curator

Fowler, David J. (David Joseph)

curator

Perrone, Fernanda.

project manager

Radick, Caryn.

metadata contact

De Fino, Melissa.

Exhibition case

Forms part of

Why Not Own Your Own Home?

That was the question posed by a promotional pamphlet published in 1891 by the Central Railroad of New Jersey. A similar pamphlet advertised Homes on the Central Railroad for New York Business Men. In so doing they tapped into the American dream of home ownership by the burgeoning middle class. One travel writer noted in 1874 that “No such overflow of population has ever been witnessed before, and the past is but the index finger, showing what is to come.” Promotional pamphlets invariably included advertisements by land improvement companies that were affiliated with railroads, and sometimes even included actual designs for suburban cottages. Rapid transit made the commute feasible between urban workplaces and suburban dwellings. In 1904, the Central Railroad transported 3,150,000 passengers in the Jersey City and Newark district alone. The importance of railroads as “lifelines” in the suburbanization of rural communities such as Bergenfield “can hardly be overstated.” A significant part of people’s workday was spent at suburban depots or urban terminals waiting for trains, as well as on the commute itself. Timetables regulated not only trains, but people’s lives. In 1873, a promotional publication commented upon the change wrought in the countryside: “In every direction, within an hour of New York, we find the same signs of growth …; the old farm look has all disappeared, houses have risen like magic, mere settlements have grown to be villages, villages to be towns, and towns to be cities.”

Exhibition caption

“Passengers’ Waiting Room of the Pennsylvania Railroad Depot, Jersey City,” circa 1876. From: Frank Leslie’s Historical Register of the United States Centennial Exposition, 1876 (New York, 1877), p. 92.