Englewood, Bergen County's first city, celebrates 125th birthday

Once the "only city," the Englewood of today is known for its proximity to New York City, abundant trees and vibrant arts and culture.

Englewood was born 125 years ago as Bergen County's first city. It is now city shaped by divisions of race, class and geography.

Intensified by the creation of the World War I embarkment camp, Camp Merritt, in Dumont and Cresskill, the city's history is marked by struggles over race relations both external and internal. While the 1st and 2nd wards in "East Hill" housed leading industrialists and bankers, such as Dwight Morrow, the city's 3rd and 4th wards drew working and middle-class Southern Black migrants as well as Jewish, Italian, and Irish immigrants.

Still a diverse community, Englewood is the place where Vince Lombardi started coaching football. It is also the home of the Sugarhill Gang, the group that in 1979 introduced the world to hip-hop with "Rapper's Delight." It can also lay claim to an advance in technology: the first customer-dialed long-distance call.

Here's a look back at Englewood's history

Englewood 1776: Washington's troops retreat

A phone would have come in handy in November 1776, when Gen. George Washington's Continental Army had to flee a British trap at Fort Lee.  For two days that month, soldiers marched from Fort Lee to  Englewood's Liberty Pole Tavern and on to New Bridge Landing for the famous crossing of the Hackensack River, which may have prevented an early and vastly different end to the American Revolution.

Named for a Liberty Pole with a gold Liberty Cap erected to celebrate the 1766 repeal of the Stamp Act, the inn and tavern was Englewood's de facto community center. Those who went to Liberty Pole Tavern were allegedly met with refreshments from the landlord, and local tradition claims Washington himself was a guest there a few days prior to plan out a march through the state, according to Adaline Wheelock Sterling's 1922 publication "The Book of Englewood."

The area then known as English Neighborhood never saw a battle during the war, but Washington headquartered near Liberty Pole in the summer of 1780. Englewood also hosted local Continental Army meetings and suffered raids from armies in search of provisions. The first came from the British soldiers in pursuit of Washington's men in November 1776, Sterling wrote.

Englewood 1859: A village is born from a neighborhood

Incorporated as a city in 1899, Englewood was founded as a village 40 years prior. Then a collection of rough fields and farms, the area was surveyed in 1858, when James Wasson Deuel got a jump on the rest of the original villagers by starting construction on his half-residence, half-school.

Englewood then didn't have a name.

Part of Hackensack Township and still considered by many to be "English Neighborhood," Englewood allegedly was born during an 1859 meeting at a carpenter's shop owned by John Van Brunt, according to Sterling. "Names were suggested and laughed out of court," Sterling wrote. "As to derivation, some said it was taken from English Neighborhood, and others declared it was a combination of the name of the Engle family, who lived at New Durham, and the woods on the Palisades."

Englewood 1899: Becoming the 'only city'

For whatever reason locals liked the name and it stuck. Paperwork was filed with the county to create a village, and Mai Humphrey, future wife of future county tax collector-turned-Englewood postmaster, James H. Coe, became the first native.

The village didn't last long.

In 1871, Hackensack Township split into three. Its center strip became Englewood Township. It didn't last long either. State legislators in 1878 adopted the Borough Act and parts of the new township began to break off. Bergenfield, Teaneck and Englewood Cliffs took chunks. Considerably downsized, the township in 1899 combined with parts of Ridgefield Township to form the city of Englewood. Nicknamed the "only city," Englewood was the lone city in Bergen County until 1917 when Garfield incorporated. Hackensack, the county seat, followed in 1921.

Englewood 1859: The Northern Railroad comes through

The village's creation in 1859 also coincides with one of the biggest occasions in Englewood's modern history, the formal opening of the Northern Valley Railroad.

Just weeks after the name was selected, the railroad's first locomotive left the northern terminus at Piermont toward Englewood. After coming through the former railroad station at Depot Square, it stopped a mile south at Van Brunt's to provide a "stop on signal" for summer boarders at the Van Brunt and prospective residents of the nascent village living in nearby farmhouses, according to Sterling. Van Brunt's ultimately became a regular stop and was later renamed the Nordhoff station.

"Liberty Pole Tavern realized that its prestige had departed," she wrote. "Its lease of life still had years to run, but it could glory no longer in its role as community centre, and the days were growing near when its Revolutionary traditions would be dimmed in the actualities of a greater war." The town built increasingly large train stations through 1887 and hotels began to pop up. "Englewood House," once located near the Engle Street library, was among 13 in operation by 1903, local records show.

Englewood 1966: Passenger train service ends

Just as commuter trains eliminated the viability of the stagecoach, motor vehicles ultimately doomed Englewood's center city tracks.

