LHS grad makes Route 1 focus of new book
By: Ilene Dube
Peter Genovese loves to drive.
His 1992 olive green Jeep has 400,000 miles on it. The Newark Star Ledger feature writer, who averages 50,000 miles a year, added 30,000 alone while researching his latest book, “The Great American Road Trip: U.S. 1, Maine to Florida” (Rutgers University Press, 1999).
I recently asked Mr. Genovese if he could give me a tour of Route 1 from South Brunswick to Trenton. We arranged to meet at the McDonalds on Major Road in South Brunswick.
As I waited, inhaling vapors of french fries and fried fish, my ears buzzed with customers ordering Filet o Fish and Big Xtras over the loudspeaker in the drive-through lane, punctuated by static and the stop and go of truck traffic.
On this sunny day, pear trees rimming the parking lot are in full bloom. Extra large paper cups — flattened, squished plastic lids and straws litter the asphalt, spotted with oil spills like a Jackson Pollack painting. An attendant sweeps the detritus into a dust pan on a long handle.
Mr. Genovese had forewarned me that this was his least favorite strip of what he calls “the best damn highway in America.”
Before we start out, Mr. Genovese, also the author of “Roadside New Jersey” and “Jersey Diners,” admits that it hurts every time he drives by this McDonalds. He waxes nostalgic over the Loraine Diner that had formerly occupied the site.
Southbound, we pass on the right the little food stand on a corner with take-out windows in the front and a sign above that says “Burrito Royale.” At 10:30 a.m. on a Friday morning, the parking lot is empty.
Mr. Genovese plans to revisit it for his “Eat with Pete” column in the Star Ledger. He marvels how difficult it must be to stay open with the price of land so high. “Everyone else has sold out,” he laments.
As we pass the Islamic mosque on our right, he remarks that its architecture is interesting to see amid all the office buildings. We pass the Monmouth Mobile Home Park — “A Community of Nice People,” says the sign. Mr. Genovese warns that it is not politically correct to call these “trailer parks” anymore. “One in eight Americans live in mobile homes,” he says. “For couples starting out, it’s great to be able to buy a house for $30,000.”
The Monmouth Mobile Home Park has a colorful display of lights every winter, and social activities are offered to its residents, including bus trips to Atlantic City, says Mr. Genovese.
On our left are the colorful shapes of Princeton architect Michael Graves’ Miele headquarters. It is one of the few newly constructed office buildings in the area that Mr. Genovese finds at all interesting. “It is a wonderful building,” he adds.
Mr. Genovese admits that the idea for the U.S. 1 book was not his, but that of his editor, Marlie Wasserman, editor-in-chief at Rutgers University Press. “My first reaction was, ‘Why?’ I said, ‘No way. There’s nothing on this road!’”
At that point, he hadn’t seen much of Route 1. He had written a series for the Home News on U.S. 1 in Edison and Woodbridge, and as a child his parents had driven from Trenton to Philadelphia on Route 1 to visit his aunt.
Curious, he took two weeks off from work to drive to Key West, Fla., where the road ends. “This is one wild and colorful highway, I told myself. I couldn’t wait to get back and tell Marlie I wanted to do the book. I was hoping she hadn’t changed her mind.”
She hadn’t, and Mr. Genovese couldn’t wait to start the book. He used up all his vacation time and took several long weekends. When making the transition from the Home News to the Star Ledger in 1998, he took six weeks to research the book.
“No other road matches U.S. 1’s combination of history, culture, scenery, roadside attractions, variety and vitality,” says Mr. Genovese. “It’s the most visually diverse major highway in the country. Hey, the FBI is on U.S. 1. So is the National Enquirer. The Okefenokee Swamp and the Bronx Zoo. The Museum of Natural History is on U.S. 1. So is the Mushroom Museum. Route 66, America’s most revered highway, can’t touch U.S. 1. It’s got romance and nostalgia behind it, but it doesn’t have one-tenth of U.S. 1’s pizzazz.”
