Collecting Hoboken – COVID-19

The Hoboken Historical Museum is documenting our community’s experience of the COVID-19 pandemic in real time, using crowd sourcing, in addition to our own collections efforts. We are interested in collecting as many different stories, interviews, images, audio files and videos as we can.

We invite you to join this effort. Click the button below to visit our “Collecting Hoboken” site. Browse the images and stories as we are collecting them in real time, contribute your own story, request or suggest an interview for an oral history (virtually, of course), and learn about our artists appeal, “Every Mask a Blank Canvas.”

Visit ‘Collecting Hoboken’ now 

A short history of the Shipyard…

Hoboken maintains a palpable sense of history, but sometimes the past lives of buildings and the people who worked and lived in them can be hard to figure out after adaptive reuse. If you ever wondered about what went on in the building the Hoboken Museum occupies and the background of the complex known as “The Shipyard,” we are pleased to present a short documentary created by friend of the Museum, Lisa Sartori (Coyle). 

The waterfront property was formerly home to Bethlehem Steel, and before that, the W&A Fletcher Brothers shipyard. The workers built ships for day trips up the Hudson River, and troop transport ships for World War II, among others. After Hoboken’s waterfront lost jobs to other deep water ports, it sat empty for many years, until the Applied Companies acquired it and preserved the old Machine Shop, and created new buildings for residential, retail, and commercial use.

The film features interviews with Museum Director Bob Foster, and with several people who worked as crane operators, riggers and other jobs on Hoboken’s industrial waterfront. It’s illustrated with amazing film footage and historic photographs, including some by the very talented Benedict J. Fernandez, whose photos are also featured in our book, “From Another Time, Hoboken in the 1970s.” 

Film credits: Cretic Productions LLC, [Hoboken], 2001. Produced, written and directed by Lisa Sartori.

See a vintage baseball game this Saturday!

It’s been 173 years since Davis from the NY Knickerbockers was fined 6 cents for swearing at the first match game of Base Ball played at the Elysian Fields in Hoboken. They played a few “warm up” matches in the fall of 1845, testing out their new rules.  But it was June 19, 1846, when they finally decided to officially keep score.  It was a lopsided, rain-shortened match. The New Yorks defeated the New York Knickerbockers 23 – 1.  Baseball was born!

On Saturday June 22, the Hoboken Base Ball Club will play the New Brunswick Liberty Base Ball Club using rules from 1864.   No gloves, no batting helmets, no catchers equipment.   Game will be played at 1PM at Dobbelaar Field at Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken.

After game celebration will be at the Ferryman on First pub on first and Bloomfield in Hoboken, NJ.

For a truly Hoboken experience, take the On the Waterfront tour

Do you really know Hoboken? For one of the best deep dives into Hoboken history, join Hoboken native and film industry pro, Lenny Luizzi, on Sunday, June 9, 1 – 4 pm, for his one-of-a-kind “On the Waterfront” bus tour.

Lenny was a boy when director Elia Kazan and a Hollywood film crew descended on Hoboken in search of the gritty realism that would suit the gripping story of longshoreman Terry Molloy’s struggle to do the right thing. Scriptwriter Budd Schulberg based his story on a Pulitzer Prize-winning series of news reports about Father Corridan, a crusading priest, who organized a worker’s resistance movement to the mob influence in the longshoremen’s union that controlled jobs across the New York harbor docks. 

Schulberg and Kazan quickly learned the docks on the New York side of the Hudson were still too much under the control of the mob for safety. They discovered that Hoboken’s docks afforded the same setting, but with less danger, and set up film locations inside tenement apartments, churches and local taverns, as well as up on the rooftops and on the docks of Hoboken. They happily employed locals as extras, including a young boy, Tom Hanley, whose father had disappeared and whose mother struggled to pay the rent. (Hanley tells his story in the Museum’s “Vanishing Hoboken” oral history chapbook series).

Lenny has spent his career in the film business, and with his insatiable curiosity about all things Hoboken, gathered every available detail from neighbors who were involved to members of the crew. He weaves the details into a compelling story of how Hoboken came to be one of the stars of this iconic American film, which earned 8 Academy Awards. The tour is unforgettable, and will help you appreciate the story behind the story.

Seating is limited. Tickets are $20 for members, $25 for nonmembers (plus ticket-handling fee). The bus will depart from and return to the Hoboken Museum, 1301 Hudson St. Film clips will be screened on video monitors on the bus. Click here for a web feature on the movie. Don’t miss it!

Click here to book your spot.

Then & Now Masked Ball Was a Great Night for All!

Another one of Hoboken’s best parties is in the history books.  The Museum’s annual Masked Ball at the W Hotel Hoboken on Oct. 26 was a great success, thanks to the efforts of many volunteers and donors. We thank all 200 guests for coming together to celebrate the good work the Museum does in the community, and party with your friends and neighbors. 

The Masked Ball raised $50,000 through a combination of ticket sales, generous donations to support our next exhibition, “Greetings from Hudson County: Then & Now,” and vigorous bidding in our annual live and silent auctions of unique travel, dining, entertainment and other prizes. Guests also enjoyed a great variety of dishes representing the diverse palates in the community and danced the night away with music provided by DJ Rhythm in Motion. This year’s special guest emcee was Marci Rubin of News 12 New Jersey, and magician Tod Buchanan wowed the crowd with his sleight of hand performances, while the dancers of Believe Ballroom Dance Studio showed off some fancy footwork.

