B
BarryC
Guest
From "Iron in the Pines", by Arthur D. Pierce.
After discussing how the tavern was there at least before 1820 it says,
"The Quaker Bridge tavern was still standing in 1849, when it was shown on maps and listed in Gordon's Gazetteer. Also shown in that year was the house of "W. Richards" across the road from the hotel, at a location where it is still possible to trace the vague outlines of an old cellar hole. Just when the tavern burned down-- it's probable fate-- is as difficult to discover as the date of its erection. Certainly there is little now to suggest human habitation, at any time.
There is a "labyrinth of roads" much like that Torrey (the botanist, discussed earlier) found a century and a quarter ago; so, too, in season, is an abundance of the golden Hudsonia which he also remarked. (my note: this describes driving eastward from Atsion. I believe the roads mentioned next are the ones immediately after the bridge.) The fact that Quaker Bridge is a junction of no less than four trails, all of which may once have been important, perhaps explains why in wagon wheel days the tavern was as busy as legends tell us. The first junction road swings sharply left, to run more or less northwest above and along the bank of the Batsto River. It winds eventually to what once was Hampton Furnace and now is a major cranberry development, and on the way passes a clearing where the mysterious forge may have stood. For a motorist, it is a road to be "handled with care." The second trail on the left leads to High Crossing, on the Jersey Central, which is not far from the spot where the Mexican airman, Emilio Carranza, perished on his famous good-will flight in 1928. The cellar hole and a few bits of brick and fieldstone are in the angle formed by these trails. What seems the most likely location of the old hotel is the substantial clearing at the right of the main trial, which heads more or less due east, but which looks so much like all the other branch trails that many travellers have been lost in these parts since Torrey's visit. On a fine spring day this clearing has seemed to be almost solidly covered by the Hudsonia or, as some call it, "golden bell." The fourth road turns sharply to the right a few hundred feet beyond the bridge. This, too, winds along the Batsto River, but soon turns and re-connects with the main trail. Some years ago a hunter's shack stood at this spot, but such is the capacity of the Pine Barrens for obliterating the handiwork of man that no trace of it remains. Aside from the bridge itself, the sole evidence of civilization in Quaker Bridge today is a concrete surveyor's monument.
I think these clues might be able to help us find the house across from the tavern, and then the tavern site itself.
Barry
After discussing how the tavern was there at least before 1820 it says,
"The Quaker Bridge tavern was still standing in 1849, when it was shown on maps and listed in Gordon's Gazetteer. Also shown in that year was the house of "W. Richards" across the road from the hotel, at a location where it is still possible to trace the vague outlines of an old cellar hole. Just when the tavern burned down-- it's probable fate-- is as difficult to discover as the date of its erection. Certainly there is little now to suggest human habitation, at any time.
There is a "labyrinth of roads" much like that Torrey (the botanist, discussed earlier) found a century and a quarter ago; so, too, in season, is an abundance of the golden Hudsonia which he also remarked. (my note: this describes driving eastward from Atsion. I believe the roads mentioned next are the ones immediately after the bridge.) The fact that Quaker Bridge is a junction of no less than four trails, all of which may once have been important, perhaps explains why in wagon wheel days the tavern was as busy as legends tell us. The first junction road swings sharply left, to run more or less northwest above and along the bank of the Batsto River. It winds eventually to what once was Hampton Furnace and now is a major cranberry development, and on the way passes a clearing where the mysterious forge may have stood. For a motorist, it is a road to be "handled with care." The second trail on the left leads to High Crossing, on the Jersey Central, which is not far from the spot where the Mexican airman, Emilio Carranza, perished on his famous good-will flight in 1928. The cellar hole and a few bits of brick and fieldstone are in the angle formed by these trails. What seems the most likely location of the old hotel is the substantial clearing at the right of the main trial, which heads more or less due east, but which looks so much like all the other branch trails that many travellers have been lost in these parts since Torrey's visit. On a fine spring day this clearing has seemed to be almost solidly covered by the Hudsonia or, as some call it, "golden bell." The fourth road turns sharply to the right a few hundred feet beyond the bridge. This, too, winds along the Batsto River, but soon turns and re-connects with the main trail. Some years ago a hunter's shack stood at this spot, but such is the capacity of the Pine Barrens for obliterating the handiwork of man that no trace of it remains. Aside from the bridge itself, the sole evidence of civilization in Quaker Bridge today is a concrete surveyor's monument.
I think these clues might be able to help us find the house across from the tavern, and then the tavern site itself.
Barry
