By Ruth Luse, Managing Editor
I want to thank Jean Hall Gianacaci, Heidi Kahme, Linda Maiden, Vanessa Sandom, Sheryl Stone, Sally Turner and Lisa Wolff — the “magnificent seven” — for doing all the planning and work that resulted in the surprise party they pulled off for me at the Hopewell Valley Golf Club on Nov. 17.
And it was a surprise! It all began, I understand, because of an e-mail I sent to Ms. Kahme, who heads the Valley’s Municipal Alliance. I said something about having been with the HVN for 45 years while commenting on an unrelated matter. That did it. She took my comment and ran with it. Be careful what you say because it may come back to haunt you. Just kidding!
Also, I want to thank all the people who showed up. When one sees a sea of faces — like the one that greeted me when I walked in the door — it’s not easy, at first, to get a hold on what you’re actually looking at. It took me time to grasp why all the people actually were there. I told Linda and Jeff Maiden, as we arrived, that there was no room in that banquet room for us to have dessert, because some group was holding a large reception there. I never dreamed the gathering was for me. (I had been at the Maidens’ home for dinner. Linda said we’d go the club for dessert. Why didn’t I think that was strange?)
I won’t even try to make a list of the people I saw. Surely, I would leave some important someone out.
In addition, I will try here to recall some of the people I got to know and some of the issues that were important to residents when I began my long, mostly enjoyable journey with the HVN in September 1966.
It was because of the Hopewell Valley Jaycees — the group no longer exists — that I got the job at the HVN in the first place. During the summer of 1966, while helping the Jaycees and the committee that was preparing for the week-long celebration of Hopewell Borough’s 75th anniversary of incorporation that September, I was asked to help create a special section for the Hopewell Valley News. Entirely historical in nature, it featured old photos and a history of Hopewell, based almost entirely on old Hopewell Borough Council minutes made available to me by the borough clerk, Joseph M. Pierson. (Jean Gianacaci’s great uncle).
The late Mr. Pierson served as clerk for Hopewell for about 40 years and worked out of his home on Model Avenue. At one time he also was Mercer County GOP chairman. His nephew, James Hall and wife Marie (“Red”) are Jean’s parents. When I joined the HVN, they were operating Jimmy’ Corner Store, at North Greenwood and Railroad Place. Mr. Hall is a former Hopewell councilman and he and his wife have been active in the American Legion on local, county, state and national levels for well over 45 years.
Florence V. Bodine, daughter of a former Hopewell mayor, had been editor of the HVN for about 10 years — almost from the time it was created in 1956 by the late Harry A. Richard. Ms. Bodine was retiring, she said, and asked if I wanted the job. I said yes and the rest is history, as they say. The office was a 5 Railroad Place, Hopewell. It was the home of Herald Printing Company and the Hopewell Herald, a newspaper that served the Hopewell area community from the late 1800s until late 1955, when the name was purchased from publisher, Vincent Savidge, by the Princeton Packet, which did not make use of the name for long.
It took a few weeks for Mr. Richard to become accustomed to working with someone new — especially someone who had limited knowledge of the area. My family moved to the Valley in 1961. My son began kindergarten at Bear Tavern School in the fall of 1966 — just months after Valley schools had regionalized. The late Dr. William J. Nunan was superintendent of schools. He stayed on the job for 21 years and later served as a member of the Hopewell Township Committee. The late Philip Alampi, then state secretary of agriculture, was school board president.
The people I remember clearly from the early days are: Herbert and Dot Jordan, who handled things at the Hopewell Township municipal office; Mr. Pierson, Hopewell Borough clerk; Joseph B. Hill, who, I believe, was Hopewell mayor at the time; and T. Romeyn Voorhees, who was Pennington Borough clerk — followed not long after by Sharon Szalontay (Reed). The first Pennington mayor I was fortunate to get to know well was the now late William E. Wade.
Because I concentrated on Hopewell Township coverage initially, the first officials I remember include: Lester Huff, Theodore A. Pierson III, Thomas Dent, Fred Rasweiler, Donald Woodward and Joseph Wyks. I also remember well the only full-time police officer, Chief Malcolm Joiner, who lived in a historic house near the northeast corner of Routes 579 and 546. I often visited him to discuss police-related matters.
