Pompton Lakes vs. Cooper Union

The 1870's.  The Pompton Lakes area was surging with industry.  Just down the turnpike, Paterson was making history with it's volume of silk, firearms and railroad car manufacturing.  The time was just after the Civil War, and steel was taking over iron in the manufacturing world.  Steel manufacturing requires lots of water.  Pompton Township had lots of that, along with a history or iron and steel production, by then.

There was iron and coal coming out of Western New Jersey and Pennsylvania.  The Morris Canal was moving the ore eastward to the cities.  Steel mills on our rivers had easy access to the Morris Canal.  They could get the ore cheaper, and get their product to the cities thanks to the canal.

At that time, there was also a plan to connect the coal fields of Scranton, Pennsylvania with the energy hungry cities.  This goal was feebly approached by a small group of financially weak railroad companies in a time when railroads were coming and going in that increasingly popular trend of transportation.  Remember, there are still gunslingers out West in these days . . .

To make a long story short, the Township of Pompton (much larger than today) got an extension of the Montclair Railroad to go through town.  These days, that railroad crosses the Paterson-Hamburg Turnpike in Riverdale and continues North, up to Ringwood.

In theory, this extension would connect the coal bearing railroad project at a junction in Greenwood Lake.  Pompton Township issued bonds for the construction, along with many other townships (note the word).  Cooper Union Academy for the Arts and Sciences (4th Ave. & E. 7th St.) bought $100,000 worth.  Everyone was happy.  Notes from the U.S. Supreme Court proceedings (that's right) indicate that Pompton was making interest payments as agreed.

All this was going on around the time of State legislation that was creating boroughs out of townships.  Borough fever or "Boroughitis"  was a favorite topic in the press of the day.  To Cooper Union, there was something disquieting about new and innovative changes in governments that owed them bond investments.  They wanted their money back. 

There are conflicts in the sources, and how long Pompton Township was tied up in court is difficult to determine.  As previously mentioned, the case eventually made it's way to the United States Supreme Court.  An 1890 Supreme court report relates: 

"By the first section of the act of 1874, the office of commissioners of Pompton Township was abolished, and their duties were devolved upon the township committee".

1874 to 1890; that's a presumed 16 years of litigation.  Sounds about right.  In the end, Cooper Union's argument that their bonds were no longer backed by a legitimate government were struck down.  Pompton won and the terms of the bonds were upheld.

Oh by the way, it looks like the Montclair Greenwood Lake railroad was a huge failure.  For moving coal, the Erie Canal worked better.  Pompton Township had a less than profitable railroad, for which they had to repay the bond holders.

Pompton Lakes and its environs were soon to become a recreation destination because of the rivers and lakes.  An 1895 New York Times story reports on the forming of Pompton Lakes as Passaic County's first of the newly fashionable boroughs.

In the article, I found the following anecdote to be interesting.  Notice the plug for the tourists:

"The territory includes all the elegant Summer residences erected recently, and embraces one-third of the township taxes."

The article goes on to comment:

"Pompton Township will be improvished by the erection of this new borough.  It carries a heavy debt, incurred by issuing bonds for the construction of the Greenwood Lake Railroad, and great difficulty will now be encountered in the payment of interest."

There is a 23 year gap between the creation of Pompton Lakes and the incorporation of the remaining villages of the old Pompton Township, with bonds to pay.  I'd bet there's a story there . . .