On This Day in New Jersey History

The history of the Garden State is filled with well-known events and forgotten happenings. German Americans opened the nation's first kindergarten in Hoboken on February 11, 1861. Prohibition brought more than two hundred bootleggers together in Sea Bright on August 15, 1924, to discuss a fixed price on their product. As America fought World War I and desperately needed ammunition, the T.A. Gillespie Shell plant exploded in Sayreville on October 4, 1918, killing at least one hundred people. From military feats and shady politics to the extraordinary episodes in the lives of everyday people, explore an entire year of events from New Jersey's history. Local historians Joseph Bilby, James Madden and Harry Ziegler chronicle the state's most intriguing and monumental moments—one for each date on the calendar.

Joseph Bilby served as lieutenant in the First Infantry Division in Vietnam and is the author/editor of more than three hundred articles and fourteen books on New Jersey and military history. He is a trustee of the New Jersey Civil War Heritage Association, publications editor for its 150th Anniversary Committee and assistant curator of the National Guard Militia Museum of New Jersey. Harry Ziegler worked for many years at the Asbury Park Press, New Jersey’s second-largest newspaper, rising from reporter to bureau chief, editor and managing editor of the paper. He is currently associate principal of Bishop George Ahr High School in Edison, New Jersey, and has coauthored several books on New Jersey history.