton elementary schools every spring.
“We’ve been happy to do that and lucky to do that because we’ve had people who are available during the week,” Federici said. “They do that because third grade is when they study the community. As part of the community, we teach them about their history.”
In addition to a tour of the house, students also take a bus ride to look at other local historical sites.
The tours are an important aspect of the society, noted Lois Majarowitz, a member since 1997 and a volunteer docent at the Abbott House. She explained that once the students start to learn about the history in Hamilton, they realize how interesting it can be, and often come back to explore the Abbott house with their parents on the weekend.
“When you tell them about history, people love history,” Majarowitz said, “not just names and dates and places, but the background of history.”
Majarowitz, 70, describes herself as always having been a lover of history. She attended Rider College and worked 38 years for the state. Around the same time she took an early retirement at age 55, Majarowitz discovered the historical society and began volunteering for it and also with the Friends of the Hamilton Library.
For years, Majarowitz said, she never realized the Abbott House was located in Veterans Park, and said the house is also significant because it’s registered as a state and federal historic site.
Still, the society has continued to improve its knowledge of Hamilton history and improve its methods of sharing that knowledge with others.
“We go to other historic homes or museums, just to see how their docents greet the people and how they conduct tours, and…how they are furnished,” Majarowitz said, “and we pick their brains and we got a lot of local history from them, too.”
Majarowitz also noted how valuable the lifetime members’ knowledge is to the group, and noted that the society’s oldest member, Rob Simkins, had passed away a few years ago at age 102—but not before he had passed on plenty of his own knowledge of Hamilton history.
“He was a wealth of knowledge about Hamilton Township,” Majarowitz said. “When he was growing up, he remembered his parents pointing out specific farms that were stops on the Underground Railroad.”
The group’s lifetime members had helped to research much of the history the society knows today, and have also become resources for new members looking to become more educated.
Longtime member Georgiana Smith has loved her time with the society, and over the years, expanded her circle of friendship with other members who shared her interest for a love of history—the reason why she first got involved.
Smith graduated from Trenton State College with English and history degrees, and went on to teach a number of different subjects in the Hamilton public school district for 35 years and also taught 20 years of Sunday school.
Smith recalled at one point during her membership, the society was losing members and funding, and the primary goal was to keep the organization afloat.
“There were very few people involved, and so I tried to get more people involved,” Smith said, “and it was successful. We got involved in things that raised money.”
Smith served as president for nine years, and noted that members who have joined over the years have continued to contribute; one member, upon joining, had gone right to the state to try and get some new information.
Still, there will always be some mysteries about Hamilton that the society hopes to eventually uncover. There are two particular puzzles Federici has always wondered about: where Hamilton Township’s name originated, and where John Abbott II is buried.
The Hamilton Historical Society meets at 7 p.m. on the first Monday of each month in the lower level of the Hamilton Township Library, located at 1 Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr. Way in Hamilton. On the Web: hamiltontownshiphistory.org.
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