Historical Society of Riverton

Spring has sprung and I am already anticipating the arrival of Jersey tomatoes at the local farm stands. They are the best.

I don’t mean those genetically engineered supermarket mutants that have been miraculously bred to fit three to a cardboard cello-wrapped sleeve.  Most commercially farmed tomatoes are hybrid varieties developed to withstand the rigors of harvesting, shipping, and handling, often looking far better than they taste. You really can recapture that old-fashioned intense flavor and heady aroma of a real Jersey tomato if you seek out “heirloom” tomatoes.

What is an heirloom tomato plant? Definitions vary, but basically it is an open-pollinated plant with valued characteristics. You may find a school of thought that says seeds must be a hundred years old, fifty years old, date from World War II, or before 1950; in any case, the seeds for heirlooms have usually been passed down for through a family for several generations.

Master gardener and herbalist Jeannie Francis raises tomatoes from seeds that she has saved from previous seasons, and she has done it for years. Who does that?

It turns out, plenty of people do who want to stem the genetic erosion caused by commercial growers’ widespread use of fewer hybrid tomatoes, bred for their commercially attractive characteristics. Or maybe she just loves great tasting tomatoes.

Come to hear Master Gardener, Herbalist, and Plant Historian Jeannie Francis talk about heirlooms, “the True Jersey Tomato and explore the history of the “Garden State” tomato, the importance of local farms, Campbell’s Soup, Dreers, and more on April 17 at 7 p.m. at the Delran Historical Society.

Delran Historical Society meets in Community Room 3 of the Delran Municipal Building at 900 Chester Avenue, Delran. – John McCormick, Gaslight News editor

In anticipation of the 100th Birthday of the present Riverton Public School in 2010,  I collected scans of eighth grade graduating class photos that were missing from the display in the school hallway for several years and gave prints to the principal.

You would think that the school would have a record of all of those photos but, when I started, over half of the photos were missing. I appealed to HSR members in the Gaslight News to lend us their old school photos to scan, and Mrs. Mabel Kloos did the same during a presentation she made to mark the school’s 100th Birthday.

Just when I thought we had all the RPS eighth grade graduation pictures that we could find, Cindy Klabe Robertson brought this Riverton School Eighth Grade Class of 1969 photo to my attention. A few minutes of photo-editing restored the 43 year-old photo to mint condition. I gave an 8×10 inch print to Mabel to take into school the next time she went in to sub.

Shortly afterwards, Mabel knocked on my door with a list of the remaining photos that are still needed for the school’s hallway display of eighth grade graduation photos. Please contact me if you can donate an original or loan one so that I may make a copy.

I still hold out the hope that some of these photos will show up in an old family album, a forgotten trunk, or grandmother’s attic.

The pictures don’t have to be in perfect condition either. If you find one of the absent photos and it is showing its age, please don’t hesitate to contact me as I can often restore even torn and faded photos.

Here’s one that was a particular challenge. The whole top part of the photo was gone so I borrowed a top from another similar picture and blended them together to make a passable photo of a Class of 1935.

As Betty Hahle so patiently pointed out to me in 1985 when Principal Rip Kilne was organizing the 75th Riverton School Birthday, the brick school that was built in 1910 was not the first Riverton School.

Recently, I found this account of the RPS  Class of 1903 in a newspaper archive. So definitely please contact me if you find any class photos, graduation programs, newspaper articles, etc. about Riverton student activities prior to 1910 that you want to donate or loan for scanning.  – John McCormick, Gaslight News editor

 

 

The majority of the over 200 postcards that once belonged to Miss Clara Yearly, Riverside, NJ,  date from the Golden Age of postcards, roughly 1907-1915–a time during which the sending and collecting of picture postcards became the rage.

The scans displayed here are a diverse mix of greeting and travel postals received by from Clara from nearby and far away.

Plain non-pictorial message postcards for simply sending correspondence had been around for some time, but the first picture postcards in the United States began with the souvenir issues sold at the World Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893. Each postal had a picture and space for a message on one side, with the other side reserved for the address and cost only one cent to mail.

