Introduction

History is the witness that testifies to the passing of time; it illuminates reality, vitalizes memory, provides guidance in daily life, and brings us tidings of antiquity.

- Cicero

I make no claim that this book’s portrayal of New Jersey as a “frontier land” is a scholarly presentation of this subject.  It was written rather to be more specific in informing the general public about it.   Because there has been a tendency to skim over New Jersey in the treatment by many historians of the states’ true role in the dramatic period of American history, I wanted to fill this gap.

            To clarify my purpose here I would first have to define a “frontier.”  It refers to any new or previously unexplored region.  New Jersey certainly falls into that category.  This state most assuredly did play a part in Europe’s search for a new route to the Far East by sailing west.  In order to accomplish this goal they encountered the frontier they called a “New World.”  This frontier gradually moved westward as it continued to be part of that unsettled region which bordered upon a settled area.

I understand that it may be difficult today to imagine New Jersey as once part of this frontier.  The fact is that it very much was.  My purpose here is to make that fact very clear.  I will hopefully illustrate to my readers that though most historians give this state little recognition as being a crucial part in this exciting period of America’s history, it does indeed belong there, and deserves to be so noted.  It also continues to be a “frontier land” in this nation’s expanded realm of experiences not only in land, but in knowledge as well.  

            To many Americans the “Frontier” begins with Daniel Boone in Kentucky and moves west from there.  I will attempt in this book to correct that misguided assumption.  New Jersey was indeed once a “frontier land” in the true sense of that term and did have the same type of fur trading, explorers and encounters with a hostile wilderness.  It also continues this role in many other endeavors as well, even today.

            Unit I will explore the background that led to this states’ becoming a part of that age of discovery and exploration as a “new” land.  Unit II will reveal those who first experienced New J