Goal for the Summer: Ong's Hat

MikeBickerson

MikeBickerson

Explorer
Feb 8, 2004
753
300
42
Barringtonl, NJ
www.southjerseytrails.org
Summer is here, the woods are full of ticks, and I have no school. Thus, after years of looking, once and for all, I'd like to finally find Ong's Hat. This is my summer resolution.

I know that there isn't really anything there. I definately know that there are no time traveling inter-dimentional portals there. I know there are no t-shirts that say "I found Ong's Hat!" (although there should be). I just want to have the option of making a t-shirt that says "I found Ong's Hat!" and not have it be a lie.

I know at the second circle on Rt 70, I head away from LBI. I know that Ong's Hat is somewhere on the left. I've found Ong's Hat Road, so I know that I've been very close. Can anyone please help me out?
 
Teegate

Teegate

Administrator
Site Administrator
Sep 17, 2002
25,627
8,228
I like the fact that you are so interested in finding it. You are hooked I believe :)

With that said, I have never looked for it so I can't help you. I don't think there is a specific location, so if you find Ong's Hat Road in my opinion you are close enough. Other's here may be able to help you more than I can.


Guy
 
W

WAMBA

Scout
Mar 20, 2006
74
0
Voorhees
i've heard so many different things about ong's hat it's ridiculous. the sjgeocaching board recently had a discussion about it where a few different points of view (that sounded a little more realistic than a techno-tantric commune of time travelers in airstream trailors) i hadn't heard before were discussed. here's the two relevent posts:

Bayberry said:
You can't find ruins at Ong's Hat because there are no ruins to find. There was never a town or even a village there.

It was just a crossroads in the woods, where a guy named Ong had a wooden shack where he could fix his Sunday mid-day meal and take a nap before going back to chuch services in the afternoon.

There wera a lot of these around, but this one got named ecause there was nothing else at that crossroads to distinguish it. The English who came later misheard the word for "shack" -- "huet" (not certain of the spelling) and made up a story to go with it.

We don't need any time travel eggs. We've got the Jersey Devil. He's real.
Click to expand...


Chstress said:
This is the accurat facts of Ongs Hat

A mere pinhead on the map, Ongs Hat consists of a few houses and a family restaurant, Anapa's In the 1840s, however, it was widely known for its cranberry cultivation. The town was named for Jacob Ong, a robust Pennsylvania Quaker who loved to drink and dance. Ong ran a tavern in the 1700s and one night, when he might have had one drink too many, he tossed his hat high up onto the limb of an oak tree. Too high to retrieve, the hat became a conversation piece. Customers would yell to newcomers, “There’s Ong’s hat.” By 1828 this cry was officially adopted as the town’s name. All that is left of Ongs Hat is the northern terminus of the Batona Trail, a 50-mile-long, pink-blazed path through the pinelands of southern New Jersey that was charted and built by the Batona Hiking Club of Philadelphia in 1961. The trail was designed to offer a true wilderness experience, despite the fact that it cuts across several roads and


These are the other claims to Ongs Hat, I make no claim to their accuracy though:
http://www.marsearthconnection.com/ong.html

http://deoxy.org/inc2.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ong's_Hat

There is a book called Ong's Hat: The Beginning (Paperback)
by Peter Moon
Click to expand...

the diner at ong's hat, which i highly recommend, can be found at www.apanaycafe.com

as i said in the sjg thread, i think the whole airstream commune time travel story would make for a sweet movie.

but if you're looking for the true location of ong's hat, go no further than the apanay cafe. they even have a branch mounted on the wall with ong's hat hanging on it!
 
wolfspider05

wolfspider05

Explorer
Nov 12, 2004
223
11
40
Riverside Nj
I have also have this thing about Ong's hat. I have always imagined finding some old ruins of a village in the woods of that area. The truth is that where the diner is, that is where Ong's hat is. As for the grave of Joe Mulliner, I believe the exact location of the gravesite is unknown, but there is a grave near sweetwater. I doubt that it is the original gravesite though. Lately I have been working on certain things in BRSF and looking for the lebanon glassworks cemetary. I believe that I found the location, just haven't got out there to see.
 
O

onehand

Explorer
Apr 11, 2005
374
1
potter co. pa.
the orignal road crossed in front of Apanay Cafe which in the earys 60's as i remember was just a very small ice cream stand with two windows which we used to frequent just living close by. one side is called turkey buzzard bridge road
the road in front of the cafe is a relitivly new road, in its early days it was known as Buddtown road, then Buddtown Ong's hat road, it has had many different names
but the orignal road crossed it at the cafe and ran eventually to lower mill on the greenwood branch (behind the persidental lakes area) on the other side to the rt 532 cut off to chatsworth, part of the road was called pemberton rd. behind the NL colony it parallels rt 72

it is interesting to look at old and new maps and make compairsons through the years. i have hiked on all the above roads except the ones blocked by the NL colony and private property

my personal beleif is, yea, some where very close by maybe "earlys crossing" Ong being drunk or stoned left his hat hanging in a tree :guinness:
 
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