USA > New Jersey > Passaic County > Preakness and the Preakness Reformed Church : a history 1695-1902 : with genealogical notes, the records of the church and tombstone inscriptions > Part 11
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In 1738, this Church at Pompton had a membership of seventy- two. "Whether at that time worship continued, and a distinct organization existed at the Ponds, is not known. If not, its dis- continuance was brief. This movement did not give satisfaction to the people living around the Ponds, and especially on the side towards Wyckoff." (Van Benschoten.) The people of Ponds attended the Union Church two or three years, when they deter- mined to have a sanctuary again of their own, near the old site. The present site, after some deliberation and changing of plans, was at last selected, and a stone church, hexagonal in form, roof of the same shape, gallery across one end, seats around the walls, and
III
AND PREAKNESS REFORMED CHURCH.
the centre occupied with chairs, with the names of the occupants upon the backs, was built. The new Ponds church was erected be- tween 1740 and 1748, "and for the times, was a first-class structure, far superior to the one at Pompton, and showing both ability and interest on the part of the people." (Van Benschoten.)
In 1748, on account of certain irregularities, Van Driessen's labors closed in this field, with his being silenced as a minister, and we know little more of him. It is uncertain whether he ever preached in the new Ponds church.
The Rev. David Marinus followed Van Driessen in 1752 as pastor at Acqauckanonk and Pompton; while in 1756, when the First Totowa Church was organized, all three Churches made out a new joint call for him. He was pastor of the First Totowa Church only about six years, when his labors closed also at Pompton (near the Steel Works) ; but he continued as pastor at Acquackanonk, as well as at Pompton Plains, in a new church, which the Coetus party built there for him, and where he preached, until he removed to Kakiat, now West New Hempstead. Marinus lived in his own house at Totowa, owning a farm there between the Falls and Ham- burg Avenue, and was a person of considerable ability. His labors likewise were fairly successful. Already some of the people of Preakness, who had been going especially to Acquackanonk, began to attend at Totowa.
The reason Marinus stopped preaching at the Pompton Steel Works, and had a new church built for him at Pompton Plains, was as follows :
Owing to the strong desire on the part of many of the Ameri- can Churches to have young men ordained to the ministry in this country, instead of in Holland, as had been the custom in years past, there gradually grew up a division in the Reformed Church, and the sides took the names of the Coetus and Conferentie parties. The Coetus party were the progressionists, and wanted ordinations performed in America. The Conferentie party adhered to the old way; and the feeling at one time ran high. This region, of course, felt the agitation, as other parts of the country did, and there was general division and embitterment, not only in Churches and con- gregations, but among neighbors, and between members of the same families. In 1762, the Coetus party of Pompton, Preakness, and the surrounding country, which was all the time increasing, with- drew from, or were put out of, the Pompton church, and built, as we have stated, a church for themselves on the Plains, near probably
II2
HISTORY OF PREAKNESS
where the people had formerly worshipped, which church stood for nine or ten years only, and in which Domine Marinus was the only minister. This church was located about where the present church on the Plains stands, and where the new one, as it was afterwards, was erected in 1771. The present church on the Plains was built in 1871, after the old structure had stood one hundred years. Do- mine Marinus, while preaching at Pompton Plains, continued to live at Totowa, (although he had changed farms), as he also served the Acquackanonk Church, until 1773. All of his name in this vicinity are his descendants. Mrs. Richard Henry Ackerman, of Upper Preakness, whose maiden name was Hester Marinus, is the domine's great-great granddaughter.
In 1762 also, when the Coetus party in this neighborhood with- drew, or were driven out of, the church at Pompton, a call was made by those known as the Conferentie party in the Churches of Totowa, Fairfield, and Boonton or Montville, on the Rev. Cornelius Blauw, who, during his pastorate, lived at the Two Bridges, in the old Reformed Church parsonage there, which stood on the left bank of the Pompton River, between the Two Bridges and Mountain View, on the very spot where the house occupied by the late James Monroe Demarest (b. 1817) stands, and where his widow, and son and family still live (1902). The front door knocker, some of the window casings, sawed off a little, and the red sandstone blocks in the south wall of the Demarest house were appropriated from the old parsonage, which was taken down in 1850. The principal part of the old house, except the front, which was of red sandstone, was built of rough fieldstone, all the stonework being laid up in clay. The structure was a story and a half high, about thirty-six feet long, by twenty wide, and fronted south. There were four rooms in it, besides the cellar kitchen, which was very large, in which Domine Blauw lived and studied, and in which his wife died. The house was never finished during Blauw's pastorate, but was finished later, probably in 1776, for Rev. Hermanns Meyer, after- wards Dr. Meyer, who came to labor at Totowa, Fairfield, and Pompton, or Pompton Plains, in 1722. Dr. Meyer, for the most of his pastorate, occupied the whole house. In addition to the cellar kitchen, there was a room on each floor each side of the twelve-foot- wide hall, both up and down stairs, which, on the lower floor, had double doors, one above the other at both the north and south ends. There were four windows in front, on the first floor, two on either side of the front door, with arched brickwork over them, and four
II3
AND PREAKNESS REFORMED CHURCH.
