USA > New Jersey > Bergen County > Ridgewood > Ridgewood, Bergen County, New Jersey, past and present > Part 6
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to time, the methods of township government were unsatisfactory and were not suited to these changed conditions and not adapted to the solution of these problems. Prior to the new state constitution of 1875, special charters were granted to cities and many other munici- palities. After that date the Legislature sought by general statute to provide for the government of municipalities.
In 1878 the Legislature provided for the formation, in a township or part of a township, of boroughs not exceeding four square miles each; in 1891 it provided for the organization from a township or part of a township of villages whose population should be at least 300 inhabitants for each square mile. These municipalities were created after an election held to determine whether the territory described in the application should be incorporated as a borough or a village. Orig- inally both the borough and the village remained a part of the town- ship for certain purposes, notably for the election of a county Free- holder. The villages voted with the township in the election of the Collector and the Assessor. A short time prior to the year 1893 ยท boroughs were permitted to include within their limits a portion of one or more townships.
In the last mentioned year the Legislature provided that unless a borough contained a portion of two municipalities, it could not have a Chosen Freeholder. A large number of boroughs were then formed in Bergen County, caching taking a portion of two or more townships in order to have a representative in the Board of Chosen Freeholders.
The boroughs of Midland Park and Glen Rock each had included within their territories a portion of the Township of Ridgewood. In order to prevent further reduction in the territory and to provide a more suitable government, on the twenty-seventh day of September, 1894, a petition was presented to Judge Van Valen, Law JJudge of the Court of Common Pleas of the County of Bergen, to fix a time and place for an election, to submit to the voters the question of incorporating the remaining portion of the township into a village. The election was held November 15, 1895, and resulted in a vote of 277 for the incorporation and 62 against it. The township at that time was composed of about 51/2 square miles, with an assessed valua- tion of real estate of about $1,000,000 and a population of about 2,200.
The new governing body of the village was a Board of Trustees of five members, Milton T. Richardson, H. E. Hopper, Joseph W. Ed- wards, Dr. Geo. M. Ockford, and W. J. Fullerton, who served without compensation. The Board elected Mr. Richardson President and Mr. Fullerton Treasurer, who thus became respectively the President and Treasurer of the village. The other officers of the village, Village Clerk, Village Counsel, Street Superintendent, and Policemen, were appointed by the Board of Trustees and held office at the pleasure of the Board. The village Trustees had exclusive jurisdiction over the streets within the limits of the village and had power to lay out, widen, and vacate streets and provide for their lighting; to ercate a police and fire department ; to construct sewers and drains and other street improvements ; to license and regulate publie hacks, peddlers and hueksters; and to cause to be raised by taxation every year such sums
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of money as they deemed expedient for the current expenses of the village. Their important legislative power in the village was exercised in drawing up, considering, and passing of ordinances. The Assessor, Collector and Chosen Freeholder of the township still continued to act for the village, and the Township Committee performed certain formal duties within the village. In the year 1896 the legislature abolished the Township Committee for the Township and Village of Ridgewood, vesting the powers of the Committee in the Board of Trustees.
In 1912 the offices of township Clerk, Assessor and Collector were abolished and the governing body was authorized to appoint a Collector and an Assessor for the village.
The Village of Ridgewood was governed by a Board of Trustees for seventeen years. During this time many municipal propositions for the improvement and development of the village were acted upon by the Trustees. A system of sewers was constructed, public franchises for water, gas and telephone were granted, and many street improve- ments were made. The last Board of Trustees consisted of Frederick H. Bogert, President ; George F. Brackett, John J. Lannuier, Joseph H. Martin, and James H. Snyder.
Village Commissioners
The endeavor to secure greater efficiency in the administration of municipal affairs in this state resulted in the passing by the legislature of 1911 of what is known as the Walsh or Commission Form of Gov- ernment Act.
