New Jersey: A Historical Timeline

PRIOR TO PRIOR TO 1500 PRE-EUROPEAN
5000 BCE	Native Americans occupy New Jersey thousands of years before European arrival. The Delaware (also known as the Lenape) tribe of the Algonquin live in the area, spending most of their time hunting and growing crops, such as corn, squash, and beans.
1500-1664 EARLY EUROPEAN EXPLORATION AND SETTLEMENT
1524	Giovanni da Verrazano, sailing for France, explores the Jersey coast, including Sandy Hook and the Narrows.
1609	Henry Hudson, an Englishman sailing for the Dutch East India Company, explores Newark Bay and the Hudson Valley.
1609-13	Adriaen Block explores and maps the coast along Delaware, New Jersey, and Long Island, naming it New Netherlands.
1638	A Swedish colony, New Sweden, is established along the Delaware River.
1655	The Dutch seize the New Sweden colony.
1660	The Dutch establish Bergen, now Jersey City, the first permanent town in New Jersey.
1664	A British fleet sails into New York Harbor to take control of New Jersey from the Dutch. England’s King Charles II grants land in New Netherlands (now New Jersey) to his brother James, the Duke of York. (June 24) New Jersey, named after the Isle of Jersey, is founded.
1665-1739 NEW JERSEY COLONY
1676	The New Jersey Colony is divided into East Jersey and West Jersey.
1702	East and West Jersey are combined into one royal colony under the reign of Queen Anne.
1721	William Trent starts a village named "Trent’s Town," which becomes Trenton.
1740-1776 PRE-REVOLUTIONARY NEW JERSEY
1746	The College of New Jersey (now Princeton University) is founded in Elizabeth. It is the forth institution of higher education in the country to teach classes. Unlike others, it does have an official religious affiliation.
1758	The New Jersey Legislature forms the first reservation for Native Americans, establishing a permanent home for the Lenni-Lenape in Burlington County.
1774	(December 22) The Greenwich Tea Party. One year after the Boston Tea Party 40 Patriots dressed as Native Americans at Greenwich Township torch a load of tea meant for Philadelphia. It is a similar show of protest against the British tax system.
1775	The New England Restraining Act forbids trade in the colonies with any country other than Britain or Ireland.
1776-1800 REVOLUTIONARY NEW JERSEY
1776	The Revolutionary War begins. More than one hundred battles take place in New Jersey. It becomes known as the "Pathway of the Revolution." (July 2) New Jersey adopts its first state constitution. (November 20) The British invade New Jersey. (December 26) General Washington makes his famous overnight crossing of the Delaware River from Pennsylvania to surprise the British in New Jersey. He defeats the British forces in the Battle of Trenton, capturing nearly 900 prisoners in 90 minutes and changing the course of the war.
1778	Battle of Monmouth. Washington leads the Continental Army to attack the rear of the British army as they leave Monmouth County Court House. The British slip away in the night and continue their march to Sandy Hook. The Battle of Monmouth is still reenacted at Monmouth Battlefield State Park each year during the last weekend in June.
1783	Governor Washington issues his "Farewell Address to the Army" near Princeton. -The Continental Congress meets at Nassau Hall in Princeton for several months, effectively making the town the national capital
1787	(December 12) New Jersey becomes the third in the Union after ratifying the U.S. Constitution.
1789-90	(November 20) New Jersey is the first state to ratify and sign the Bill of Rights.
1790	"All free inhabitants" are granted to right to vote in New Jersey. Trenton officially becomes the state capital.
1791	Alexander Hamilton builds the country’s first planned industrial city in present-day Paterson. By the 1880s, Paterson became so well known for silk manufacturing that it was called "Silk City."
1800-1860 POST-REVOLUTIONARY NEW JERSEY
1804	Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr famously duel near Weehawken. Vice President Aaron Burr mortally wounds first Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton with a pistol. New Jersey becomes the last state in the Northeast to free slaves. At the time it has more slaves than any other Northern state.
1807	After the U.S. Constitutional Convention gives states the right to set voting qualifications, New Jersey becomes the last state in the current Union to deny women the right to vote.
1834	New Jersey and New York ratify the first U.S. interstate crime compact.
1846	The first organized baseball game is played in Hoboken.
1848	In order to meet an increasing demand for his wire rope, John Roebling opens a factory in Trenton. He and his sons will eventually build the Brooklyn Bridge and many other suspension bridges in the U.S.
1854	The USS New Era sinks off the coast of New Jersey, killing 300 people.
1858	The first nearly complete dinosaur skeleton, the Hadrosaurus foulkii, is found in Haddonfield. It is soon mounted for public display.
1860-1900 THE CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION ERAS
1860	The Civil War begins. Over the next five years, 88,000 soldiers from New Jersey become part of infantry and cavalry regiments, although no battles are fought in the state.
1869	Dr. Thomas Welch, a wine steward at a church in Vineland, pasteurizes Concord grape juice to make an unfermented sacramental wine. He later becomes the father of the fruit juice industry.
