Many of Warren County’s historic sites are participating in the 3rd Annual Explore Warren History Trail, a self-guided county-wide tour, on the weekend of November 4-5, 2023. Each stop along the trail offers something different and exciting for the all, with family activities at each location.
Sites will be open 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., with eight locations in the northern area of the county open on Saturday, and six in southern Warren County open on Sunday. Find more information at www.warrenhistorytrail.org and download the map at https://www.warrenhistorytrail.org/history-trail-map/
As it approaches its bicentennial in 2024-2025, Warren County will celebrate a remarkable history as well as its reputation for the cleanest waterways and richest farmland in New Jersey. Stemming from wilderness times well before the county’s official formation through 1824 legislation, the area’s earliest settlements were in Greenwich, Oxford Furnace, and Pahaquarry.
Situated at the confluence of the Delaware and Musconetcong Rivers, Greenwich was the gateway for the northward migration of Quaker, German, and Scots-Irish settlers landing at Philadelphia. Oxford Furnace’s first pioneers arrived in 1726, but real growth followed the building of the furnace in 1741, creating Warren County’s first hub of commercial activity and population growth. In 1732, Abraham Van Campen built a mill in what became the tiny village of Calno in Pahaquarry, the southernmost settlement in a chain of Dutch villages extending down the Minisink Valley from Esopus (now Kingston), New York. Warren County’s agricultural heritage, in combination with eighteenth and nineteenth century innovations in transportation and industry, are important chapters in the rural American tradition.
Open Saturday, November 4, 2023
Millbrook Village
Vass Farmstead
Blairstown
Johnsonburg
Rutherfurd Hall
Moravian Village of Hope
Ramsaysburg Homestead
Belvidere
Open Sunday, November 5
Shippen Manor
Van Nest Hoff-Vannatta Farm
Roseberry-Gess House
Shimer Mansion
Bread Lock Park
Asbury Mill
Self-Guided Explore Warren History Trail
Explore Shippen Manor, Blair's Town, Oxford Furnace, the Morris Canal and many more historic sites throughout Warren County. This is a free self-guided, county-wide driving tour, where you can visit one or multiple sites at your own pace each day. Sites in the county's northern region will be hosting visitors on Saturday, 11/4; and the southern destinations will be open on Sunday, 11/5. Each site will have a docent on hand to convey the history of the location, and some sites will host demonstrations and festival activities.