Led Princeton Borough during the 1960s
By: Jennifer Potash
Former Princeton Borough Mayor Henry Patterson died Sunday at The Medical Center at Princeton.
Mr. Patterson, 80, a Republican, served as mayor from 1962 to 1969.
During his tenure as mayor, Mr. Patterson oversaw the construction of Princeton Borough Hall at the corner of Stockton Street and Bayard Lane and the controversial closing of Jackson Street that lead to the construction of Paul Robeson Place, creating a throughway between the western section and east end of the borough.
Charles and Christine St. John, Prospect Avenue residents, recalled Mr. Patterson as a political mentor.
Mr. St. John said then-Mayor Patterson appointed him to serve on the borough’s Zoning Board of Adjustment.
"He worked hard for the best interest of borough residents," Mr. St. John said.
During the battle to consolidate the borough and Princeton Township schools into a single district, Mayor Patterson assisted Mrs. St. John in leading that charge, she recalled.
After a referendum for school consolation had gone down to defeat, Mrs. St. John spoke to Mayor Patterson about trying a second time. The mayor encouraged Mrs. St. John to run the effort herself.
"He helped me an awful lot with that," she said.
While his name is on a plaque noting the construction of Borough Hall, Mr. Patterson’s public service may have been obscured by the passing of time.
"I was with him recently at Borough Hall and nobody recognized him," Mr. St. John said. "He let it slip he had once been mayor and drew an absolute blank."
Amid the civil rights turmoil of the 1960s, Mayor Patterson promoted the hiring of blacks for key Borough Hall positions, which drew protests from some less progressive-minded residents, Mr. St. John said.
Also, the Hodge Road-Paul Robeson Place-Wiggins Street- Hamilton Avenue corridor was created during Mayor Patterson’s tenure, said Mrs. St. John.
"We call it the Henry Patterson Memorial Speedway," she quipped.
Outside his Borough Hall duties, Mr. Patterson worked for Elizabethtown Water Co. beginning in 1950, serving as president from 1973 until his retirement in 1985. He also was president of E’town Corp., a holding company of the water company.
He served most recently as a director of Elizabethtown and its subsidiary, the Mount Holly Water Co. Mr. Patterson graduated from Princeton University in 1943.
Mr. Patterson’s obituary appears in the obituary section of this Web site.