Site of planned 19th century N.J. factory town is now open space

The Great Depression sacked plans for the factory town on Broadway and Route 601 in Montgomery Township.

MONTGOMERY - A proposed factory town in Belle Mead in the late 19th century that was never built has been sold to the township and will be used as open space.

On May 23, the township completed the purchase of a new tract of open space in Belle Mead near the Sourland Preserve, known as the Skillman/Hillmont property, it was announced in a news release.

The $382,500 purchase was completed with funds from Township Open Space Trust Fund, in partnership with the state DEP Green Acres Program.

"We are thrilled to close on this new open space acreage," said Mayor Ed Trzaska. "It adds to the 800 acres of protected land surrounding Lubas Park. One of our core governing principles is to protect Montgomery's rural character. Over the past several years, we have preserved over 600 acres of additional open space, including authorizing funding to purchase 170 acres in 2016 alone."
 
The 13.5-acre tract in the woodland on Broadway and Route 601 with views of the Sourland Mountains has an interesting story behind it.

In the late 19th century, the land, a conglomerate of a large number of small residential building lots, was owned by Charles H. Cook, it was stated in the release.

Cook, who was a pottery manufacturer from Trenton, tried to lure people to the Belle Mead area by advertising it as a factory town with healthy country air for workers. A master plan called for manufacturing plants to be built along the railroad on Reading Boulevard, the release said.

As part of its sales pitch, the company ran free excursion trains from Trenton to convince potential factory workers to buy the nearby lots on non-existing streets on time-payment plans for a few dollars down, according to a Van Harlingen Historical Society document.

Although a few small factories were built along the railroad line, the proposed prosperity was never realized. Cook and his company failed to make residential improvements for the building of a neighborhood and almost all buyers lost their lots to tax foreclosure in the Great Depression.

Dix Skillman, who was an attorney and active citizen of Montgomery for decades, decided to buy many of the undeveloped individual lots and rejoin them.

Last month, his widow, Virginia Skillman, sole the property to the township, reuniting many of the small individual lots.