Black Horse Pike

[buckykattnj]

Everything I've ever known about the Black Horse Pike seems to indicate that its been around for a long time, stretching from Camden To AC. Problem is, most of the maps I've seen, don't seem include the part from Weymouth-Malaga Road to the Hamilton Mall.

It seems that most traffic before that section was built must have detoured, but how? Through Mays Landing? When was this stretch of BHP built anyway?

 

[Teegate]

http://www.amazon.com/BLACK-Images-America-Arcadia-Publishing/dp/0738556785

 

[lakesgirl]

while doing some research on Penny Pot I came across a bit of information that might help. The road now called the BHP followed along what is now 559. If you are heading towards the shore, before you get to the double lights at 559, you can faintly see where the road forked to the right.

I believe it was in the early 1900's that the BHPwas continued down to AC. Sometime in the early 60's if my memory is correct the double traffic lights were put in at Weymouth Road (559) and the original fork was closed.

There is another fork in Cecil by the Trio Tavern, this was also part of the original BHP.

 

[Spung-Man]

+13,000 Years of Transhumance

Everything I've ever known about the Black Horse Pike seems to indicate that its been around for a long time, stretching from Camden To AC. Problem is, most of the maps I've seen, don't seem include the part from Weymouth-Malaga Road to the Hamilton Mall.

Buckykattnj, Lakesgirl,

The Black Horse and White Horse Pikes are roughly the modern equivalent to the Long-a-Coming Trail, an ancient Indian path that ran from Camden to Jobs Point near Somers Point. Upon European settlement, Cooper’s Ferry linked the track with Philadelphia, and Job’s Ferry provided crossing to Beesleys Point where the Cape Trail could be followed to Cape May. This trail was improved several times through the centuries, and had become a stage route during the first half of the 19th century. The White Horse Pike remained but a sandy track until 1896, when it was gravelled for bicyclists who referred to it as the Appian Way. Hard-surfacing began in 1918, but wasn’t completed until 1922.

Planning for the Black Horse Pike started in 1925 in anticipation of the Delaware River Bridge (i.e., Ben Franklin). Its layout was completed by 1928. Passage through the Lochs-of-the-Swamp proved troublesome. Woodsman Fountain Gale, of Weymouth, guided engineers through these wilds saving much surveying time. I am told that one of the project planners who enlisted Gale was a Steelman. Coincidently, an earlier Steelman improved the original Long-a-Coming Trail during the 1690s, and by 1706 this family of Swedish ancestry settled upon a plantation situated between up-to mile-long lochs (narrow spungs). The three largest "winter ponds" were Lookout (Loch-Out?), Crane, and Brake Ponds. The Steelman Place was located near today’s Custard Castle, across from Galletta’s blueberry field. The Pike was opened to traffic in 1932.



Spung-Man

Boucher, J.E., 1963: Absegami Yesteryear. Egg Harbor City, NJ: Laureate Press. 149 pp. (nice photo of Fountain).

Chalmers, K.H., 1951: Down the Long-a-Coming. Moorestown, NJ: The News Chronicle. 206 pp.

Wilson, H.F., 1953: The Jersey Shore: A Social and Economic History of the Counties of Atlantic, Cape May, Monmouth and Ocean (2 vols.). New York: Lewis Historical Publishing Co. 1055 pp. A third but separate volume contains family and personal history.

 

[glowordz]

Thanks, Spung-Man, for these tidbits and the bibliography. Interesting. Useful!

Glo

 

[buckykattnj]

Buckykattnj, Lakesgirl,

Planning for the Black Horse Pike started in 1925 in anticipation of the Delaware River Bridge (i.e., Ben Franklin). Its layout was completed by 1928.

Well, I assume you mean the planning the modern rendition of the Black Horse Pike (answering my original question), but its my understanding that the name Black Horse Pike dates back to the 1850s.

Interesting, so the pictures on historicaerials.com from the 1930s must be the creation of the road.

Passage through the Lochs-of-the-Swamp proved troublesome. Woodsman Fountain Gale, of Weymouth, guided engineers through these wilds saving much surveying time.

Interesting. I imagine Gale Ave near Weymouth Furnance is named for him or his family.

 

[Spung-Man]

its my understanding that the name Black Horse Pike dates back to the 1850s.