dormer windows on the second floor. The west room on the second floor was Domine Meyer's study, and was finished off with boards, There were two windows only on the north side of the house down- stairs, and none on the second floor. A piazza was put on this side when Mr. Demarest's grandfather owned the property. The two, and only two, ministers who lived in this parsonage were Revs. C .. Blauw and H. Meyer, afterwards D. D.,-the former from 1762-8, and the latter from 1772-91, in which latter year he died. When the house was taken down in 1850, it was supposed to be 100 years old. On an old board in the stairway, on the first landing, were the figures 1776, written on it with red chalk, accompanied by the words, "John Vreeland, his handwriting, written by the light of the candle, daddy and Hendrick Van Houten standing by." (On authority of the late James M. Demarest.) This stairway was supposed to have been put up when the house was finished for Domine Meyer. Dr. Meyer, it is said, married a great many couples in this historic house, in the wide and roomy front hall downstairs. After Domine Meyer's time, the property was sold to Abram Ryerson, Mr. Demarest's grandfather. All the old iron work in the house, including the nails, was blacksmith work. The farm in connection with it, consisting of about fifty acres, was taken off of an adjoining farm owned by a Mr. Jacobus. Domine Meyer bought eleven acres more while he lived there. Mr. Demarest's father, John M. Demarest, once a member of this Church, as his son and daughter-in-law were, built the house, in 1850, that stands on the spot now. He for some years had a private or select school there. One of his pupils, who finished her schooling in that school, was Mrs. Henry Vail, of Preakness, formerly Leah Ellen Budd, then of that neighborhood. Mr. Demarest before this had taught the District School in Lower Preakness, and was considered a superior teacher. Many yet living in Preakness and elsewhere unanimously bear this testimony.
Domine Blauw, while living at Two Bridges, kept no horse (he seems to have been very poor), and the people of his different congregations took him back and forth to his various duties. Nat- urally, being so near to the church at the Steel Works, which was known as a Conferentie Church, the people there, or in that con- gregation, looked to him for the services they needed. Blauw therefore likewise served this Church with all his other charges, for the time that he lived at the Two Bridges, which was for five years or more, until he removed to Hackensack ; after which, Pomp-
II4
HISTORY OF PREAKNESS
ton, as it was then, or the Steel Works congregation, never had another pastor. The Church is these days known as Pompton was built and organized almost forty-five years later, in 1813-15.
About this time, or soon after, the parties into which the Re- formed Church as a denomination was divided, came together,- .the matter of ministerial ordination in America being settled, the Coetus party gaining the day ; and there was a general burying of the hatchet, which, on every hand, was certainly a very great cause for rejoicing. The favorable thing which concerned the inhabi- tants of this section in this regard was the coming together again of the two congregations at Pompton and Pompton Plains, or the Coetus Church on the one hand, and the Conferentie Church on the other, both of which really were styled the Church of Pompton. On this union, the Pompton Church at the Steel Works, to which many Preakness people went, after standing about thirty-five years, in 1771, was abandoned; while the one on the Plains, in which Marinus preached, was sold for other purposes and removed, and a new structure, of proper size, for the accommodation of both con- gregations, was built on the Plains, on the present site, on land already deeded to the Consistory, in 1767-70, by Colonel Theunis Dey, of Preakness. This location was chosen in preference to the old one at the Steel Works, for one reason because the Ponds people for whom that in part had been built, were no longer with the Pompton, or Pompton Plains, people, and for another, because the original preaching station had been on the west side and not on the east side of the river. While this arrangement suited most of the families in Pompton and Pompton Plains, it could hardly have suited those living in Preakness quite as well as if the new church had been erected on this side of the river.
