Following in Clara Barton’s Footsteps

Over the past couple of years Hunter Research has been privileged to undertake archaeological work at two locations associated with esteemed humanitarian, nurse and educator Clara Barton, founder of the American Red Cross.

First, close to our Trenton home, working for the Bordentown Historical Society, we have investigated the Clara Barton Schoolhouse. This is where Barton, early in her storied career, opened and successfully operated the first free public school in New Jersey in 1852-53. Shortly thereafter, with enrolments rising and a new school building planned, the school board rudely replaced Barton with a male principal on the grounds that the position as head of such a large institution was unbefitting for a woman. The first schoolhouse still stands today, a charming one-and-a-half-story brick building, which for much of its existence has served as a residence. Our excavations exposed the remains of a rear kitchen addition and recovered artifacts from the period when the schoolhouse was home to two notable African-American families. Abraham Crippen, a prominent pastor in the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) church, lived there with his family from 1866 until 1872, followed by the family of Civil War veteran Henry Cole who were resident until around 1900.

More recently, in Glen Echo, Maryland, on the outskirts of Washington, DC, we have been part of a consultant team headed by Mills + Schnoering Architects, retained by the National Park Service to develop plans to rehabilitate the Clara Barton National Historic Site. This blufftop property, adjoining the delightful Glen Echo Park, was Barton’s home in her later life, the 38-room residence functioning as the nerve center for her many philanthropic and charitable endeavors. Our archaeological studies have focused on the remains of buildings and other buried features on the grounds associated with Barton’s occupation of the premises from the early 1890s until her death in 1912. The property is also yielding an abundance of Native American artifacts consistent with its ideal setting for camping on the bluffs overlooking the Potomac River.

Success! Ironworks and Academy Listed

Hunter Research is proud to announce the successful listing of two historic properties on the New Jersey and National Registers of Historic Places. 

Working with Connolly & Hickey Historical Architects for the Town of Boonton, Hunter Research detailed the archaeological potential of the Boonton Ironworks Historic District through the use of historic maps, photographs, GIS, and historical and archaeological research.  This site includes the remains of an important, fully integrated ironworks that underwent the conversion from charcoal to coal furnaces in the mid-19th-century. At its peak in the 1860s the ironworks employed over 600 workers and was producing 200,000 kegs of nails a day.  The district also includes elements of the Morris Canal, which supplied charcoal, coal, iron ore and water power to the early ironworks and the Morris & Essex Railroad, which supplied the works with iron and coal later in its history. 

The Mount Pleasant School, also known as the Richwood Academy, was built in 1870 in Harrison Township in Gloucester County. The schoolhouse is an excellent example of a two-story, two-room schoolhouse. It represents a model type of rural and small town school that was popular in New Jersey during the mid- to late 19th century.  The building features two exterior doors that could serve as separate entrances to upstairs and downstairs classrooms and featured minimal ornamentation in a vernacular Greek Revival style.  Of note are two fluted, cast-iron, interior columns that have structural and aesthetic characteristics.

Dead Center

Cemetery, burial ground, graveyard – what is the difference? Each refers to hallowed ground harboring our discarded human shells. As we go about our daily lives, these places of final repose may seem like fixtures in the landscape – pillars of the community that never change. But study any burying ground in depth and you will be struck by how transient such places are, how fleeting the afterlife can be.

In recent years, Hunter Research has specialized in the study of cemeteries – documenting them in their current state; remote-sensing them to delineate their boundaries and pinpoint graves; excavating them to make way for development; and making recommendations as to how best to preserve them for future generations. Yet, the physical fabric of all cemeteries – the memorials above ground and the bodily remains below – inexorably fades and its management is but a tale of short-term maintenance to stave off long-term decay.

Over the past two years, with funding support from the New Jersey Historic Trust, Hunter Research has completed preservation plans for two of downtown Trenton’s most venerable graveyards, both now closed for burying: the First Presbyterian Cemetery on East State Street and the non-sectarian Mercer Cemetery across from the Trenton train station. We have wrestled mightily with the challenge of how to protect and honor these cemeteries in the face of erosion by the weather and pollution, and damage from vandalism and neglect.

The First Presbyterian and Mercer Cemeteries are quite different. The First Presbyterian Cemetery was in use from the late 1720s until around 1900, and today sports roughly 200 grave markers and 16 monuments, although in excess of 500 interments are thought to have been made over the centuries. Many of the grave markers have been moved from their original locations. The Mercer Cemetery was established in the early 1840s, filled up rapidly in the later 19th century and burying continued intermittently into the 1970s. There are close to 3,000 grave markers and monuments and most are in their original locations.

The two preservation plans are founded on a comprehensive documentation exercise, including a conditions assessment of each grave marker and monument, that resulted in the creation of a cemetery-specific geographic information system (CGIS). The ultimate goal of each CGIS is to make the cemetery data accessible online in the form of a geodatabase and an interactive map. Each plan uses the CGIS as a basis for formulating prioritized treatment recommendations for the preservation and maintenance of the cemetery and for deriving rough cost estimates for their repair and restoration. The Mercer Cemetery study also includes a heritage tourism plan which considers the feasibility of incorporating the cemetery into Trenton’s plans for revitalizing the city around its history assets.

Both preservation plans are currently under client and New Jersey Historic Trust review, but will hopefully be accessible on our website within a few months. We acknowledge the considerable assistance of Schnabel Conservation, LLC and Horsley Archaeological Prospection, LLC in our study of the First Presbyterian Cemetery, and of Schnabel Conservation, LLC, Clarke Caton Hintz, Hargrove International, Inc. and Richard F. Veit, Ph.D. in our study of Mercer Cemetery.