Long Pond Ironworks
History
The Long Pond Ironworks Historic District is a National Historic Landmark in nearby Long Pond Ironworks State Park. This 170-acre historic property encompasses early ironworks and the supporting worker’s village dating back to the Revolutionary War. From the wilderness they carved roads, built forges, furnaces, and homes; and created supporting farms. At Long Pond (now Greenwood Lake), they dammed the river to provide waterpower to operate the air blast for a furnace and a large forge.
In 1765, Long Pond Ironworks was founded by German Ironmaster Peter Hasenclever. He imported more than 500 European workers and their families to build ironmaking plantations at Ringwood, Long Pond, and Charlottenburg in New Jersey.
In the 1770s, Robert Erskine was ironmaster at Long Pond and Ringwood. He took up the American cause during the Revolutionary War, supplying iron products to the Continental Army and serving as George Washington’s chief mapmaker.
In 1807, Long Pond Ironworks was bought by Martin J. Ryerson, who owned of the Pompton Ironworks.
In 1853, the Ryerson family sold the properties to the industrialists Peter Cooper, Edward Cooper, and Abram S. Hewitt. The Cooper Hewitt enterprise operated Long Pond Ironworks as part of their larger Trenton Iron Company.
In the 1860s during the Civil War, two new blast furnaces, new waterwheels, and workers’ housing were built at Long Pond. The iron made here was found to be well suited to making guns for the Union Army.
The 1870s brought major changes in the American iron industry, such as the rise of cheap steel manufacturing and the discovery of new coalfields in Pennsylvania, and iron ore in the Midwest.
In 1882, the last fires were blown out at Long Pond, ending more than 120 years of ironmaking history at the site.
After 1882, although iron was no longer made at Long Pond, mining continued as a major industry in the area.
Through the turn of the 20th century, residents of Hewitt, the village that had grown up around the ironworks, adapted to changing times. They built a new school and church between 1895 and 1905 and a new sawmill in 1913. Ice cutting on Greenwood Lake and recreation also became key industries.
By the time of the Great Depression in the 1930s, however, these industries were in decline. Residents of historic Hewitt began to move away, seeking opportunity elsewhere.
In 1957, the Ringwood Company donated the Long Pond Ironworks property to the State of New Jersey.
In 1987, Long Pond Ironworks was dedicated as a State Park administered by the NJ Department of Environmental Protection, Division of Parks and Forestry