In his travels, Mr. Genovese ate at whatever place caught his eye. “I’m a big breakfast person. I like to go to diners, luncheonettes or local places. I don’t go to chains. I prefer mom and pop places. South of Philly there are not a lot of diners. I would eat at Waffle Houses or Huddle Houses — these are chains but like diners with a grill out front, and you can get grits. I’m a big grits person.” The back of the book includes a section on where to eat on Route 1.
Mr. Genovese waxes nostalgic about the fields and farms and open space from his childhood that is no longer on U.S. 1. But some things remain. As we pass the hub cap dealer in Lawrence, Mr. Genovese recalls a front page story he wrote for the Home News years ago about this very same hub cap dealer. The place was for sale then, and it is still for sale now (see sidebar).
Passing the Quaker Bridge Mall on the left, Mr. Genovese remembers the Clarksville Diner that used to be located at that intersection. It was moved out to Iowa more than 10 years ago, but was never successful there, and moved to Paris two years ago, where it is used for special parties and functions by a French TV station. “It is one of only six diners on the National Register of Historic Places,” he said.
On our left we pass another old steel-plated diner, this one formerly a storage facility for plumbing supplies and now vacant. Mr. Genovese wishes aloud that someone will buy it and restore it as a diner. It chagrins him that even the Clarksville, thought happily living in Paris, is not in use as a diner.
As the road splits into the Trenton Freeway and Business 1, Mr. Genovese points out that there are only three or four sections, all the way from Maine to Florida, where the road separates like this.
Born in Trenton, Mr. Genovese spent most of his childhood in Ewing, graduated from Lawrence High School, got his driver’s license at the Baker’s Basin station on Route 1, and lived in Plainsboro for seven years in the early 1980s while working at The Home News.
As we pass the Trenton Farmer’s Market, he recalls going there weekends, though he is careful to note that the market is, technically, not on Route 1. His book mentions only sites that are right on Route 1. “There is enough on this highway, you don’t have to go off.” He points out that Princeton never touches U.S. 1.
His mother, who lives in Ewing, still goes to the Trenton Farmer’s Market. We pass another store that Mr. Genovese remembers used to be a Two Guys department store. “I painted the walls there one summer,” he said. “We used to come to Extension Patio to buy chairs.”
“Route 1 is a great travel experience,” said Mr. Genovese, who took most of the pictures in the book. “Everything is familiar.”
His favorite part of Route 1, by far, is in the Keys. “It is the best driving in the country. In a car like this, with the top down, it doesn’t get better than that. If I won the lottery, I would move there tomorrow.”
Since beginning the book, he has gone to the Keys eight times. “You just park on the shoulder and the beach is right there. Anyone who has been to the Jersey Shore is amazed that you don’t have to put money in a meter or walk a mile to the beach.”
He says he has never eaten better in his life than in the Keys — “fresh fish at sunset. At Mile Marker 88 — that’s the name of the restaurant — I ate one knockout meal after another.”
“There is a lot of bizarreness in the Keys,” he adds. “It’s honky tonk, it’s tacky, but for signage and visual variety it can’t be beat. In the Keys, they know how to do commercial strips. Here, you could fall asleep.”
The Route 1 experience is a bargain, he points out; the only two tolls are on the George Washington Bridge ($4) and on the bridge from Trenton to Morrisville (50 cents) — and each of these bridges only collect in one direction.
As we turn around and head northbound again, Mr. Genovese feels himself drawn back to the pre-Wal-Mart days. Passing an animal kennel now occupying an old farmhouse, he says, “I love places like that, just hanging on until a developer blows them away with an offer and they’re gone.”
He remembers going to the Lawrence Drive-In. “The sign was there until a few years ago.” He and his brothers would go to the dusk-to-dawn specials, eight movies for $1 for a carload. “There were monster specials. We would bring lawn chairs and a blanket and fall asleep until a monster destroying Tokyo woke you up.”
In South Brunswick, we pass the sign for the Old Stone Inn, covered with vines. The stone inn itself was removed years ago. “It was a great old restaurant and bar. But the owner passed away and it was sold.”