The card at right is from a time when postal regulations required that only addresses be written on the back of the card. The 1907 postal rule change which allowed “divided back” cards and writing on back launched the Golden Age of Postcards. Divided back postcards came along later in 1907, with the image on one side and, on the other side, a section for a message and another for the address.

The divided back postcards allowed for short messages, not unlike the  text-based posts of up to 140 characters known as “tweets” posted by twitter  followers today. Many vintage postcards have very short messages or none at all, and some are “postally unused,” having never been mailed.

Note the two postmarks on this divided back postcard. One postmark was imprinted when the postcard was mailed, canceling the stamp, and another was imprinted when the postcard was received. Do the math and you will see that the postcard left Willow Grove at 11 a.m. on Jun 1, 1909, and a mere five hours later landed in Riverside. Remarkable postal service for a penny!

Can any reader verify that back in the day (don’t ask me how far back) towns along the Delaware enjoyed two mail deliveries daily?

With the increased mobility brought on by the automobile, people traveled more and the penny postcards were an inexpensive alternative to telegraph or long-distance telephone rates for sending brief messages. Improvements in photography and printing technology, and the growth of a middle class with more money to spend on non-essentials are other factors that contributed to the picture postcard craze that exploded across America during the early 1900s. US Postal Service records show in 1908 that the population of 88,700,000 Americans mailed 677,797,798 postcards; that’s an average of over seven for every person!

Germany had a lock on producing the finest quality color lithography postcards until the onset of World War I curbed the  civilian German printing industry. Most of this area’s superior color postcard views are consistent with this development, having postmarks before 1915.

In 1903 Eastman Kodak introduced a type of camera that enabled the public to take their own black and white photographs and have them printed on to postcard backs. Soon, Kodak and other manufacturers marketed more postcard format cameras, thus igniting the era of the real photo post card, or RPPC. Many RPPCs  instead have a sepia tone, and they may, or may not, have a white border.

These unique cameras had a small thin door at the rear that could be lifted to allow the photographer to write a caption on the negative with an attached metal scribe. Inexpensive to produce at the time, these real photo postcard views can be among the most costly and sought after ones by collectors because of their one-of-a kind nature.

You can distinguish between a mass-produced lithography process printed postcard and a RPPC in a couple of ways. The  lithograph process produces the image as little dots, but the photo image shows no dots when viewed closely. In a RPPC, the image has smooth transitions from one tone to another. In addition, older RPPCs sometimes show a silver sheen in the darker areas when viewed at an angle due to the silver used in the early photographic process.

The detail of the RPPC of Woodside Park in Pennsylvania at right exhibits this silvering in the darkest parts of the tree trunk above the swan.

During this time, just about any town appearing on a map had an array of hometown views to represent it. Riverton’s population was 1,788 in the 1910 US Census, and it easily is depicted in over a hundred unique postcard views of which we are aware so far.

A town with numerous postcards of its landmarks, parks and public spaces, schools and churches, government and civic buildings, business establishments, and such could promote itself as a good place to work, live, and visit to outsiders. Persons passing through the towns picked up the inexpensive cards as souvenirs of their travels as well as for jotting off a quick message to the folks back home.

Just as today one might point to their number of Facebook friends or Myspace connections, it was fashionable in the early 1900s for families to have a postcard album proudly displayed so visitors could browse through their social network. Postcard albums were the “coffee table books” of that era. Except for a few images, these postcards are not views of Riverton, but are greeting and travel postcards that Clara Yearly received from her relatives and acquaintances.

Postcard recipients carefully preserved the cards sent by their friends and family in albums, and the senders had high expectations of receiving many in return. Several of the messages on Clara’s cards mention receiving a card or say “many thanks for your postal,” so we might infer that Miss Clara gave as good as she got.  If so, then there must be a lot of Riverton postcards out there from this young woman. 

Readers and visitors, know that the Society is fortunate indeed to have received so many wonderful donations over the years from generous people who have helped enrich our understanding of Riverton history with their gifts.

The many gifts of artifacts, collectibles, ephemera, vintage clothing, and scans of collectors’ postcards related to local history all combine to help to better achieve our mission to discover, restore, and preserve local objects and landmarks, and to continue to expand our knowledge of the history of the area.

Today, as in days gone by, a spirit of altruism and civic-mindedness continues to be part of what it means to be a Rivertonian.