Consideration of the adoption of the commission form of govern- ment is left to the voters of any community at an election called for that purpose. The Village of Ridgewood was among the first to adopt the new act. The petition for an election was presented to the village Clerk, and an election was held on the second day of September, 1911. This election resulted in the adoption of the new form of government. On the seventh day of November, 1911, Daniel A. Garber, George U. White, and Frederick Pfeifer were elected Commissioners of the Village of Ridgewood, and on the fourteenth day of November, 1911, the new government was organized.
While the Village still continues to be governed by the laws relating to a village, the methods of administration of Village affairs was changed by the adoption of the commission form of government. The number of Commissioners is determined by the population. Municipalities hav- ing a population of 10,000 or over have five Commissioners; under 10,000, such as Ridgewood, the number of Commissioners is three. The powers of the Commissioners are determined by the village act. The method of procedure remains the same as under the Board of Village Trustees except as modified by the law relating to commission govern- ments. Some of the distinctive provisions of the new form of gov- ernment are as follows :
(1) A special day is appointed for the election of Commissioners other than the general election day; preferential ballot is used and party politics practically is eliminated from the election.
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(2) The Commissioners are elected for a term of four years; the terms of all Commissioners to expire at the same time. All other officers are appointed by the Commissioners.
(3) The right of Recall is exercised by the voters, who possess the right by petition to require any Commissioner, if he desires to continue as Commissioner, to run again for the office at a special election called for that purpose.
(4) The legal voters possess the right of Initiative. By petition they may require any ordinance to be passed, amended, or repealed by the Commissioners, or else to be submitted to the voters for their action.
(5) The legal voters possess the right of Referendum. By petition they may require any ordinance passed by the Commissioners to be repealed or else to be submitted to the vote of the people.
In order to safeguard this right of Referendum, no ordinance takes effect until ten days after its final passage, unless it is an ordinance for the immediate preservation of the public peace, health, or safety.
(6) Each member of the Board has particular work to perform. Upon its organization, one member is elected mayor, and he there- upon becomes the presiding officer. The Mayor ex-officio is director of the department of public affairs and public safety.
By a majority vote of the Board, one of the remaining members is appointed director of the department of revenue and finance. Upon him falls, in addition to the duties of his department, the duty of acting as presiding officer in the absence of the mayor. The other member is appointed director of the department of streets and public improve- ments, parks and public property.
(7) In transacting the business of the municipality, every resolu- tion or ordinance must be reduced to writing and read before the vote is taken. The yea and nay vote must be recorded and the resolutions and ordinances signed by a majority of the members of the Board.
Resolutions and ordinances providing for the appropriation of money for street improvements, and for granting franchises are re- quired before final passage to remain on file with the clerk for two weeks for public inspection. No franchise is granted except by ordi- nance which must be published before final passage and receive the approval of a majority of all members.
(8) The mayor receives a salary of one thousand dollars and the other commissioners salaries of seven hundred fifty dollars each.
(9) The Board is required to hold regular meetings at least onee each week. These meetings and the record of their proceedings are open to the public.
The Board of Commissioners appoint the subordinate officers and boards for the Village. The most important of the present village officials are : Village Clerk and Collector, Wilbur Morris ; Assessor, Louis H. Kroder; Engineer, F. W. Simonds; Recorder, F. V. Watson : Coun- sel, J. W. De Yoe. The names of other officers, such as the Superin- tendent of Streets, Superintendent of Police and members of that de- partment, Chief of Fire Department and members of that department, Board of Health and Shade Tree Commission, are shown in the chapter
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of this book which relates to the particular department or commission. Each officer, department, and board has specific duties to perform in the successful working of the local self-government.
The commission form of government has succeeded to a large degree in eliminating partisan polities from public affairs in the municipalities which have adopted it. It is particularly successful in bringing about prompt and efficient action in the public business of the community.
THE MAYOR
Upon the adoption of the commission form of government by the Village and the election of Commissioners in 1911, D. A. Garber, who received the largest number of votes for Commissioner, was elected by the other Commissioners at their organization meeting as Mayor of the Village. Upon his re-election as Commissioner in 1915 he was again chosen as Mayor.
The Mayor is the chief Executive officer of the Village and it is his duty to see that the ordinances of the Village are properly enforced.
