Belvidere, NJ

New Jersey's Victorian Secret

On the first Saturday in September, Maryanne Meyer-Garcia will step out onto the porch of her 1880 Victorian home in Belvidere, N.J., (pop. 2,660) to see a town transformed. Bunting will be hung, homes dressed out and ready for visitors, carriages waxed and polished, horses groomed, and the square ringed by more than 100 antique cars. The sounds she hears will be the swishing of long, ankle-length, bustled dresses and the clink of tea china from the parlors of proud homeowners. It will be Victorian Days.

“All of a sudden, the town just becomes this other place,” Meyer-Garcia says. “They just go back in time. It’s like an awakening. It’s beautiful.”

Belvidere is New Jersey’s secret treasure, looking to its future by reaching back into its past.

Tucked up against the shores of the Delaware and Pequest rivers on the west and north, the town was settled on land reaching back to William Penn and Robert Morris. Belvidere’s original courthouse, still in use today, was built in 1820.

During the American Revolution, Belvidere entrepreneurs made cannon and shot in the nearby Oxford smelters. Later, the surrounding farmland generated a class of prosperous landowners. Their agricultural enterprise bearing fruit in conjunction with the dawning of the Victorian age, they lived and built lavishly. Today, more than 100 Victorian homes and buildings are on the National Register here.

The town’s fortunes ebbed and flowed with the nation’s, through the depression, World War II, and the prosperity of the 1950s. Flood damage in 1955 put a damper on things, however, and by the 1960s, the interstates had bypassed the downtown business community. Belvidere’s fortunes ebbed.

Then, 14 years ago, the Chamber of Commerce met to figure out how best to employ Belvidere’s heritage to revitalize the town. Arlene Tishuk, whose family goes back 200 years in the area, came up with a plan. “The idea was to build some pride in our town,” she says, “and to get people to realize what a wonderful town we have. I just stood up and said, ‘Why don’t we have Victorian house tours?’”

Victorian Days was born.

The first celebration was a one-day event, done with little money and lots of work, but the idea was popular, and it grew. Despite the work, townspeople came forth. “When it came time to do it, people just pitched in, and we did it,” Tishuk says. “I wanted this to represent Belvidere’s finest hour, and it does.”

“Victorian Days has a certain ambiance about it that just took over,” Earline Zeich, a town librarian, says of her 14 years working on or chairing committees. For the two days of this year’s celebration, she’ll be around the square in her original 1900 pleated dress that she found in an attic, enhanced with lace, a parasol, or hat, or whatever strikes her fancy. But her main interest is in what the celebration does for the town she clearly loves. “You see a lot of pride in the homes and gardens. It’s good for the town.”

Last year, Victorian days attracted more than 20,000 visitors, many joining in the spirit of the town in their own Victorian garb. Volunteers guide walking tours of more than 80 homes and watch over several homes open for tea. Money from ticket sales goes to the town for scholarships and perpetuation of Belvidere’s Victorian ambiance.

Pam Turney and her husband open their 1882, three-story home with its original oak spiral staircase and second-floor porch to visitors for teas and tours. Allowing up to 1,000 strangers to stroll through her house can be a chore, but she reasons, “It’s a chance to help the town, to give something back.”

“It’s kind of untouched by time,” Rebecca Lucas says, explaining why she and her husband moved to Belvidere and into their three-story 1910 “bungalow,” which they open to visitors. “I love the old houses, they have so much character.”

The same can be said for the town and the people who treasure them.

Warren D. Jorgensen, who lives in Tarrytown, N.Y., is a frequent contributor to American Profile.

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