Ponds, in 1748, after the building of their new church, united with Paramus, and called the Rev. Benjamin Van der Linde. Do- mine Van der Linde was a man of learning and ability, very large and commanding in appearance, and exceedingly particular in his dress. He married a Miss Schuyler, of Pompton. His labors were immense, embracing a territory of fourteen by twenty square miles. He was born in 1717 or 1719 at Pollifly, near Hackensack, N. J., where his grandfather settled as early as 1686, studied under Dor- sius and Goetschius, and was licensed by the Coetus convened in New York City April 26, 1748. He preached at Paramus and Ponds for over forty years, and for the last five years of his life also at Saddle River. He died July 8, 1789, seventy years of age.
II5
AND PREAKNESS REFORMED CHURCH.
Ponds had his ministrations only every fifth Sunday, and paid $125 of his $300 salary. But the Paramus people furnished him also with firewood, the use of forty-five acres of land, and a parsonage. He preached but once a Sunday, and devoted his afternoons to catechetical instruction. (Van Benschoten.)
Of course, the preaching in those days, and yet for some time, was all in Dutch, and Van der Linde preached in Dutch. English was not very much spoken as early as that among the Hollanders in these parts. Some of the Preakness people, who attended the Ponds Church in Domine Van der Linde's time, and before that, were the Berdan and Van Riper families on Berdan Avenue, which highway, extending across the mountain, was one of the earliest roads laid out in this region.
In 1772, as we have noted, the three Churches of Totowa, Fair- field, and Pompton (Pompton Plains), called the Rev. Hermanns Meyer, afterwards (1789) Doctor of Divinity, who served all three Churches until 1785, although it seems that in 1779 and 1780, one Matthew Leydt, or Light, who preached then at Belleville, also preached at Fairfield, doing so no doubt for Mr. Meyer's relief. In 1785, Domine Meyer gave up his labors altogether at Fairfield, and continued to serve only the Churches of Totowa and Pompton (Pompton Plains), until his death in 1791. At his death, he was widely lamented, and was buried under the pulpit of the Pompton Plains Church. He was a man of learning and ability, and for the last few years of his life, was a professor in the Theological Seminary of the Reformed Church.
In 1789, Petrus Leydt, or Light, brother of Matthew Leydt, and a student of Dr. Meyer's, was ordained and installed over the Churches of Penne or Ponds, Kekiet, or West New Hempstead, and Ramapo. Leydt's pastorate lasted until 1793, about four years. His ministry, though short, was much blessed. He died in 1796, of consumption. The Leydt brothers were sons of the Rev. Johannes Leydt, of New Brunswick and Six-Mile-Run, or Frank- lin Park. The family is now extinct.
The same year in which Rev. Petrus Leydt, on account of his health, had to give up his duties, i. e., in 1793, the Rev. Stephen Ostrander was called to the pastorate of the Churches of Pompton (Pompton Plains) and Parsippany (Montville), where he re- mained, living at Pompton Plains, until 1809. The Ponds Church, after Leydt's ministry closed, was vacant until 1798, when the Rev. Peter De Witt was called to the pastorate of that Church
I16
HISTORY OF PREAKNESS
in connection with the preaching station of the same Church at Wyckoff. Wyckoff was not organized as a Church until 1822; but a preaching station of the Ponds Church, as one had originally been at Pompton Plains, was started there in 1798, as soon as De Witt came in the neighborhood. This brings us down to the year in which the old Church of Preakness was built. De Witt, who sup- plied here at Preakness some, remained the pastor at Ponds until he died in 1809.
Totowa, after Dr. Meyer's death, did not have another pastor until 1799, a vacancy of eight years occurring, when the Rev. H. Schoonmaker was settled over that Church in connection with Ac- quackanonk. Schoonmaker remained in his charge until 1816. Fairfield was without regular preaching, so far as we can learn, from 1785, when Domine Myer dropped it, until 1801, when for another sixteen years, it was supplied only by the Rev. John Dur- yee, who likewise, for a little while, supplied Preakness.
117
AND PREAKNESS REFORMED CHURCH.
CHAPTER V.
THE OLD CHURCH, AND THE EARLIEST PREACHERS IN IT.