Please do not hesitate to contact us if you have something you wish to add to this growing internet archive. We invite readers’ comments, corrections, and submissions of photos, articles, or research projects.  – John McCormick, Gaslight News editor

 

 

 

 

No, you’re not on the wrong webpage.

Will Valentino from THE PALMYRA HISTORICAL AND CULTURAL SOCIETY asked if we could help get the word out about a bus trip to Batsto, so here it goes. Will’s copy follows:

Now that Spring is in the air and the Daffodils are blowing in the cool breeze of March, you may wish to reconsider The Palmyra Historical Society’s bus trip to Batsto village on April 28th. Information and updated revised flyer attached.

PLEASE FORWARD THIS E-MAIL TO ANYONE INTERESTED OR PRINT THE ATTACHED FLYER AND POST IT IN A PUBLIC VENUE FOR US !

Hello Friend of the Palmyra Historical & Cultural Society ,

On April 28th, join fellow residents and history buffs  as we travel back in time to Batsto village in the heart of the Pine Barrens. I have attached a brochure listing details,cost and tour schedule.

There  are only 55 seats available . We recommend you book your reservations early for this fascinating trip into New Jersey’s past.

If you have any questions, you can e-mail  Society trustee Genevieve Lumia  @  gen.lumia@comcast.net  or call Judy at 856-456-1121.  We will be accompanied by a tour guide who is an expert on pinelands history.

So, travel back in time with us and help support the Palmyra Historical & Cultural Society.

Hope to see you there.

Will Valentino Author of BACK IN TIME Trustee, Palmyra Historical & Cultural Society

Riverview Estates at 303 Bank Avenue in Riverton will host the Historical Society of Riverton’s February program on Friday, February 24, at 7:00 p.m.  Songs of the Civil War: History and Myth is a lively and engaging musical history program featuring Plum Run with Lisa Godino and Chuck Winch. 

This free concert is part of an ongoing series of HSR history programs to commemorate the American Civil War Sesquicentennial honoring the legacy of freedom, unity and sacrifice shared by our nation during the last 150 years. The public is welcome to attend the free concert by calling Gerald Weaber at 856-786-6961 to reserve a seat.

Plum Run’s entertaining and informative performance brings to life the spirit and sensibilities of the Civil War era.  They play reproduction and period musical instruments while wearing authentic 19^th century attire.  Their music, rich in storytelling culture, incorporates folk, bluegrass, and old-time and traditional country music.  During the question and answer period after the performance, the instruments will be on display.

The Positive Press Community Calendar, a piece in the Gaslight News, and posters displayed around town all beckon to HSR members and the public to come in to get out of the cold on Friday night February 24 and enjoy this warmhearted entertainment among friends.

Chuck’s great grandfather fought at the Battle of Gettysburg, and Lisa is a Civil War re-enactor with the 2^nd South Carolina, Valley Division. Their repertoire includes both songs of the mid-19th century and original compositions drawn from their album titled “No Longer Gray or Blue” which tells stories of how soldiers may have felt in the time of war and the yearning of their families for their loved ones.

Here’s another link to a Plum Run performance of a song called Iverson’s Pit dedicated to the 23rd North Carolinians. Hearing the pair play this song with such genuine flair and vocalize those powerful, sometimes mournful, lyrics so expressively is, to me, like listening to a history lesson set to music.  I absolutely recommend that you attend this free public performance at the former Baptist Home on Bank Avenue by the River in Riverton.

This performance by Plum Run marks the second year of Sesquicentennial events sponsored by the Historical Society of Riverton.  This past October, Jane Peters Estes lectured on the topic, “Gettysburg: Where Were the Women?” and in July 2011, a three-day exhibition at the Burlington County Farm profiled the lives of Riverton Civil War veterans.

Please join us on February 24^th for a truly unique musical history program.  The public is welcome to attend the free performance. Call Gerald Weaber at 856-786-6961 to reserve a seat.  Free refreshments will follow the program, courtesy of Riverview Estates.

This program is funded by the Horizons Speakers Bureau of the New Jersey Council for the Humanities, a state partner of the National Endowment for the Humanities.  – JM