Behind the scenes, a volunteer committee planned all the details, led by Val Hufnagel, president of the Museum’s Board of Trustees, with the input of several experienced professionals including Jennifer Claire Scott, Jennifer Icklan Eckert, Jennifer O’Callaghan, Trish Gallagher, Joyce Doyle, Michael Summers, Bob Foster, Eileen Lynch, Melissa Abernathy, and social media guru Vix Reitano of 6Boro Social. 

Click on the button below to view a gallery of party photos snapped by LAPhoto Party.

 Click here to view gala photos!

In homage to our next exhibit, “Greetings from Hudson County: Then & Now,” which opens January 27, 2019, the theme this year and special focus of the auction was raising money for the exhibition, which will feature vintage postcards and an augmented reality app that allows visitors to compare “then” (early 20th century) with now. Proceeds will also support the associated education programs, events and collections. 

In honor of the past, the Museum honored several former trustees of the Museum who have helped build the Museum into what it is today, along with three local heroes who have done so much to help support local businesses and nonprofits: restaurateurs Eugene and Joyce Flinn, and Hoboken Girl founder, Jennifer Tripucka.

A highlight of the evening was Eugene Flinn serving as auctioneer for our popular Live Auction, featuring coveted experiences, including:

• A summer pass to the Shipyard pool with a view
• One week stay in San Miguel Allende, Mexico
• One week stay at White Face Lodge in Lake Placid, NY
• A year of indoor parking in uptown Hoboken
• A special themed dinner for a party of 10 at Anthony David’s, with wine pairings
• And an overnight stay with dinner at the W Hoboken or Standard Hotel in New York

Expanded Silent Auction

An expanded silent auction this year included over 40 of tempting packages, artworks and gift certificates for local businesses, including tickets to see “A Band’s Visit” at the Barrymore Theater on Broadway, tickets to a taping of “Live with Kelly & Ryan,” and a Hoboken Memorial Day Parade ride for kids on a fire truck. Smart-phone bidding provided by GiveSmart made it easy for everyone to compete for these and other donated packages from Prime Cycle, Hudson Table, Cellar 335, Pier 13/NY Harbor Jet Ski, Hand and Stone Spa, passes to Liberty Science Center, a stay at the Tropicana Atlantic City, a framed print by local artist Ricardo Roig, vintage Hoboken images on canvas…and much more!

The event is made possible through the generous support of sponsors and donors, including: BCB Community Bank, Bijou Properties, Dragonfly Imaging, Halstead Properties NJ, Haven Savings Bank, Provident Bank, Strategic Insurance Partners, The W Hoboken, LA Photo Party and Rhythm in Motion, Applied Companies, Marcia Hermann, Rich DeVita, Anthony & Liz Pino, as well as supporters Cindy Cray, the Schmalzbauer Family, Nancy Lynch and Chris Falkner, and Jim Magenheimer and Terry Pranses.

The “Hoboken Horni” finds a new home

Among traffic signal afficionados, the traffic signal that humbly served its purpose for more than 80 years at the intersection of Washington and First Sts. is known as a “horni” model. Its very endurance there made it a rare artifact among traffic signal enthusiasts. 

Rather than try to tell its story, we humbly refer readers to the GardenStateSignals.net website for the tale of its journey from its longtime home to its new place of honor in the Hoboken Historical Museum collections.

Click here for the full story.

An American Soldier’s Journey Home

On November 11, one hundred years after the last shot was fired in The Great War, Douglas Taurel will perform his new play, “An American Soldier’s Journey Home,” at the Hoboken Historical Museum, 1301 Hudson St., at 4 pm. Tickets are $15 in advance, $20 at the door. Seating is limited. Reservations can be made from the link below.

Taurel is an actor and creator of the acclaimed solo show, “The American Soldier.” The new play was commissioned by the Library of Congress’s Veterans History Project, and performed at the Library of Congress on Veterans Day and Memorial Day in 2017 to commemorate the centennial of World War I.

Veterans Day, which celebrates the service of all U.S. veterans, is observed on the anniversary of the WWI Armistice, which was signed on November 11, 1918. 

Taurel’s play is based on the life of Irving Greenwald, a soldier who served in World War I in the 308th Infantry Regiment, who was part of the Lost Battalion. His diary is preserved by the Library of Congress Veterans History Project and is part of the Library’s exhibition, “Echoes of the Great War: American Experiences of World War I.” This play is being presented in conjunction with the Hoboken Museum’s exhibit, “World War I Centennial, 1917-2017: Heaven, Hell or Hoboken.”

An excerpt: 

“I stand with bated breath waiting for the explosion of the shell. I imagine the toll of injury and death it takes. The cost of it. The futility of it. The war will never be won on the field of battle. Why not end it all and spare men and women.”

– Irving Greenwald

Greenwald wrote his entries in the tiniest of handwriting, eloquently relating his experiences in training, in combat, and in the hospital after he was wounded in October 1918. The diary is the only diary that has ever been digitized, having been type written by his granddaughter who is the daughter of his only child Cecile. 

The Lost Battalion were five hundred American infantrymen cut off from their regiment and surrounded by Germans during six days of fighting in the Argonne Forest. Roughly 197 were killed, 150 were missing or taken prisoner before the 194 remaining men were rescued.  The battalion suffered incredible hardships. 

[Photos by Helene McGuire Photographie]

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