{"id":160,"date":"2013-07-01T04:33:29","date_gmt":"2013-07-01T04:33:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.morgan-nj.org\/blog\/?page_id=160"},"modified":"2013-10-25T06:12:15","modified_gmt":"2013-10-25T06:12:15","slug":"1882-ny-sun-newspaper-interview-with-charley-applegate","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.morgan-nj.org\/blog\/sample-page\/morgans-people-places\/people\/1882-ny-sun-newspaper-interview-with-charley-applegate\/","title":{"rendered":"1882 NY Sun Newspaper Interview with Charley Applegate"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Where<\/a>

This is where Cheesequake Creek and Stump Creek Meet as of 2008. Seen in the Background is Viking Marina which was wiped out in October 2012 by Hurricane Sandy.<\/p><\/div>\n

Morgan Memories \u2013 1882 NY Sun Newspaper Interview with Charley Applegate<\/h3>\n

A huge shout out goes to Alycia Rihacek, a very good friend of this web site from the Thomas Warne Museum in Matawan, for providing us with the August 3, 1882 New York Sun article about Cheesequake Creek.\u00a0 Alycia has been doing massive research on her passion, the history of Laurence Harbor, and ran into the below article.<\/p>\n

The article was written seven years after the railroad through Morgan and the railroad station in Morgan opened up and four months before construction and dredging began on the present day channel and jetties at Morgan Beach which connect Cheesequake Creek to Raritan Bay.\u00a0 A noted Morgan resident, Charley Applegate, was interviewed and featured in the article which was primarily a report about the $15,000 appropriated by the US Congress to create the channel and jetties.\u00a0 Also mentioned was the 100+ year old inn Mr. Applegate ran which we all knew as the Old Spye Inn.<\/p>\n

If you have yet to visit the Thomas Warne Museum at 4216 Route 516 in Matawan, I encourage you to physically go there.\u00a0 It is one of those little gems that we are lucky to have available.\u00a0 Until you are able to actually get there, you can visit their web site<\/a> or see them on Facebook<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Here is the article in the New York Sun, from Thursday, August 3, 1882:<\/p>\n

CHEESEQUAKES’ BUSY CREEK<\/b><\/p>\n

THE NOW FAMOUS STREAM WHICH HEADS NEW JERSEY\u2019S RIVERS.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

What is to be done with the $15,000 Appropriated by Congress for the Opening of the Chanel-The Future of Cheesequakes.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

