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Bergen Square

Colonial forts in New JerseyGeography of Bergen County, New JerseyHistory of Jersey City, New JerseyNeighborhoods in Jersey City, New JerseyNew Netherland
Populated places established in the 17th centuryPre-statehood history of New JerseySquares in Jersey City, New JerseyStreets in Hudson County, New JerseyTourist attractions in Jersey City, New JerseyUse American English from November 2017Use mdy dates from November 2017
Bergen Sq JC jeh
Bergen Sq JC jeh

Bergen Square, at the intersection of Bergen Avenue and Academy Street in Jersey City, is in the southwestern part of the much larger Journal Square district. A commercial residential area, it contains an eclectic array of architectural styles including 19th-century row houses, Art Deco retail and office buildings, and is the site of the longest continually-used school site in the United States. Nearby are the Van Wagenen House (sometimes called the Apple Tree House) and Old Bergen Church, two structures from the colonial period. St. George & St. Shenouda Coptic Orthodox Church founded by early Egyptian immigrants was one of the original Coptic congregations in New Jersey.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Bergen Square (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Bergen Square
Bergen Avenue, Jersey City

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Geographical coordinates (GPS)

Latitude Longitude
N 40.72942 ° E -74.06594 °
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Address

Bergen Avenue at Academy Street

Bergen Avenue
07306 Jersey City
New Jersey, United States
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Bergen Sq JC jeh
Bergen Sq JC jeh
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Bergen Section, Jersey City
Bergen Section, Jersey City

The Bergen Section of Jersey City, New Jersey is the neighborhood on either side of Kennedy Boulevard between Saint Peter's College/ McGinley Square and Communipaw Avenue in the Bergen-Lafayette section of the city. The name Bergen, used throughout Hudson County, is taken from the original Bergen, New Netherland settlement at Bergen Square. While there was discussion of building a county long road as early as the 1870s, the Boulevard was officially opened in 1896. In the early automobile age it became part of the route of the Lincoln Highway and one of the busiest roads in the state. Bergen Avenue is a major north-south thoroughfare in the city running south from Journal Square along the ridge of the diminishing Hudson Palisades known as Bergen Hill. Monticello Avenue, which takes its name from mid 19th "suburban" development, is a shopping district lined with many turn-of-the-century buildings with storefronts being brought back into use. As its name suggests West Bergen overlaps this neighborhood. The section retains much of the character that at one time made it the premiere 20th century residential district of the city. A variety of architectural styles can be found along the Boulevard, Bergen Avenue, and sidestreets including 19th-century rowhouses, Victorian and Edwardian mansions. Many of the multi-family buildings are pre-war, built during the period of expansive growth in the 1920s and 1930s, sometimes Art Deco style. including The Hague, residence of one of the city's best-known mayor, Frank Hague. Among the many landmarks in the area are the Fairmount Apartments, Temple Beth-El, and the former Jersey City YMCA. Lincoln the Mystic, a statue of a seated Abraham Lincoln by James Earle Fraser is situated at the entrance to the park which bears the president's name. and is one of the Hudson County's largest public green spaces.

Speer Cemetery

Speer Cemetery is located at 145 Vroom St in the Bergen Square neighborhood of Jersey City, New Jersey, between Bergen Ave. and Van Reypen St. Speer Cemetery is frequently confused with the present day Bergen Cemetery owned and operated by Old Bergen Church, a portion of which also fronts on Vroom St but is further east, at Tuers Ave. The two cemeteries always operated independently of each other. The land Speer Cemetery sits on was originally part of apple orchards owned by the Van Waganen family of Apple Tree House fame. After title to the property was transferred from the Van Waganens to Matthias DeMott, it became the Bergen DeMott's family burial ground. The Bergen DeMotts were early settlers to New Netherland first in Esopus(present day Kingston, NY) and later, Long Island, NY before later generations, including Mathias, settled in Bergen, New Netherland(present day Bergen Square, Jersey City) in the 1770s.Speer cemetery is named for Jane Speer and her husband, Abraham Speer, the local undertaker and former sexton of Old Bergen Church during the mid-1800's. They bought the land from the De Mott estate in 1857 and made it a public cemetery, selling burial plots for $16 each. Despite Mr. Speers' affiliation with Old Bergen Church, one did not have to be affiliated with any church or religion to be buried in Speer Cemetery. Speer Cemetery was abandoned in the early 1900s and the Speer family records have never been published. The cemetery has been maintained by volunteers for over ninety years. The volunteers' motto is, "Caring For The Forgotten". Cataloging of names from headstones and historical records, including individual deeds and burial records collected by neighbors and volunteers, make it possible to now verify many who are buried in the cemetery. Additionally, underground sonar was conducted to locate unmarked graves. Contact the Bergen Square Historical Society via their Facebook page for more information. In addition to hundreds of non-denominational interments, Speer Cemetery is the final resting place for dozens of patients of Snake Hill(Laurel Hill) Sanitarium. They were interred in one of the two large Speer catacombs during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It's rumored that DeMott family members are interred in the second catacomb, though many DeMott headstones are above ground. The earliest surviving gravemarker in the cemetery is dated 1756. Headstones indicate the burial of the veterans of the American Revolutionary War, War of 1812, American Civil War, and the Spanish–American War. Its last interments occurred during World War I. Plans to construct a building on a lot adjacent to the remaining cemetery grounds have been met with opposition, since it is believed that the land being developed was once part of the burial ground and contains human remains, possibly dating back to the 1660s; the developer has been ordered to hire an archeologist to validate that belief.