In early October 1966, the Erie-Lackawanna ended the daily commuter trains that took workers from the then-bustling city of 27,000 to New York City. Like management for other commuter train operators, such as the Susquehanna that closed earlier in 1966, Erie's management argued the cost of maintaining passenger service was untenable. Ditching commuter service was one of a variety of ways the company briefly regained profitability amid the expansion of the U.S. and state highway systems.

Though the elimination of rail service would forever change downtown Englewood and its business district, locals had by then moved on. The railroad's board chairman, William White, said staff had ensured almost all the riders had already secured other transit options prior to confirming the line's closure.

Still in place today, the rails that run through Englewood have been holding on for a long-awaited reopening. New Jersey Transit still has plans to extend the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail from North Bergen to Englewood. The so-called Northern Branch Corridor Project would bring stops near Route 4, the city center and Englewood Hospital and Medical Center.

Englewood 1937: Trolly takes its final trip

Nearly three decades before residents lost their passenger rail, Englewood lost its historic trolley.

Opened in 1896 to connect Englewood with the Edgewater Ferry, the trolley helped spur the growth of Englewood as a viable suburban hub for New York City workers.

The city by then had formed its police and fire units, as well as established the original Englewood Hospital on Engle Street. The Lyceum on the corner of Engle Street and Palisade Avenue housed the bank, men's club, concert hall and library.

The Northern Railroad of New Jersey proclaimed Englewood in 1895 "one of the healthiest and most progressive towns in the state" with a blend of natural beauty and modern infrastructure. The trolley, which was expanded outside Englewood in 1910, further added to the city's allure and likely helped to lure in prominent financial players. The most notable among them was Dwight W. Morrow. A lawyer turned J.P. Morgan & Co. partner and ambassador to Mexico, he was once the town's most famous resident.

Englewood 1931: Dwight Morrow dies, cornerstone laid

Elected as a United States senator in 1930, Morrow was among the state's wealthiest and most influential citizens. In Englewood, he was a key player in local politics.

Morrow was born in Huntington, West Virginia, but had lived in Englewood for more than two decades before his Oct. 5, 1931 death at the age of 58.

As Englewood's Republican leader in the early part of the century, Morrow was continually asked to run for office but declined due to business pressures what only increased when he entered the banking realm in the summer of 1914. He was nonetheless thrust into government affairs during World War I, when he became the head of New Jersey's National War Savings Committee. He ultimately became a chief civilian aide to General John J. Pershing, the commander of the American Expeditionary Forces, before the end of the war.

His death as a sitting U.S. senator was unexpected, coming as the result of a cerebral hemorrhage in his Englewood home.

Within two months, his widow, Elizabeth Cutter Morrow, would lay the cornerstone for a new high school in his honor. Now the northern part of the expanded school at 274 Knickerbocker Rd., Dwight Morrow High School opened the following year.

Englewood 1951: First long-distance phone call

On Nov. 10, 1951, Englewood had another first, the first customer-dialed long-distance call. The call center at New Jersey Bell in Englewood was the first in the Bell Operating Company umbrella to adopt direct dialing for long-distance telephone calls. Before Mayor M. Leslie Denning called Mayor Frank Osborne of Alameda, California, all long-distance calls were operator-assisted, adding several minutes to each call.

The move allowed 10,000 customers in Englewood to reach nearly a dozen cities at a moment's notice. In all, they had direct access to 11 million lines, about 30% of all lines that existed in the country at the time. However, the technology began as one-way traffic. Englewood could not be dialed directly from linked cities such as Oakland, Boston, Philadelphia, Cleveland, Chicago and Detroit.

Englewood was selected not by happenstance, but because it had among the most modern infrastructure in existence at the time, according to company officials.

Englewood 2003: Commissioners bail out Harms Center

In more modern history, one of the biggest names in Englewood has been John Harms. An organist turned impresario, Harms put on local concerts starting in the mid-20th century.

He lured the Vienna Symphony, the New York Philharmonic and the Philadelphia Orchestra to Bergen County and in 1976 revived the former Englewood Plaza movie theater.

Built in 1926, the 1,600-seat theater was originally designed for vaudeville acts and movies. It was remodeled for a wide screen in 1963 but closed a decade later under the ownership of United Artists. When it went on the market in the mid-1970s for $80,000, the local school board almost bought it to be Dwight Morrow High School's theater annex. However, Harms teamed with a not-for-profit started by Englewood actor John Naughton to secure the deed.

The center fell on hard times in the late 1990s despite major renovations that decade and closed in April 2003. Still, support from the county government as well as local investors such as Frank Huttle III, who later became mayor of Englewood, helped revive Harms' dream. They helped transform the plaza into the Bergen Performing Arts Center, better known as bergenPAC, which today contains the John Harms Center for the Arts.

This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Englewood, Bergen County's first city, celebrates 125th birthday