Sayreville Pumping Station

I first noticed this small complex of brick buildings while running errands for work. I noticed a sign that said "Old Water Works Road". I wondered if the road's namesake was still around. Sure enough it was, and the buildings appeared to be in really bad shape. I soon returned to find out what was left of the facility.

It turns out all the old pumping equipment was removed some time ago. Both of the larger buildings were just brick shells being used to store mulch and woodchips.

The facility used to be fed by its own railroad spur, which still streches from the pumping station to the main freight line nearby.

The buildings and wells all had this terra cotta cartouche of the town seal somewhere on their facades.

The old iron removal plant had the most interesting design. The inside had a pressed tin ceiling, but the interior had little resemblance to its former function.

I was disappointed that there wasn't more left behind, but it was still cool to find a small piece of history hidden off the main road. Since the buildings are so badly deteriorated I'm sure they will be demolished at some point. I just hope the building materials are salvaged, as the brick and glazed terra cotta were probably manufactured at the nearby S&F Brickyards which makes them especially significant to the town of Sayreville.

St. Marks Church

Rahway's St Mark's parish was founded in 1871. Their church was constructed in 1885 in the period appropriate Carpenter Gothic style. Few Roman Catholic churches from this time period survived as long as St Mark's had, as many sanctuaries were rebuilt or lost to fire. The congregation at this time was mostly German immigrants.

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Despite the long run, the parish had an uneventful history. At some point the structure was heavily modernized. Most of the building's original charm was lost during this process. The St. Marks parish merged with the nearby St. Marys Parish in 2010. St Marys was a larger, more wealthy congregation. St Marks was operating with a $70,000 deficit. At the same time the St. Mary's parish had a $20,000 surplus. The merger did not go smoothly though, as many from the St. Mark's parish felt their wishes were not being catered to. Services were slowly and quietly phased out at the aging sanctuary.

Demolition started in the spring of 2018 when the stained glass windows were removed. A small portion of the building itself had been demolished when work suddently stalled. However it only lasted long enough for myself and a few other to be able to document the sanctuary. Demolition was completed in 2019.

St. Lucy's Church

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The St Lucy's Parish was an Irish parish formed in Jersey City in 1884. However, it wasn't until 1895 that their iconic sanctuary was completed. The beautiful new building was designed in the Romanesque Revival style by local architect Jeremiah O' Rourke. O'Rourke was best known for designing Roman Catholic churches, most notably the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart in Newark.

The relatively poor parish got a strong start, but in the 1920s a large chunk of homes were demolished in order to build the Holland Tunnel. A large percentage of those displaced by the construction were parishioners of St Lucy's. By this time Roman Catholicism had spread throughout the country, and as a result the city was peppered with other large Catholic churches. The now- diminished St. Lucy's parish no longer needed such a large worship space.

In 1930, a statue of St. Jude was moved outisde the church building and a Perpetual Novena to St Jude was started. A "perpetual novena" is an anual 9 day prayer event intended to go on forever. This drew catholic pilgrims from all over the region. Many came from New York City, through the Holland Tunnel which had opened a few years prior.

At some point the inside of the building was almost entirely painted white. This was likely the result of roman catholic leadership wanting to dress down some of their more impoverished parishes churches all across rhe country. Many more wealthy parishes could afford to keep their worship sites looking palacial, but not all were so lucky.

By 1986 the church campus was closed. The school building was converted into a homeless shelter, and the statue of St Jude and the associated novena were moved to St. Michaels Church in Newark (also designed by Jeremiah O'Rourke). The closure did not sit lightly with the St Lucy's parishioners. Services were held outside the the building in protest. However the archdiocese of Newark upheld the closure, and the doors of the structure were closed for good.

As the decades passed the building deteriorated heavily. Holes began to appear in the roof, windows were broken and boarded up, and the property became a magnet for garbage and drug paraphenalia. I visited the building for the first time in 2017 and the structure was already in a severe state of decay. Preservation New Jersey named the cluster of buildings to its 10 Most Historic Endangered Places in 2018. Shortly afterwards plans came foward for a 20 story glass tower on the St Lucy's property. The church building is supposed to be incorporated into the new development, but the plans are being opposed vehemently by many locals. Even if it is incorporated I'm sure it will be gutted beforehand. Im glad I was able to document the structure before anything else happens to it.

The Morton Street School

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The earliest mention I found of a school on Morton Street is on a map from 1873.  It shows the parcel occupied by the "13th Ward Public School". Within the next decade the name would be changed to Morton Street School, in keeping with the Newark tradition of naming school buildings for the streets they sit on.

By 1898 the Morton Street School had undergone a major rebuild. A large new section was added to the rear of the existing school, on parcels that formerly held houses.

Ten years later, the original building was demolished and a large, state of the art addition designed by Ernest Guilbert replaced it. The new construction, carried out by the E.M. Waldron Company, seamlessly matched the 1898 structure. The new space included a handful of luxuries. The building was so extravagant that several newspapers ran articles about it. The nearly 65,000 square foot addition included  an incredibly ornate 750 seat auditorium, a gymnasium, 35 classrooms and a large playground on the roof.

The $240,000 addition also included 2 kindergarden rooms, each with a stained glass window.

The stained glass tray ceiling over the auditorium was a true work of art. The gigantic display covered three quarers of the room.

One August night in 1912 the school roof was open to the public so everyone could enjoy the facilities. A concert was held, as well as athletic contests for guests to participate in. It was such a success that the school was once again in the news.

Anyone familiar with Newark knows how critical the Central Ward of the city was during the rebellion of 1968. The Morton Street School stood right in the middle of one of the hardest hit areas of the event. During the unrest a man named Junius Williams stood outside the Morton School alongside another man named Eulis "Honey" Ward. Mr. Ward was a democratic leader in the central district, and Mr. Williams was a young civil rights advocate. The two men watched as looters ran through decimated storefronts along Springfield Avenue as the unrest was unfolding. Mr. Williams would go on to become one of the most well known witnesses to the rebellion. His writings tell of the true causes of the uprising, which were often obscured by racist interpretations and speculation in the decades that followed. At the time this article was published, Mr. Williams was serving as the head of the Newark Historic Preservation Commission.

A century after being completed, the Morton Street School was closed by the district. At first the building was maintained and used for storage by the school district. However, after repeated break ins and storm damage, the school was quickly being destroyed. A 2013 assesment by the school district deemed the school to be in very poor condition.

Unfortunately in 2017 some local fame-hungry instagram accounts posted photos of the school, drawing hundreds of similar brainless fools to the building. With that came more local foot traffic, including grafitti artists and assorted vandals. A 2018 appraisal report recommends demolishing the school, and since it's already in such bad shape I can't imagine anything else happening to the building.