We have now, in a cursory way, gone over all the preliminary history of this Church, or the religious history of the neighborhood and vicinity. We have confined ourselves to as brief notices as possible of the various changes, simply to give an idea,-and a bare outline idea,-of the growth and relations of the community out of which the Church in this place at last sprung. We do not know of any preaching station in Preakness before 1798, although it is probable that preaching was enjoyed here in schoolhouses and in private dwellings previous to that date. The oldest schoolhouse that we can learn anything about in this region stood, it is said, ir Upper Preakness, above the Roat farms of this day, and beyond where the Andrew Conklin house is now, on an old road, at present (1899) unused, extending from the public highway,-the old Pater- son and Hamburg Turnpike, near the eastern entrance to the Sam- uel Briggs place on the hill,-to the old Dirk Van Riper place. A new road has since been put through here, not quite on the same course, passing the Van Riper, or George Roat farm house as it is now, and coming out on Berdan avenue north of the A. P. Hopper residence. Mrs. Andrew H. Van Riper, however, says that this schoolhouse was further up towards Pompton, not far from the main road, in the meadow, almost opposite the said Samuel Briggs house, near an old well by the roadside, which is still in use. Pos- sibly a schoolhouse at different times stood on both these spots, being moved from one to the other,-from the former to the latter place, as we believe. Said schoolhouse, or schoolhouses, on either or both sites, as may have been the case, therefore, one after the other, was or were, older than the old Preakness Church; and there may easily have been preaching in it, or in both of them, after the Pompton Steel Works Church was no more.
There may have been preaching, too, and this is very probable, in some schoolhouse in Lower Preakness, as it was customary in olden times to use schoolhouses for preaching services on the Sab- bath, as well as sometimes on weekday evenings. The oldest school- house in Lower Preakness that we can get any trace of, stood just below the Isaac Van Saun house on the Preakness Race Course
118
HISTORY OF PREAKNESS
property, on the opposite side of the road, somewhere between Peter J. Doremus's private entrance and the bridge. (Mrs. J. R. Ber- dan.) Also, no doubt, private houses likewise were used at times, as it suited for the same purpose.
Nevertheless, the people of Preakness, toward the close of the eighteenth century, began to feel the need of a consecrated building in their midst in which to hold religious worship. We do not ques- tion but that for years the spot had been marked, and in a general way the location had been selected where the people of the Valley, both of the Upper and Lower portions, desired their House of God to stand. The site eventually chosen (or available) was, and still is, a commanding one, near the centre of the valley, at the southern end of the Upper Preakness plateau, or gravel flat, from which you can see and be seen from almost all parts of the Valley, north, south, east, or west,-a spot, moreover, which was as accessible to all the old Dutch inhabitants, (and they were nearly all Dutch in those days), as any it may be, that could have been set upon.
Church Lane, as we call it, used to begin near the foot of the hill below the church and ran north. It was a continuation of the road from Totowa, across the brook, and past the front of the house of the late John S. Hinchman, through and across the lots west, and over the hill back of the parsonage barn, coming out at the corner of Charles H. Tintle's field, by the bog. Another road branched off from this at the top of the hill, on the south side of the church, past the present row of horse sheds, in the direction of what we call the John Campbell place ; and there was a branch from this somewhere to the Vail place, and over the hill, called the Saw Mill road, to the saw mill in the valley on the other side, where the Yan place is, and which was afterwards extended to the Black Oak Ridge road. This road from the church for a long time was pri- vate, and was obstructed by several sets of bars, which, later, for greater convenience, were made to give way to gates. Back of the parsonage barn, a road also branched off from the Totowa road, on the line between what are now the Post and Walder properties, run . ning due south through where the parsonage barn and parsonage stand, to Lower Preakness. There was no road then where the present road is from the parsonage to the foot of Church Hill, and none from the corner in this road to the entrance of the John Campbell place.
We have no record of the movement which started the building of the old church, except the copy of an old subscription list, which
119
AND PREAKNESS REFORMED CHURCH.
said copy bears the date of 1805, together with a longer list without date,-from which evidently the other was taken,-and both of them, as far as the names and amounts subscribed go, appear to be in the same handwriting. Of course, these give some light, though very meagre and unsatisfactory.
Probably the movement of the choice of location, as well as of the building of the church edifice itself, took shape only by degrees, and without any particularly organized effort other than the general desire which led to natural cooperation. In common also with a number of churches in early times, in this part of the country, the congregation and house of worship were here in Preakness before there was any separate religious organization, or the congregation owned any land for their place of worship to stand on. The copy of the old subscription list here referred to is in pounds, shillings, and pence, and is as follows :
"A true copy taken from the subscription list for the purpose of building a church."
£
S
d
Saml V. Saur
10
Cor. Kip
10
Isaac V. Saun
10
Phi. Dey
6
Christaan Shurte
5
James Westervelt
4
Cornelius Kint
3
Jacob Doremus
3
Peter T. Doremus.
