02020131 – New Jersey

NEW JERSEY

At the southern end of the Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area, Mount Tammany rises above the river, rewarding hikers with sweeping views of forests, cliffs, and the winding Delaware Water Gap. The challenging trail to the summit is one of New Jersey's most popular hikes, especially in autumn when the hillsides glow with brilliant red, orange, and gold foliage. Together, Mount Tammany and the Delaware Water Gap showcase the natural beauty of the Appalachian Mountains and provide an unforgettable destination for outdoor adventure and scenic photography.

Statue of Liberty

Standing proud at the entrance to New York Harbor, the Statue of Liberty is located on Liberty Island in New Jersey. The statue, measuring 151 feet from base to tip, was designed by Frenchman Frederic Auguste Bartholdi, and made in France before being shipped to the U.S.A. in 1885 and assembled on a specially prepared pedestal. Originally named Liberty Enlightening the World, it was given as a gift from France.

Atlantic City

New jersey’s east shore is home to more than 50 resorts, including the oldest summer resort in the country, Cape May. Biggest and most famous of them all, though, is Atlantic City. In the late 19^th century, it became a popular resort, known for salt water taffy. It was the first resort to open a boardwalk, which today, at four miles long, is the longest boardwalk in the world. In 1921, Atlantic City hosted the first Miss America Beauty pageant. In 1976, casino gambling was made legal in Atlantic City and it became the East Coast’s answer to Las Vegas.

Away from the crowded Turnpike and the Garden State Parkway, New Jersey offers far more than the traffic jams and oil refineries of the popular imagination. From north to south and from the shore out to the west, the state is filled with rural areas, small farms, horse country, rolling hills and gentle mountains, pretty historic Revolutionary War era villages and small towns. Almost half of New Jersey is covered in trees; it has miles and miles of gorgeous seashore; it’s a cultural hotbed of diversity and inventiveness; it’s home to one of the world’s most revered universities, Princeton (founded in 1746); and it boasts the most famous U.S. icon of all, the Statue of Liberty. Plus, you can’t look too unfavorably on a state that has made the knobbed whelk its official seashell.

Creative Streak

New Jerseyans like to express themselves and many of them have made a living out of it. Frank Sinatra, Jack Nicholson, Meryl Streep, Dionne Warwick, Bruce Springsteen, Bruce Willis, Whitney Houston, Paul Simon, John Travolta, Danny DeVito, Joe Pesci, Abbott and Costello… the list goes on.

New Jersey played host to the first drive-in movie, the country’s first brewery (opened in Hoboken in 1642), the first successful submarine voyage, and the first organized baseball game. Baseball may not be a New Jersey forted today but New York’s two biggest football teams, the Giants and the Jets, choose to play their games in New Jersey, at the MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford. New Jersey also gave us the Miss America beauty pageant, the phonograph, the movie projector, and the electric lightbulb – the last three from the mind of Thomas Edison, who did most of his work in his laboratory in Menlo Park.

Fertile Land

The Dutch and the Swedes were the first to discover the fertile pleasures of New Jersey before the British took over. Due to its favorable position between the Delaware and Hudson rivers, the Province of New Jersey became a major theater of the Revolutionary War, earning the nickname the Crossroads of the Revolution. It was a price worth fighting for, a fertile agricultural province, and on December 18, 1787 it became the third state of the newly formed Union. It would go on to produce two U.S. presidents, New Jersy native Grover Cleveland and Woodrow Wilson, who was governor of New Jersy prior to his election.

Today the nickname “The Garden State’ may seem somewhat incongruous, though New Jersey is a leading producer of superfoods – cranberries, blueberries, spinach, tomatoes, and asparagus. Most New Jerseyans would rather eschew such posh nosh in favor of a hoagie or a sub (depending on which part of the state you come from).

New Jersey is a predominantly urban culture, with most people living in the suburbs of two major conurbations that spill over from neighboring states: Philadelphia and New York City. Between the two runs the New Jersey turnpike, one of the busiest 122.4 miles of road in the world, immortalized in song by Simon and Garfunkel. In New Jersey, you don’t tell people which town you lived, you tell them the exit at which you get off.