He is also the chief guardian of the peace of the Village. He has power to suppress riots and when necessary may call upon the county or state authorities for aid.
As the titular head of the Village, the Mayor represents the munici- pality on public occasions. Because of his position the people look to him not only to safeguard the community's present interests, but also to plan and to suggest such changes and improvements as will provide for their future civie welfare.
DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS AND PUBLIC SAFETY
Under the direction of the Mayor, this department protects the lives and the property of the citizens against vice, crime, and destruction. In performing its functions, it is divided into the following sub-depart- ments: Police, Fire, Board of Health, Shade Tree Commission, and Building Committee.
THE POLICE DEPARTMENT
The functions of the police force are mainly, the enforcement of law, preservation of the peace, protection of life and property, the arrest of all violators of the law, and the prevention and detection of crime. Other duties are incidental; but all must be performed with energy, discretion, promptness, and fidelity.
It is the duty of the Police Department and every member of the force, at all times of the day or night, especially to preserve the peace, to prevent crime, and to detect and arrest offenders; to suppress riots, mobs, and insurrections; to disperse unlawful or dangerous assemblages and crowds which obstruct the free passage of public streets, sidewalks, parks, or other places; to protect the rights of persons and property ; to safeguard the public health ; to preserve order at all meetings and assemblages ; and to regulate and control the movements of all vehicles in the streets and public places.
It is their duty also to remove all nuisances in the public streets, parks
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and highways; to arrest all mendicants and beggars; to provide proper police regulation at fires; to assist, advise, and protect strangers and travelers on the public highways and at all railroad stations ; carefully to observe and to inspect all places of public amusement and places of business having licenses to carry on a particular business; to repress and restrain all unlawful and disorderly conduct or practices; to enforce the observance of all Village laws and ordinances; and for these pur- poses to arrest all persons guilty of violating any existing law or ordi- nance for the suppression or punishment of crimes or offences.
During the early ninety's the citizens of Ridgewood were without adequate police protection and suffered to such an extent from robberies that in consequence a number of citizens, headed by Joseph W. Edwards, formed an organization called the Village Protective Association. This Association held monthly meetings. Its members furnished not only the funds necessary to hire at first one man to do police patrol work and later others, but they were subject to call for purposes of protection when need arose.
The first real police force was organized in 1892 and continued under the direction of the Village Protective Association until the Vil- lage Trustees took over their work.
Peter Pulis was sworn in as a special officer on July 1, 1897. At that time the force included James E. Houlihan and James Ham- mond. On October 1, 1897, Mr. Pulis was appointed Chief of Police, and on October 31st the other two men were relieved from service. Chief Pulis continued as the only member of the force until March 1, 1903, when two additional men were placed under his authority. Since that time the force has been gradually increased to a present member- ship of ten men, including a Police Clerk, first appointed on June 1, 1909.
During the latter part of 1915. the Commissioners, deeming it wise to place the department under a Superintendent of Police, selected for this office Robert Groves, for over thirty-two years a member of the Police Department of the City of New York and appointed him to the position to take office on January 1. 1916. Chief Pulis resigned his position on February 1, 1916.
The force at present consists of a Superintendent of Police, one Sergeant, seven patrolmen, a clerk and a German shepherd police dog. Police dogs were first used in Ridgewood in 1913.
Ridgewood's first lock-up for law-breakers was in an old stone house located on the summit of the rise on the west side of the railroad tracks and south of the present Play House. Later a small wooden shack on Rock Avenue (now Broad Street ) was erected and used for this purpose. In 1898. The Village Improvement Association, as a result of complaints regarding the conditions existing in the jail, which, when unoccupied. was used as a shelter for stray dogs, aroused the citizens to provide a new building which was erected just baek of the present Municipal Building. This building was equipped under the supervision of the Humane Committee of the Association. When the Municipal Building was built, rooms were provided in it for police headquarters and for the lock-up.