2
Abr. Ryerson
2
Garret V. Riper
8
John Hopper
1
4
Henry Mead
16
Roelif Doremus
1
4
Aughty Doremus
1
10
Henry Kip
1
4
Rich'd Kip, Jr
8
David Dey.
10
Sophia V. Houten
2
Philip Doyle
16
Rich'd. Dey
10
Nich's. Kip
3
Cornelius Doremus
16
£88
6
0
Rulif gecobes
1
4
10
£89
10
10
-
The last name evidently was written by the subscriber himself. All the other names are in the same handwriting.
On the back of this paper, along with the accompanying cal- culations, is this endorsement :
I20
HISTORY OF PREAKNESS
"On the 10 day of December 1805 Cornelius Kip Produced his accounts and vouchers Respecting the Collection of his District. I find that he has by his Vouchers paid the sum of therty seven Pound 10/2 in cash, twenty seven Pound 11/7 in credit to him turned in and Twenty five 3/5 un Collected. I find a ballance in his favour the sum of 14/4.
"JOHN VAN WINKLE."
The calculations below are in our own way of putting them :
£
S
d
Cash
37
10
2
Less amt overpaid
14
4
36
15
10
Credits
27
11
7
Uncollected
25
3
5
. .
-
89
10
10
On this paper, it will be seen are twenty-four names, and, so far as we can judge, all of them being of people who lived in Lower Preakness, where also Cornelius Kip lived, who is said to have "pro- duced his accounts and vouchers Respecting the Collection of his District."
The second paper, from which, without question, as we believe, the former names, except those of Sophia Van Houten and Rulif gecobes, were taken, has, with these, and the amounts specified, just as they are, a great many more names and amounts, together with additional subscriptions, more or less for all, in materials, as well as in money. We cannot account for Sophia Van Houten's name being on one paper and not on the other. But Rulif gecobes's name plainly was written by himself on the first paper after the copy of it was made. The names of people who lived in all parts of the territory covered by the congregation in those days are un- questionably found on this second paper, while the amounts con- tributed certainly indicate a very high average of financial standing, not to say great liberality and willingness.
On the first paper, which contains twenty-four names, the aggregate amount or total in money is observed to be about $225, an average of almost $10 per subscriber, $125 of it being given by five persons, who each contributed £10 or $25 (reckoning $2.50 to the £), and this, as we have intimated, too, in addition to what was afterwards given in materials. When, however, we take into ac- count the purchasing power of money in those days, and its com-
I21
AND PREAKNESS REFORMED CHURCH.
parative scarcity, along with the greater difficulty of securing or earning it, it is really a marvel that so much could be contributed for the purpose for which it was given, in a rural district, such as Preakness is and always has been. No wonder the old Preakness church was built without any at least organized aid from outside, or from any Church Board or Fund.
The other paper to which allusion has been made, as we have said, is without date. The amounts also are in pounds, shillings, and pence. We will not give the paper in its entirety, as it is quite elaborate, but we will furnish simply the names, the amounts sub- scribed in money, and the aggregate amounts, that is, money and materials together, when contributions of both kinds were made.
The paper then is as follows :
Names.
Money subscriptions.
Total money and materials together.
Phi. Dey
6
0
0
. .
. .
Rulif V. Houten
3
0
0
3
. .
. .
Jacob B. Doremus
5
0
0
5
. .
. .
Michael Doremus
3
0
0
3
Henry J. Spear
2
0
0
. .
1
12
0
1
12
. .
Jacob Van Riper
4
0
0
4
. .
. .
Corn's Veeder
2
0
0
1
..
. .
Corn's Kint
3
0
0
3
14
6
Henry Mclean
1
0
0
. .
10
10
Corn's Hennion
3
0
0
1
4
5
Jacob Doremus
3
0
0
3
0
0
Peter T. Doremus
2
0
0
2
. .
. .
A. Ryerson
2
0
0
2
0
Garret V. Riper
. .
8
0
8
..
John Hopper
1
4
0
1
4
. .
Henry Mead
16
0
16
..
Corn's Doremus
16
0
16
. .
Rulif Doremus
1
4
0
1
4
..
Aughty Doremes
1
10
0
1
10
. .
Henry Kip
1
4
0
1
4
..
Phi. Doyle
10
0
0
10
0
0
John V. Riper
6
0
0
6
12
9
Adr'n V. Houten
1
0
0
.
. .
Garret V. Riper
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