The Making of an Historical Park: Why Morristown?

MNHP dedication button, July 4, 1933.

By all accounts it was Mayor Clyde Potts who advocated earliest and most pointedly for some type of heritage tourism site at Morristown as early as 1930, immediately after the start of the Great Depression. What form or shape that might ultimately take was undetermined. Mayor Potts had as his close associate Lloyd W. Smith, who had recently purchased the bulk of the land known as Jockey Hollow from investor W. Redmond Cross and partners. It was likely Redmond Cross, through mutual acquaintances, who introduced NPS director Horace Albright to Clyde Potts and Lloyd Smith sometime in 1930 or 1931.

Morristown map depicting the location
of the Continental Army Encampment, 
dated June 1929.

Director Albright was interested from the start of his tenue with the NPS in acquiring national historic site for the creation of a new type of park, a National Historical Park. When he was introduced to Potts and Smith, Albright probably could not believe his luck. Potts and Smith presented Albright with what was in essence a ready-made historical park. Potts could provide the land at Fort Nonsense, and Smith could provide land at Jockey Hollow for a new National Historical Park. Albright's new chief historian, Vern Chatelain, was equally enthused by the idea of a historical park in Morristown. 

Close up of label from March 1931
blueprint of the "Proposed
Jockey Hollow Park" 

At some point in 1931, Albright became interested in the Ford mansion being included in the new national park taking shape in Morristown. While the exact sequence of events are not known, Albright likely promoted the idea of the Ford mansion being part of the park to the Washington Association of New Jersey, who owned and operated the mansion as a tourist site since 1874. The Depression, and lagging membership, made the Association receptive to Albright's overtures. By mid 1932, the Ford mansion, Jockey Hollow, and Fort Nonsense, where lined up as the first National Historical Park. Legislation was prepared, and Congress debated the measure in January 1933, sending the final bill to President Hoover for signature.