CHAPTER VII.

NEW JERSEY: NOTES ON THE WOODBINE SETTLEMENT AND. FLEMINGTON, HUNTERDON COUNTY.

WOODBINE.

INTRODUCTION.

Perhaps the best known of the so-called Hebrew agricultural colonies is Woodbine, N. J. No other colony was more carefully planned or more amply financed, none represents better the execution of the philanthropic purpose in the mind of the late Baron de Hirsch when he bequeathed millions of dollars of his great fortune to be devoted to the assistance of Russian Hebrew immigrants in various parts of the world. The proceeds of this legacy have materially aided every one of the agricultural colonies of Hebrews, but Woodbine was the first colony organized, planted and fostered by means of its beneficent instrumentality. Partly because it was the first colony so assisted and partly because the place has been widely advertised as the seat of the Hirsch Agricultural School the settlement has been widely known in the eighteen years of its existence. Although some have attempted to minimize the agricultural purpose of the founders in establishing Woodbine, the Jewish Encyclopedia," perhaps the highest authority, states that "the primary intention of the founders of Woodbine was the establishment of an agricultural colony for Jewish immigrants from eastern Europe." This authority says further that farming was the chief motive, but that later a village was laid out to provide a local market for farm products, and as at Carmel and Alliance, for the establishment of factories to give supplementary employment to the members of farmers' families. and to farmers themselves until a living could be made from the land. This ideal of the founders has not been fulfilled, for instead of a farming community with the village as an adjunct, Woodbine has developed into an industrial center with a few outlying farms, which occupy perhaps one-eighth of the original "Woodbine tract" near the borough of Woodbine.

In 1892 there were between 50 and 60 farm families in the colony, in 1901 there were 52 Hebrew farmers, in 1905 the number of farmers who "derived their living in whole or in part" from agriculture had fallen to 20 families, and in 1909 there were between 25 and 40 farm families in the colony.

For the reason that Woodbine is more important. industrially than agriculturally, because full report has been made of several Hebrew colonies and so much has been written concerning this colony both in official documents, in the public press, and in Hebrew reports, the

a Vol. XII, pp. 558-559.

с

See Jewish Encyclopedia, Vol. I, p. 262, and Vol. XII, p. 588.

See report of the United States Industrial Commission, Vol. 15, Annual Report of New Jersey Bureau of Statistics of Labor and Industries, 1900, pp. 290 et seq.

Commission made a much less detailed and careful investigation of Woodbine than of the other Hebrew colonies in New Jersey. The colonies at Rosenhayn and Carmel are similar in many respects, hence this report deals summarily with the points of likeness and presents in a general way the salient facts of the history, progress, characteristics, and present condition of the agricultural part of the Woodbine settlement, based on a personal survey of the community, inspections of the Hebrew farms, schedules of a few farm families, and interviews with Hebrew farmers, officials, prominent Hebrews in Woodbine, and Gentile agricultural experts, former instructors in the Baron de Hirsch Agricultural School.

LOCATION.

Woodbine is a borough of about 2,300 inhabitants, about 94 per cent Hebrews, in the northwestern corner of Cape May County, some 15 miles from the seacoast and 56 miles southeast of Philadelphia on the West Jersey and Seashore Railroad. The town is now a manufacturing center of some importance, with prospects of future development. Three clothing and hat manufacturing establishments and two manufactories of machinery and hardware. employing more than 525 hands were in operation in 1909. The annual report of the Jewish Agricultural and Industrial Aid Society for 1909 reports in addition 3 knitting factories established in 1909. The town has no banking facilities, but the transportation service is very good, and Millville and Vineland, a few miles northwest, are utilized as banking points. Woodbine is well laid out, on a town site of 800 acres, with good natural drainage; the town has no sewers, but an excellent water supply is piped to all its parts.

The town site was laid out in 1897 across one side of the Woodbine tract on which the colony has been located since its foundation and is easily accessible to all the Hebrew farms in the community. In 1909 the agricultural part of the settlement consisted of less than 40 households, cultivating approximately 600 acres of land, on small adjoining farms not far from the town. The agricultural aspect is not prepossessing. Truck crops, garden vegetables, and some apples, peaches, and grapes are raised in small quantities, but the returns have not been very satisfactory, hence the houses and buildings have not been kept in repair and present in general a very dilapidated, weather-beaten appearance. In the entire colony there are perhaps 375 families of, whom the Gentiles constitute about 6 per cent.

HISTORICAL.

In 1891 the Baron de Hirsch trustees for the Woodbine settlement, incorporated under the title of the Woodbine Land and Improvement Company, purchased a tract of 5,300 acres of uncleared land for $37,500. The tract is comparatively level, but, like most of the land in this section, very sandy and devoid of humus. When purchased it was covered with scrub oak and stunted pine, very few of the trees having any value except for fuel or fencing. On the entire tract, there was not an acre of tilled land and but three or four

a Industrial Directory of New Jersey, 1909.

inhabitants-section hands on the railroad that ran through the purchase. The fact that the land was cheap, that there was a railroad at hand, and that there were other struggling Hebrew settlements in southern New Jersey led the founders to choose this locality.