All paths lead back to the Long-a-Coming, an ancient byway used by South Jersey’s earliest cultures who traveled from spung to spung during ephemeral foraging at the end of the Ice Age. Colonists made good use of its trace, with many improvements over the centuries. As for turnpikes, a reiteration of the original Long-a-Coming was chartered by the Camden and Atlantic Turnpike Company in 1852, but foundered two years later. The White Horse Pike was chartered in 1854. Its namesake was probably the White Horse Tavern. I had to query a dear friend and true “roads scholar,” Ed Fox, for the rest of the story. According to him, that Black Horse Pike is a modern name given by the State. The planner’s inspiration was from the Blackwood Turnpike, of which a section was incorporated in the Black Horse’s modern route.

Spung-Man


Boyer, C.S., 1967: Rambles Through Old Highways and Byways of West Jersey. Camden, NJ: Camden County Historical Society. 284 pp.

Cresson, J.A., Mounier, A., Bonfiglio, A., and Demitroff, M., 2006: Periglacial landforms of southern New Jersey: sites, trails and ancient cultural links. In Hellström, R., and Frankenstein, S. (eds.). Program and Abstracts, 63rd Eastern Snow Conference, University of Delaware, Held Jointly with the Cryosphere Specialty Group of the Association of American Geographers, 7-9 June 2006, p. 72.

Demitroff, M., 2007: Pine Barrens Wetlands: Geographical Reflections of South Jersey’s Periglacial Legacy. MS thesis, University of Delaware, Newark, DE, 244 pp.

 

[Jerseyman]

For additional information about the White Horse Pike and the Black Horse Pike, please see this thread:

http://forums.njpinebarrens.com/f13/white-horse-black-horse-pike-532/

Best regards,
Jerseyman

 

[Spung-Man]

For additional information about the White Horse Pike and the Black Horse Pike, please see this thread:

http://forums.njpinebarrens.com/f13/white-horse-black-horse-pike-532/

Thanks Jerseyman,

Ah, this explains your reticence! My apologies for any duplication. Thanks for pointing out the earlier posts. I’m relatively new to the site, and have had little time to explore its recesses. I hope the two threads are sufficiently different to complement each other.

Spung-Man

 

[Kevinhooa]

Thanks for all that info Spungman! Very informative! It's kind of neat to see how roads have evolved by seeing where sections have joined in and split off over the years. Rt. 73 has a couple neat sections where it's been re-routed also due to RR's and new interchanges. Neat stuff.

 

[Jason Howell]

+13,000 Years of Transhumance



Buckykattnj, Lakesgirl,

The Black Horse and White Horse Pikes are roughly the modern equivalent to the Long-a-Coming Trail, an ancient Indian path that ran from Camden to Jobs Point near Somers Point. Upon European settlement, Cooper’s Ferry linked the track with Philadelphia, and Job’s Ferry provided crossing to Beesleys Point where the Cape Trail could be followed to Cape May. This trail was improved several times through the centuries, and had become a stage route during the first half of the 19th century. The White Horse Pike remained but a sandy track until 1896, when it was gravelled for bicyclists who referred to it as the Appian Way. Hard-surfacing began in 1918, but wasn’t completed until 1922.

Planning for the Black Horse Pike started in 1925 in anticipation of the Delaware River Bridge (i.e., Ben Franklin). Its layout was completed by 1928. Passage through the Lochs-of-the-Swamp proved troublesome. Woodsman Fountain Gale, of Weymouth, guided engineers through these wilds saving much surveying time. I am told that one of the project planners who enlisted Gale was a Steelman. Coincidently, an earlier Steelman improved the original Long-a-Coming Trail during the 1690s, and by 1706 this family of Swedish ancestry settled upon a plantation situated between up-to mile-long lochs (narrow spungs). The three largest "winter ponds" were Lookout (Loch-Out?), Crane, and Brake Ponds. The Steelman Place was located near today’s Custard Castle, across from Galletta’s blueberry field. The Pike was opened to traffic in 1932.



Spung-Man

Boucher, J.E., 1963: Absegami Yesteryear. Egg Harbor City, NJ: Laureate Press. 149 pp. (nice photo of Fountain).

Chalmers, K.H., 1951: Down the Long-a-Coming. Moorestown, NJ: The News Chronicle. 206 pp.

Wilson, H.F., 1953: The Jersey Shore: A Social and Economic History of the Counties of Atlantic, Cape May, Monmouth and Ocean (2 vols.). New York: Lewis Historical Publishing Co. 1055 pp. A third but separate volume contains family and personal history.

Mark it is really great to read this. I have only had this told to me through oral family history about Fountain. I will have to get copy of Down the Long-a-Coming. If other oral family history is correct, Fountain was also a game warden at that time for Atlantic County.