1870	The first section of the famous boardwalk in Atlantic City is opened to the public.
1876	Thomas Edison opens laboratories in Menlo Park.
1878	Edison patents the phonograph.
1879	Edison invents a practical carbonized cotton filament light bulb. It is the first incandescent electric lamp.
1882	The first amusement pier over the ocean is built in Atlantic City.
1892	John Philip Sousa and his band perform publicly for the first time at the Stillman Music Hall in Plainfield. Known as "the March King," went on to compose more than 136 of them, as well as several operettas.
1899	Taking advantage of the state’s lax incorporation laws, Standard Oil of New York becomes the holding company Standard Oil Company of New Jersey. It controls 91 percent of oil production and 85 percent of sales by 1904.
1900-1930 EARLY 20TH CENTURY
1903	Italo Marchioni applies for a patent for pastry cones to hold ice cream, and the ice cream cone is invented.
1910	Thomas Edison demonstrates the first "talking" pictures using a phonograph in his New Jersey laboratory.
1916	German saboteurs blow up a munitions pier on Black Tom Island in Jersey City. Seven people are killed and the damages total $25 million.
1918	World War I. A German U-Boat sinks six American ships off the coast of New Jersey.
1921	The first Miss America pageant is held in Atlantic City. Margaret Gorman of Washington, D.C., wins the crown.
1929	The first "seeing-eye" guide dog school is opened in Morris Township.
1930-1950 THE GREAT DEPRESSION AND WORLD WAR II
1931	The George Washington Bridge, linking New York City with New Jersey, opens. Today it is one of the world’s busiest traffic bridges, carrying 107,912,000 vehicles in 2007.
1932	(March 1) Aviator Charles Lindbergh’s son is kidnapped from his home in Hopewell. More than two months later, the toddler’s remains are found a short distance away. The kidnapping and murder trial are labeled the "biggest story since the Resurrection" and lead to the Federal Kidnapping Act, which makes transporting a kidnapping victim across state lines a federal crime.
1933	The first drive-in movie theater opens outside of Camden.
1936	The community of Jewish Homesteads is created. Jewish garment workers own and run a clothing factory and farm. The co-op fails before World War II.
1937	Millionaire industrialist Howard Hughes sets a transcontinental air record by flying his monoplane from Los Angeles to Newark in 7 hours, 28 minutes and 25 seconds. German airship the Hindenburg bursts into flames and crashes as it attempts to dock at Lakehurst Naval Air Station in New Jersey. A total of 36 people die when the fire ignites the 16 hydrogen-filled cells, destroying the airship in 34 seconds.
1939-45	World War II. More than 500,000 New Jersey residents join the war effort. The state produces battleships, cruisers, and destroyers for the U.S. Navy. During World War II, shipyards and military bases in New Jersey play an important role in U.S. defenses.
1940	The first solid-body electric guitar is invented in Mahwah by Les Paul. Paul’s invention would revolutionize popular music in the coming decades.
1941	An internment camp for people of Japanese, German, and Italian descent is opened in Gloucester City.
1945	U.S. forces hit and sink a German U-boat off the coast of New Jersey.
1950-PRESENT MODERN NEW JERSEY
1951	The New Jersey Turnpike opens. It becomes one of the most heavily traveled highways in the country and the nation’s fifth busiest toll road.
1954	The first microbiology laboratory opens in New Brunswick.
1957	Two unarmed nuclear bombs are dropped off Cape May in New Jersey by a cargo plane with engine problems. The bombs are never found. Market researcher James Vicary announces he has invented "subliminal advertising," a way to get people to buy things by acting on the subconscious that he had tested in a New Jersey movie theater. In 1962, he admits that his results were fabricated in order to promote business for his market research firm.
1964	Race riots in Jersey City result in damage to 71 stores and injuries to 46 people. African-Americans are frustrated by poor urban conditions, declining industrial jobs, and a biased police force with little minority representation.
1967	A race riot in Newark lasts for five days. It kills 26 people, injures 1,500, and causes $10 million in damage. New Jersey hosts the Glassboro Summit Conference, a Cold War meeting between U.S. President Lyndon Johnson and Soviet Premier Aleksei Kosygin. The leaders fail to reach an agreement on limiting anti-ballistic missile systems but achieve an amicable atmosphere at the summit.
1973	The class of 1973 is Princeton University’s first coeducational class, and includes Queen Noor of Jordan.
1978	Gaming is legalized in Atlantic City and the Resorts International Hotel becomes the city’s first casino.
1993	Christine Todd Whitman becomes the state’s first female governor.
1998	The U.S. Supreme Court rules that 24 acres of Ellis Island are part of New Jersey.
2001	(September 11) United Airlines Flight 93 departs Newark International Airport and is subsequently hijacked. Passengers force a crash in Pennsylvania, and all on board are killed. (September) Several letters containing anthrax spores are mailed to government offices and media companies from mailboxes in Princeton, New Jersey. An estimated seven letters were sent; five people died as a result.
2007	New Jersey becomes the third state to offer civil unions for same-sex couples.