The land was surveyed and divided into 15-acre lots, upon which the land company began to erect five-room frame houses to accommodate the settlers as fast as they arrived. During the summer of 1892, a house and two small outbuildings were built on each of 50 lots; by December, 1892, all the houses were occupied by families of Russian or Roumanian Hebrews. The company agreed to clear or pay for clearing 5 acres of land on each 15-acre "farm" free of charge to the buyer. The farms were sold, with buildings, at actual cost$650 each-without regard to location. It may be said in passing that 15-acre lots are now sold for $650, $750, or $850 each, depending on their proximity to the borough.

Since the land was almost absolutely unproductive for some time after occupancy, it was found necessary to introduce some industry to provide a livelihood for the farm families. In the fall of 1892, the first cloak factory was subsidized; it employed 100 hands, nearly all from the Hebrew farm homes in the neighborhood. In 1893, owing to the financial crisis, the factory was obliged to shut down and great distress ensued in the colony. Many deserted the settlement, others began to cut and sell cord wood from their land; the children gathered wild berries for market or found work in the cannery at Ocean View. Indeed the second year was the testing time. Most of the colonists were Russian Hebrews who had come to New York almost penniless and had lived in that city for one or more years before they were brought to Woodbine. Very few had been farmers abroad and practically all were ignorant of all that pertained to New Jersey agriculture. They had been engaged in all sorts of occupations abroad, but most had been sweat-shop "tailors" in New York City.

The soil was very infertile and required skillful husbandry and careful application of fertilizer before a crop could be raised. Frequently a period of four years elapsed before the farm produced sufficient to support a family. From 1895 on the prospects of the colony were brighter, especially along industrial lines. In 1894 the agricultural school was organized; in the spring of 1895 there were 15 students in attendance; the fall term opened with 22 enrolled. The school grew out of the exigencies of the situation. It was designed to give the farmers in the colony the most practical and simple instruction in farm methods, application of fertilizers, handling farm machinery, and cultivating farm crops suited to the region. Whatever may be said of its later clientage and usefulness, in its first years it exercised a most salutary influence on the farmers and farm methods of the locality.

As has been intimated the industrial activities developed more rapidly than the agricultural. The town was laid out in 1897, and since then its growth has been almost uninterrupted. In 1901 there were 175 single and double cottages in Woodbine. Of these 14 were owned by the Hirsch Fund and 161 by private individuals, built at an aggregate cost of $157,400, of which a little less than 40 per cent

• See Pincus, The Independent, vol. 55, 2338.

had been paid. The entire population was about 1,400. The farmers numbered 52 (a total rural population of 400 persons), owning 785 acres of land, 500 acres in cultivation. The aggregate value of farms and improvements was estimated at $50,000; this was ten years after the founding.

In 1903 Vineland borough was incorporated and the residents became a self-governing body. In 1905 there were 223 private houses in the borough and a total of 325 families, 1,900 persons, 6 per cent of whom were Gentiles, in the colony; there were but 20 farmers." At present (1909) the total population has been estimated at 2,300, of whom 60 to 75 per cent own their homes, while the others are tenants.

COMPOSITION OF THE POPULATION.

In 1909 the composition of the colony was approximately as follows:

All these groups are represented by farm families who came to Woodbine penniless and ignorant, practically direct from Europe. Most of the first comers were immigrants from southern Russia; later arrivals came from Lithuania and Roumania. The company first gave them employment at $1.25 a day, clearing and developing the land; later they and their children found work in the industrial enterprises established in the borough. Whether the industries have drawn the rural population away from the farm or not, it is certain that only the subvention of industrial establishments has kept the colony alive. Since none of the farmers could pay cash for their farms, land was, and is, sold on very easy terms. For three years only the interest, at 4 per cent, on the net cost of the land need be paid. After three years 1 per cent of the principal with interest is payable monthly. These terms in the case of the deserving debtor have never been strictly enforced, indeed most of the officers of the Industrial Aid Society declare frankly that the Society has been too lenient in most instances. However, in spite of all that has been done for the farmers, probably not more than 10 per cent of the population are now engaged solely in agriculture, for a great many children of farmers are employed in the Woodbine factories. In 1899 or 1900 it was estimated that 40 per cent of the population was rural.

Both the present and the initial immigration were engaged in many different occupations abroad, more industrial than agricultural. The occupational composition may in a measure account for the apparent drift to the factories and shops.

There have been a large number of desertions from the colony, especially from the farming portion of it. During the first ten years many farmers, discouraged by their meager returns, went back to

a Jewish Encyclopedia, Vol. I, 262, and Vol. XII, 558–559.

bTwenty-third (1900) Annual Report of the New Jersey Bureau of Statistics of Labor, p. 300.