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THE FIRE DEPARTMENT
DUTIES
The chief duty of the Fire Department is to extinguish fires. A very important secondary duty is the prevention of fires. Fire pre- vention is made effective in a variety of ways. A building code specifies certain principles of construction to which all new buildings must conform. Inspection of all buildings in process of construction insures observance of the building code regulations. Fire zone restrictions limit the use of wooden construction in the more thickly built up sections of the community. Periodie inspection is made of the buildings used for public gatherings with the result that the fire hazards are greatly re- duced. Further service is rendered by the Department by the assign- ment of firemen in uniform to attend publie gatherings so that any emergency of fire or panie may be promptly and effectively handled.
EARLY FIRES
The history of the Fire Department of Ridgewood, like that of other departments of the community, is the story of a gradual development as the needs of the community have demanded increased service.
Ridgewood in its existence as a municipality has suffered from only five serious fires. All occurred before the department was placed upon an efficient basis.
The first fire of importance was the destruction in 1876 of the Ridge- wood Avenue Hotel, which stood on the site of the Rouelere House.
On March 9, 1881, a fire, starting in a barn used by J. J. Bogert for the storage of hay and located just northwest of the present Municipal Building, destroyed the adjacent Franklin Hotel facing on Ridgewood Avenue. Sweeping west on Ridgewood Avenue, it also destroyed a blacksmith and wheelwright shop on the site of the present Ryerson Building. Continuing southward on Broad Street, it destroyed several small out-buildings and Whritnour and Colfax's store located on the site now occupied by the feed and grain building of E. B. Van Horn. The Masonie Hall of those days occupied the upper floor of Whritnour and Colfax's building.
The next fire oeeurred in April, 1889. It started in a small building in the rear of the Shuart Building, now the site of the Hutton Building. After destroying the Shuart Building, it consumed Crouter's Meat Market, adjoining, and two feed stores on Broad Street at the rear of the Zabriskie (now Moore) Building, which was also slightly damaged.
A row of one-story stores, commencing at the present site of the Post Office on Prospect Street and continuing to the corner of Hudson Street, was destroyed by fire on March 11, 1899.
The last fire of serious consequences oceurred on March 21, 1900. It originated in a coal cellar in the rear of Tiee's Drug Store located in the Pioneer Building (a three-story brick building) at the corner of Ridgewood Avenue and Chestnut Street. It destroyed the Pioneer Building and the next two on Ridgewood Avenue, a three-story and a one-story frame structure.
4S
Courtesy E. L. Zabriskie
Ruins of Fire, March 9, 1881.
RIDGEWOOD, BERGEN COUNTY, NEW JERSEY
ESTABLISHMENT OF THE DEPARTMENT
The fire of 1881, followed by the one in 1889, aroused the citizens to discuss the need of better protection against fire. The only method of combating fire in vogue at that time was the volunteer bucket brigade.
Some years later a meeting, on the evening of March 3, 1896, fruit- ful of results, was held in the Opera House. The meeting was attended by George R. Young, J. H. Christopher, I. E. Hutton, R. M. Bridgeman, Frank Baxter, Dr. G. Ockford, J. I. Bogert, E. A. Breusch, George Blauvelt, J. Houlihan and W. H. La Fetra. Committees were appointed to plan the organization of a fire department and to examine apparatus with a view to its purchase.
Subsequent meetings were held and on March 25th an ordinance organizing a fire department was presented to the village trustees and was adopted by that body on May 13th. An appropriation of two thousand dollars was authorized at a General Election of the citizens held in April for the purchase of fire-fighting apparatus. The first Chief of the Department, Dr. Walter Van Emburgh, was appointed on October 7, 1896.
The Department was formally organized during the early part of January, 1897, as Protection Hook and Ladder Company No. 1, with sixty-eight members enrolled. In 1905, the word "Protection" was dropped from its name and it has since been known as Hook and Ladder Company No. 1.
Following the organization of the company, plans were discussed for a building properly to house the apparatus and to serve also as a meeting-place for the members. A contract for a two-story building on the present site of the Municipal Building on Hudson Street was awarded on July 12, 1897, to George E. Ferguson. Its cost was twelve hundred and forty-six dollars. This building, when completed, served as the home of the company until the erection of the present Municipal Building, when quarters were provided for the company on the ground floor.