The location for I-95’s alignment through Hopewell Valley was the hot issue in the late 1960s Leading the opposition to almost any alignment that would take the highway north and east from the Hopewell Township section we know today was L.H. Terpening, who lived on Bayberry Road. In those days, all three Valley towns had joined neighboring Montgomery Township in opposition to the extension of the interstate through the area. Many Valley residents did not want the highway because they felt it would cut the Valley in half. From the portion that exists today (beginning at Scudder Falls Bridge), a section (for which there were quite a few suggested alignments) was to run northeast in the general direction of Montgomery. The “missing link” that would have taken the road north to the Bound Brook area never was built, In the early 1980s, federal funding for the proposed link was dedesignated and the money allocated to other projects. If memory serves me correctly, one of those projects was the improvement of the Route 1 corridor in this area. The Scudder Falls Bridge, by the way, opened to traffic in June 1961 — just a month or so before my family moved to the Valley.
A major issue of the 1970s included what sections of the Valley should get sewers — through what eventually became the Stony Brook Regional Sewerage Authority. A look at the SBRSA’s website reminded me that in March 1968 the Stony Brook Regional Sewerage Group was organized “pursuant to the Consolidated Municipal Services Act by the governing bodies of the Boroughs of Hopewell, Pennington and Princeton, and the Townships of Princeton and West Windsor to study the feasibility of a regional sewerage system. The results of the study indicated that it would be in the public interest to form a joint municipal organization.
”In 1971 parallel ordinances were adopted by the Boroughs of Hopewell, Pennington and Princeton, and the Townships of Princeton, West Windsor and Hopewell and as a result, the Stony Brook Regional Sewerage Authority (SBRSA) was organized pursuant to the Sewerage Authorities Law . . . as a body politic and corporate.
”On Nov. 1, 1977 the Amended Service Contract was executed between the SBRSA and Pennington Borough, Hopewell Borough, Princeton Borough, Princeton Township, South Brunswick Township, and West Windsor Township otherwise known as ‘participants.’”
In a controversial vote, Hopewell Township officials “elected not to execute the service agreement at that time. The service contract called for the financing, construction, and operation of three sewage treatment facilities providing wastewater treatment and disposal services for the six participants.”
Ultimately, Hopewell and Pennington boroughs saw sewer lines go into the ground. Treatment plants serving them are located off Aunt Molly Road (for the Hopewell area) and off Pennington-Rocky Hill Road just east of the borough (for the Pennington area).
The man often given much of the credit for the existence of sewers in the Valley and area is the late Ezra Bixby, a former Pennington Borough councilman and longtime chairman of the SBRSA. Today, a Pennington street section (Bixby’s Way) runs generally north between Broemel Place and West Franklin Avenue. I was trhilled when the town decied to honor “Bix” in that way. He deserevd it.
I could go on and on, but space does not permit. Let me touch on one other issue that created considerable turmoil in the Valley. This was the proposal, in the 1970s, by Rouse and Co., of Columbia, Maryland, to build a shopping mall, called Hopewell Center, on a large tract of land south of Route 546 and east of Route 31. It was to be a model for future Rouse projects. The Mercer area eventually got Quaker Bridge Mall instead, but until the Rouse plan died, there was little peace in the Valley. Today, that land is home to housing and shopping areas.
Those who remember the past as well as I should recall the names: Judy Nini, Eva Dilts, Alberta Moore, Kristina Hill Provenzano, Susan Moore and Chris Moore, who all worked at the Railroad Place office for a time. The late Betty Stellitano came on the scene in 1984 and eventually became office manager. She left when the HVN, The Beacon, Lawrence Ledger and the Hillsborough Beacon moved from Hopewell Village Square to 300 Witherspoon St. a few Decembers ago.
While we were headquartered at Sir George Square (once part of the former Pennytown Shopping Village) in the late 1980s, the late Mary Tevere worked with us until her untimely death. That’s also where I first worked with sports editor, Carl Reader, who always kept us laughing. And that’s where I first met now good friend, Diane Green, who has worked for Packet Publications in many capacities over many years.
Since the HVN joined the Packet in 1987, I have worked with only two staff writers — Dana Sullivan, who surprised me by showing up at the Nov. 17 party, and John Tredrea, who still works with me today, and will for a long time in the future, I hope!
Once again — thanks to the ladies who arranged the Nov. 17 party and to those who attended the event that made me remember all this . . . and so many other things! And thanks to my son, Jon, and his girls, Morganne and Tory — who have to put up with me at home — for attending, as well!