Cheesequakes\u2019 Creek doesn’t appear in any atlas, but it heads the list of rivers and harbors in New Jersey for which Congress has just made appropriation. The village of Cheesequakes however, does appear, not on any known map of New Jersey, but in a printed list of the towns of Monmouth County. The Post Office is given as at Keyport, and thither a reporter of THE SUN went yesterday, to see Cheesequakes Creek.\u00a0 He did not know till later that he had inadvertently crossed Cheesequakes\u2019 Creek on the New Jersey Central Railroad.\u00a0 A well-informed young man in Keyport was asked how to get to Cheesequakes\u2019 Creek.<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cD’you know where Morgan Station is?\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cNo.\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cWell, you get off there.\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cIs Cheesequake there?\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cBless you. no; it ain’t anywhere. The creek’s there.\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 The reporter took two lines of cars back into New Jersey. The train stopped near an iron bridge and a cove of Prince\u2019s Bay [VJ: should be Raritan Bay].<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cMorgan,\u201d shouted the brakeman, and the reporter left the train, and as it moved quickly away he felt that his last hold on civilization had gone.<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 It seems that Morgan station on the Central Railroad of New Jersey was so called out of respect to the worth of a wealthy landowner of that name who once lived thereabouts. It, in fact, marks the spot where the village of Cheesequakes is said to exist, at the mouth of Cheesequakes\u2019 Creek.\u00a0 Besides the railroad station, but one solitary house is visible, a low white cottage half hidden under the willows at the base of the wooded bluff, overlooking the railroad track, which in its turn runs along the very shore of the bay.\u00a0 Some half-wild rabbits hop about the place and a swarming brood of young chickens peep as the old hens scratch gravel, the one thing besides oyster shells which is found there in abundance.<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 Cheesequakes\u2019 Creek opens into Prince\u2019s Bay [Raritan Bay] a mile or more south of South Amboy.\u00a0 From its mouth it winds back into the interior.\u00a0 It is about as wide and as winding as Pearl Street. The outlet into the bay is at a right angle to the general course of the stream.\u00a0 A broad stretch of beach lies across what would be the direct channel.\u00a0 From the iron railroad bride which spans the creek the reporter looked up the stream and nearly across New Jersey.\u00a0 South of the water is a broad salt marsh.\u00a0 On the other bank a wooded bluff rises thirty feet.<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 As far as the eye can reach across the waste of salt grass not a house or other evidence of population is visible, excepting only the wreck of a canal boat which went aground here years ago, and half a dozen flat-bottomed skiffs drawn up on the bank.\u00a0 Around a bend in the road which skirts the base of the bluff is a house which was built over 100 years ago.\u00a0 Everything about it tends to this belief.\u00a0 The principal room is used as a kitchen, where yesterday an unfettered monkey sat upon the hearth of the stove, a pair of squirrels is kept the treadmill in a wire cage over the door in a constant whirl, six dogs of as many varieties lay about listless, and unconscious of the veto.\u00a0 The name of Applegate has long been identified with this ancient house, for it is a sort of inn.\u00a0 A bar, which has the appearance of not having been entered for many months, was the room which the reporter first invaded in search for some information as to what Cheesequakes\u2019 Creek was useful for.\u00a0 The host was not at home, but back at the little white house under the willows \u201cCharley\u201d Applegate could be found, and he could tell all that was known of this creek.<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 The venerable Charley Applegate is the oldest, as he is almost the only, inhabitant of Cheesequakes\u2019.\u00a0 He said he reconed he could tell all there was to tell about the creek, and he led the way out to the ditch through which it runs.<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 Why, this is a right smart little creek,\u201d\u00a0 He said. \u201cthere\u2019s thousands of dollars worth of stuff goes out of here.\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cOf what?\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cPotter\u2019s clay, brick clay, and sand.\u00a0 Those are for different firms digging here.\u00a0 You can\u2019t see from here, but about four miles up the creek they have their places.\u00a0 You see this is the oldest place in the country for sand and clay.\u00a0 They send it down the creek in canal boats.\u00a0 They\u2019ve been doing it for 100 years.\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cWhat is the $15,000 for?\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cWell, you see, the creek\u2019s all right; there\u2019s six or seven or eight feet of water in it.\u00a0 They might dig out a few oyster pints, but it\u2019s my opinion they\u2019d fill up again next morning.\u00a0 But what they want is to cut away a channel through that beach across the mouth of the creek.\u00a0 That\u2019s 200 yards.\u00a0 Then they\u2019d have to jetty out twice as much farther into the bay to get into deep water.\u00a0 The trouble is all at the mouth of the creek now.\u00a0 Unless there is a good high tide and the wind is westerly, we can\u2019t get over five or five and a half feet of water to save our souls.\u00a0 Gen. Newton says \u201ctain\u2019t worth while to begin with less than $10,000 [$40,000?].\u00a0 Don\u2019t you see then that those people up the creek have to put smaller loads in their boats and wait for high tide?\u00a0 Why, if that creek was dug out they could carry 500 or 1,000 tons more of sand to a boatload than now.\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cHow will the digging out of the creek help the neighborhood?\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cOh, it won\u2019t make any difference to any one but these four companies.\u00a0 It\u2019ll help them to send off bigger loads, but it won\u2019t bring any more business here.\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cWhat is the feeling about the veto?\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cFeeling\u201d?\u00a0 Why, bless you, there ain\u2019t any one here to care.\u00a0 The people up the creek, they\u2019re rich, and they can get along as they\u2019ve been doing for a hundred years.\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 The old gentleman turned about and pointed to a white cupola which shone among the treetops upon the bluff to the south and overlooked the bay.<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cThe fact is,\u201d he said, \u201cthis whole thing was begun by the people over there.\u00a0 They stood by Miles Ross for Congress, and then they got up a lot of maps of this salt marsh, and cut it up into building lots, and sold them to New Yorkers.\u00a0 You see that stream?\u00a0 It\u2019s a branch of the Cheesequakes, and empties into it as its mouth.\u00a0 The right name of that stream is Stump Creek.\u00a0 These fellers printed it out Roan Rover on their maps.\u00a0 Then they were going to get an appropriation to dig out Cheesequakes\u2019 Creek and Stump Creek, so that they could run a steamboat down here with people.\u00a0 If they could get \u2018em up on that point I recon \u2018twouldn\u2019t take \u2018em long to make all the money the excursion parties should bring down.\u00a0 I tell you they are at the bottom of this thing.\u00a0 I\u2019d like to see $15,000 put into the creek as well as any one, if it could be spent right.\u00a0 But it\u2019s only throwing money away,\u201d said the old man, in a sudden burst of candor.\u00a0 \u201cIt won\u2019t do any good and when $15,000 is gone they\u2019d want $15,000 more, and so on always.\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 The old inhabitant added at parting that there was a cargo of sand or clay sent out of the creek pretty near every day.\u00a0 But the trouble with the whole coast was, he said, that the bay was too shallow to fill up the streams along that part of New Jersey.<\/i><\/p>\n

Originally posted on February 24, 2013.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Morgan Memories \u2013 1882 NY Sun Newspaper Interview with Charley Applegate A huge shout out goes to Alycia Rihacek, a very good friend of this web site from the Thomas Warne Museum in Matawan, for providing us with the August 3, 1882 New York Sun article about Cheesequake Creek.\u00a0 Alycia has been doing massive research […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"parent":975,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"page-templates\/full-width.php","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-160","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.morgan-nj.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/160","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.morgan-nj.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.morgan-nj.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.morgan-nj.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.morgan-nj.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=160"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.morgan-nj.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/160\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":977,"href":"https:\/\/www.morgan-nj.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/160\/revisions\/977"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.morgan-nj.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/975"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.morgan-nj.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=160"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}