Last year I wrote about how so few of our friends in Princeton knew where we were going when we told them we were going to West Windsor back in 1957 (The News, June 26, 2015). There’s more to tell. West Windsor’s identity as a township was hard to recognize. For one thing, not many people thought of an area then as a “township” or a “borough” or any other so-called “political” entity smaller than “city,” “state,” or maybe “county.” Aside from being in New Jersey, as far as most people knew, we lived “near Princeton.”
About the only time we even saw the word “township” was on our tax bill — provided, of course, that we owned — or were buying — the property where we lived. During our few years in Princeton before we moved we had learned that there was both a borough and a township called Princeton, but we, like most people, didn’t know just where their borders were. Now, of course, they are “consolidated.”
In those days what we now know as West Windsor was served by seven different post offices, and most people had no idea what they all were or why. In Grovers Mill where we lived, our postal address was Cranbury 08512. Technically, it had been RFD (rural free delivery) Cranbury until recently, and adding the zip-code number was a new thing.
Otherwise, different parts of West Windsor were served by post offices in Dutch Neck, Edinburg, Princeton, Princeton Junction, Plainsboro, and even Trenton. What we now call zip codes were started in big cities at the time of World War II to make mail delivery more efficient by dividing the city into postal zones.
I remember our zone code for where we lived in Brooklyn was 5. Following our street address, we put: Brooklyn 5, N.Y. There were 30 zones in Brooklyn. It wasn’t until the 1950s that the zone system spread to the suburbs and what we call “zip codes” were started. The word “zip” implied that the mail would be delivered more quickly if the code was used.
Partly because of the postal diversity, many people simply didn’t refer to West Windsor at all when asked where they lived. Dutch Neck, Penns Neck, Edinburgh, Princeton Junction, and Grovers Mill were sufficient to localize your place.
And it was quite usual to refer to anything on the other side of Route 1 as Princeton. Few people realized that Princeton didn’t start until you were almost to Lake Carnegie. All those fields bordered by the elm trees along Washington Road were thought to be in Princeton.
About the only tangible identification of something near Route 1 that was not associated with Princeton was the Penns Neck School near the intersection of Alexander Road and Route 1. It had been built in 1917 — the same year as the Dutch Neck School — and was just for kindergarten through fourth grade.
The large expanse of land between Lake Carnegie and Route 1 and between Washington Road and Harrison Street was mostly farmed, though it was indeed owned by Princeton University.
Along the west or north side of Route 1 there were a number of businesses as well as a state police station — not a barracks where officers lived, but a station where patrol cars were kept as well as an office.
There were four gas stations at the traffic circle, which was much the same as it is today, except that Route 1 was one lane narrower in each direction and there was a grass median down the middle. The gas stations were Mobile, Esso, Gulf, and Atlantic. As I may have mentioned before, once, during a gas “price war,” the price per gallon got down to 13 cents. At the time, the usual price was around 35 cents or so.
On the land near Harrison Street there was a small street parallel to Route 1 called Logan Drive. There were several houses there, and we became good friends with one of the families, mainly because their son and ours were classmates at the Maurice Hawk School when it first opened. In fact, they were classmates through high school.
We got to know the family quite well, and we saw each other socially quite often. Each year in early December they had a large party to which they invited just about everyone they knew. This amounted to dozens of guests. Included were many business people from the Princeton area as well as many associated with the university.
We soon learned that her father had once been an attorney who represented the university, and that their house had originally been owned by the university. Her husband, Fred, was a graduate of West Point and had many stories of what it was like to attend the place. However, he did not serve on active duty very long after graduating. By then, World War II was over.
One of the regular guests at the party who I got to know was the owner of the tree nursery in Kingston that supplied the American elm trees that were planted along Washington Road between Route 1 and Lake Carnegie. He told me he thought it was amusing that so many people had said that his nursery had developed a variety of elm that was resistant to Dutch elm disease and that it was always referred to as the “Princeton elm.” He said that the resistance to the disease was strictly coincidental and that his nursery had nothing to do with “developing” the tree. They simply planted seedlings, let them grow a few years, and sold them to the university.
The couple were also very much involved in the early days of the Princeton Hospital Fete. It was held each spring on the university-owned land to the east of Washington Road up the hill from Lake Carnegie. Part of that area is used today for the university cross-country running course. Large tents were set up, and many exhibitors and merchants took part for the weekend.
In 1978 an annual 10k road race was begun and was held for many years. I remember running in it several times. I also remember working on the parking squad and trying to get people to park where we asked them to so others could get out and back on Washington Road safely.
But even with all the activity on that land and its notoriety over the years back then, nobody referred to it as West Windsor. As far as most people knew West Windsor didn’t start until you got to Route 1 or maybe even Princeton Junction. Nowadays, West Windsor’s identity is much better known, even in Princeton.
A major step in the awareness of the township and its history was taken in 1997 with the publication of the book “West Windsor Then and Now” by historian Henry Innes MacAdam. It would be hard to imagine a more thorough review of the history of a place that so many now call home. Anyone with a serious interest in local history would be well served by obtaining a copy of this remarkable book that celebrates West Windsor’s bicentennial.
A major accomplishment of this publication is the clarification of the often misunderstood distinction between Princeton and its surroundings. As I recently pointed out, much of central New Jersey — and other places — have come to be associated with the name Princeton. But after reading this book, it is clear that West Windsor is a place with a significant history of its own that has little to do with Princeton.