During the following August. the first fire fighting apparatus was received. It consisted of a hand-drawn hook and ladder truck equipped with ladders, buckets, and small tools. The water supply throughout the Village at that time was obtained from private wells. When a fire occurred, water was obtained from the nearby wells or streams.
The first fire to which the department responded was in a barn in Glen Rock, owned by J. W. Edwards. The first fire attended by the department within the Village was in a house on Irving Street occupied by a Mr. Lawrence. Despite the efforts of the firemen, the house was destroyed.
A second piece of apparatus, a hand-drawn Chemical Engine, was placed in commission by the Village on March 11, 1899. It is now held in reserve at the headquarters in case the present automobile ap- paratus is out of commission or a fire occurs which requires additional apparatus.
A hand-pull fire alarm bell was purchased in the early part of 1898 and installed in the Fire House on Hudson Street. It remained in
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use there until superseded by the present Gamewell Alarm System. It was then moved to the quarters of Hose Company No. 1, and placed on a tower in the yard of C. A. Swarn, Kenilworth Place. Later the bell was moved to the Circle Avenue home of Hose Company No. 1, and afterwards equipped with an electric striker. The Gamewell bell was at first mounted in the tower of the Opera House (Town Hall) but was transferred to the roof of the Municipal Building when the latter was erected.
Eagle Hose Company No. 1, was organized in January, 1900, as the result of agitation on the part of residents east of the Ho-Ho-Kus Brook. The first apparatus of this Company consisted of a carpenter's wagon filled with ladders, buckets and other fire-fighting tools. This company later dropped the word "Eagle" from its name and has since been known as Hose Company No. 1.
The apparatus of both companies in the early days was drawn to fires by hand or by teams that happened to be in the neighborhood of the fire stations when an alarm was sounded.
Arrangements were made on March 20, 1900, with E. B. Van Horn to furnish a team on alarm for the use of Hook and Ladder Company No. 1. This arrangement continued until the Village purchased its own team to be used both by the Fire Department and by the Department of Streets. Hose Company No. 1 continued to use such teams as might be available for some time thereafter. Finally the Village furnished them with a team which was also used by the Department of Streets.
The installation of the Gamewell Fire Alarm System in July, 1900 (the first alarm during its test being sent from Box 14), and the con- struction throughout the Village of a modern water-supply system (which was officially tested by the Fire Department for fire protection purposes on December 29, 1900) placed the Fire Department for the first time in a position where it could effectively combat the dangers of a serious conflagration. The department has since this time been able to confine all fires to the buildings in which they started.
The officials of the department and of the Village have endeavored to keep the department equipped with modern apparatus. In 1908 the present Hook and Ladder Truek of Company No. 1 was purchased and put into commission, and the original truck was sold. The present Automobile Combination Chemical and Hose Car was purchased in 1912.
The department, consisting entirely of volunteers, has always been known throughout the community for its efficiency and the high char- acter of its membership.
Succeeding the first Chief of the Department, Dr. Walter Van Em- burgh, and in the order of their tenure of office, the Chiefs of the depart- ment have been : J. Calvin Bogert, Edwin Nickerson, D. J. O'Neill, Dr. J. B. Hopper, George W. Courter, and the present incumbent, H. A. Tice, who was appointed on March 2, 1915.
PRESENT ORGANIZATION AND EQUIPMENT
The department now consists of a Chief, H. A. Tice, two assistants, Wm. Van Dien and Jesse Van Wagenen, a Superintendent of Fire
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Alarm Telegraph, two Captains, two Lieutenants, and twenty-four men.
The department headquarters and Hook and Ladder Company No. 1, are located on Hudson Street in the Municipal Building; while Hose Company No. 1 is located on Cirele Avenue.
The equipment of the department consists of one Locomobile, single tank combination chemical and hose automobile ; one double tank horse- drawn chemical engine; one horse-drawn hook and ladder truck; two hose wagons and four horses; and the necessary working equipment.
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