Danny’s Sweet Shop Sayreville is a town with historical roots that run as deep as the Raritan River’s clay-filled banks on which the borough stands.
Prior to World War II, when it seemed that the typical American town was either wholly urban or entirely rural, Sayreville was a strange specimen, according to Jason Slesinski, borough historian and author of “A Cultural History of Sayreville.”
“Sayreville was unique in that … industries [previously] were located primarily in urban areas,” Slesinski said. “But this was a very industrial town, and yet it was also very rural.”
The main reason for this arrangement was the Sayre and Fisher Brick Co., which required vast amounts of open space dedicated to obtaining the clay needed to create its product, Slesinski said.
Clusters of condensed neighborhoods began to crop up between the company’s land holdings, much of which was not actively mined for clay but held as investments. This led to neighborhoods with an urban pattern of life in a setting that was anything but, Slesinski said.
Parade on Main Street to celebrate the end of World War II “You had this mixing of suburbs with industry in a rural setting, and that was quite unique,” he said.
At the heart of this strange, industry-driven planning was a bustling Main Street, which served as a lively downtown where every imaginable good and service could be found.
Located in the middle of upper Sayreville, the commercial area of Main Street grew around the town trolley system that was in place prior to the 1930s, Slesinski said. Ultimately, the trolley was replaced with a bus system, which helped maintain the healthy, self-contained economy of Sayreville’s historic Main Street by providing a continuous stream of shoppers, according to Slesinski.
Greenfield’s department store, Silver’s Furniture and the Five and Dime were some of the small businesses residents recalled, laughing as they reminisced.
Edna Cornell was born in Sayreville and has lived in the borough for all of her 88 years. She looked back fondly on the memories of a thriving local economy and the tight-knit community that came along with it.
“We knew everybody,” Cornell said, noting the two churches — St. Stanislaus Kostka and Our Lady of Victories — that served the community. “So, you belonged to one or the other, and the community surrounded them.”
Polish immigrants founded St. Stanislaus Kostka, which celebrated its 100th anniversary in 2014.
In the early 20th century, Polish, German and Irish immigrants made up the majority of the town’s population.
Cornell said Main Street was the place to go for anything one might need. Greenfield’s was the largest provider of goods in town.
“There was one store where everybody bought their shoes and their dresses for school. That was Greenfield’s,” she said.
An apartment complex is now being built where Greenfield’s and the Five and Dime used to stand, according to Cornell.
Ed Strek, Cornell’s brother and a lifelong resident, said the stores were all within walking distance — a necessity in the days before it was commonplace for people to own cars.
“Everything was within a two-block radius,” Strek said. “If you lived in that area, you could walk one block and get everything you need.” But commerce is hardly the only noteworthy hallmark of Sayreville’s history.
Today, the borough is still the sort of place where one can stop a stranger on the street and likely find that his or her family has been in town for generations. If not, the odds are still good that they have lived in Sayreville for decades.
Ingrained in the borough, even now, is a deep reverence for service in the armed forces and the American national identity. Cornell recalled an impromptu demonstration of patriotism started by her father, John Strek, following Germany’s surrender in World War II.
“When the war ended on May 8, 1945, my father was working at Borough Hall,” she said. “He rushed home, got the American flag … and marched up Main Street, all the way down to Parlin, with two other men.” Residents Paul Mazur and Ben Modzelewski carried fiddles as they marched with John Strek in what quickly grew into a parade of reveling townsfolk basking in the American victory.
However, the end of the World War II brought with it great changes for Sayreville and its Main Street, along with the rest of the country.
“After World War II … the land became more profitable to sell than to continue mining, so they sold to developers and new houses came in,” Slesinski said, attributing the shift in part to the return of those who had been abroad during the war.
Population growth and a newfound ease of access to personal automobiles kickstarted the gradual shift away from mom and pops and the bustling downtown of Main Street. By the 1960s, department stores and strip malls were becoming the norm, a shift that was happening across the entire U.S., Slesinski said.
The first strip mall to move into Sayreville was Sayrewoods Shopping Center, located not on Main Street, but on Route 9. That mall is now called the Gateway Shopping Center, Slesinski said. Mid-State Mall on Route 18 soon followed, and it was clear a trend toward large, highway-based stores had begun.
“That’s when the smaller businesses started to go away,” Slesinski said. “This is the early ’50s, like 1952 or 1953.”
There had previously been no zoning laws in Sayreville, but by this time singleuse zoning had been introduced, forcing businesses that were run out of family homes to close down, Slesinski said. This further encouraged the shift to big-box stores.
Some residents recall family and friends finding employment at the department stores in Sayreville and nearby towns in the late 1950s and during the 1960s.
“Some of the neighborhood mothers worked [at the department stores] part-time. like Newberry’s and Wilco,” Karen Jackowski, a resident of 55 years, said.
Maria Rittenhouse, who has lived in Sayreville for the past 60 years except for an 11-year tenure in Ohio, said other bigname stores started to appear all around.
“A lot of the ladies that were on the block that I lived on worked in Grant’s and Penney’s or Kresge’s,” Rittenhouse said.
Although the change was gradual, by the 1970s the small-business model of Sayreville’s downtown was a shell of what it had been a few decades earlier.
“It wasn’t [immediate],” Deborah Marion, who grew up in Sayreville, said. “Over time, bigger stores came in and people were affluent enough to have more than one vehicle … so they’d go out shopping a little more.
“I graduated college in the 1970s, and [small businesses] were already pretty much declining in that time,” she added.
Marion said she still tries to stay local for most of her goods and services, but it isn’t always possible.
According to Slesinski, the days of buying all one needs right down the road are long gone.
“You absolutely need a car to survive,” he said. “There is no spot in Sayreville where you could get everything you need, like clothes, food or anything for your home.”
While many things contributed to the changes seen in Sayreville, no factor was more prominent than the widespread ownership of cars, according to Slesinski.
“The automobile is the big thing,” he said.
Although the days of a self-contained economy are gone, and Sayreville’s unique paths still lead to archetypical modern suburbia, the close community that defined the borough has remained.
It is evident everywhere — from the community’s response to superstorm Sandy to the outpouring of support that followed a recent fire at the home of a prominent borough family — that despite decades of drastic changes, Sayreville is a place steeped in community and history.