Our History

This digital collection is brought to you by the New Brunswick Free Public Library. Here, you will find information on some important events in the history of New Brunswick, from the colonial period up to the present. View it here .

The New Brunswick Free Public Library has access to databases to read past publications of The New Brunswick Daily Times, the Daily Home News, The Sunday Times, and the Home News Tribune. As of January 2023, we also have access to the Newspapers.com Northeast Collection . More details below:

Looking for something in our archives? We have designed finding aids, bibliographies, and other resource guides for you to make the most out of our archives and other collections. These tools are prone to updates, so please check back!

The details of life in New Brunswick's Fire Department a century ago are documented in the thousands of pages of the New Brunswick firehouse daily logs. These logs are digitized and only available in the library.

[Please note, the library does *not* have the hat.] The year is 1922. Edward Wheeler Hall, an episcopal priest, and Eleanor Reinhardt Mills, a member of his choir, are found dead near a farm in Franklin Township. Investigations revealed there was an affair between them; therefore the motive was beginning to form in the minds of local detectives. Hall's wife, Frances Noel Stevens Hall, and her brothers stood accused of murder, and the papers could not stop writing about the case. In the end, they were acquitted for lack of sufficient evidence. No one else was suspected or charged.

In 1755, Henry Guest, who had a flourishing tannery somewhere between Commercial Avenue and Schulyer Streets, bought two and a half acres on what would become the corner of Livingston Avenue and New Street in New Brunswick. Five years later, Guest built a sandstone house in which he and his family lived until his death in 1815.

Discover the impact of World War II on New Brunswick through the artifacts that have survived today.

New Brunswick Free Public Library has a rich local history and genealogy collection related primarily to New Brunswick and Middlesex County. Our holdings include newspaper clippings, books, pamphlets, slides, microfilms, city directories, photographs, post cards, maps, manuscripts, and letters.

Our microfilm list shows the title of the publications followed by the dates of the issues that the library has in its physical collection of microfilm, which can be viewed on one of our readers in the Reference Room.

The Morris Jacob Kafka Holzschlag Collection is a group of personal notes, written works, correspondences, community documents, and local New Brunswick history that was collected by Morris Kafka over the past 30 years. Having been a resident of New Brunswick for over 50 years, Morris Kafka has contributed to the local community through programs such as the Second Ward Block Club and dedicated his civic duty activities to the preservation of local historical sites in New Brunswick.

The Reference Department may be able to supply historical or other general information about New Brunswick cemeteries. Local cemeteries include the Baptist Cemetery, Central (Cheesman) Cemetery, Christ Episcopal Church Yard, Elmwood Cemetery, Evergreen Cemetery North Brunswick, First Dutch Reformed Churchyard, Presbyterian Cemetery, Van Liew Cemetery North Brunswick, the M.E [Methodist Episcopalian] Cemetery, Pitman, the "Old Cath [Catholic] Cemetery", St. Peter’s Cemetery, Poile Zedek Cemetery, and Willow Grove Cemetery. Use our guide to learn about our local cemeteries, or use the brochure version.

The library is hosting a collection comprised of materials collected and reviewed by the authors (David Listokin, Dorothea Berkhout, James W. Hughes) for their book New Brunswick, New Jersey: The Decline and Revitalization of Urban America (Rutgers University Press, 2016).

The library has listings of war casualties from New Brunswick.

In October of 2007, StoryCorps came to the New Brunswick Free Public Library to help capture an oral history of New Brunswick. Residents who grew up in New Brunswick shared their stories in the library. During the two-day period, interviewers logged approximately 10 hours of interviews with 14 residents. Their stories are varied and span several decades.

A portion of our digitized collection of historic New Brunswick-area postcards is available online here. The rest of the collection is available via this link: Historic Postcards Collection.

The library has a variety of historical materials including field books, insurance and tax maps, 166 volumes of the DAR Lineage Books, and city directories from 1855 to 1987. (The library also has phone books for the years following 1987.) Information on local manufacturers, historical buildings, government officials and people, celebrations and events are also available.

A major New Jersey Historical Resource is online thanks to Princeton University Library providing access to their collection of Sanborn Maps. According to their press release: “Each town or city link leads to a town/city website that lists each individual sheet, grouped by year. Clicking on the individual sheet brings up its high-resolution digital image. Copyright restrictions prevent us from showing online images of post-1922 maps — but even those are listed on these websites and can be viewed in person in our department’s reading room in Firestone Library. If the sheet or year is not represented, we don’t have it. A good way to get an idea of which sheet you need to see is to start with an "overview" sheet, if one is provided in the list.

St. Peter's Service Special Explore the publications sent to the service men and women of the St. Peter's parish during World War II. St. Peter's sent these publications which delivered local and parish news to their parishioners overseas.

The Magic Carpet was a weekly radio program of WDHN hosted by local resident Virginia Bogan during the 1940s and 1950s. WDHN was the FM radio station owned and operated by The Daily Homes News, a local newspaper owned by the Boyd Family of New Brunswick and Princeton. The Boyd and Bogan families were friends whose children spent time together. It was this fact that led to Mrs. Bogan hosting the program on travel for the station.

The library has an index card file to New Brunswick’s birth, marriage and death records for the following: Births: 1882 -1963 Marriages: 1915 -1984 Deaths: 1924 -1970

In the Fall of 2017, the New Brunswick Free Public Library was selected as one of 28 libraries across the country to be awarded a Community Webs Archiving grant by the Internet Archive. Web Archiving is the process of saving websites to ensure the information is preserved for future researchers, historians, and the public.

William Elliot Griffis Collection Catalog These images are originally found in Roots of Japanese-American Friendship: Fukui, Rutgers, and New Brunswick 1853 to 1928 . They depict artifacts, manuscripts, photographs, and illustrations from the William Elliot Griffis Collection. They are presented here as a courtesy from Rutgers University Special Collections and University Archives. Dr. Fernanda Perrone is the curator of the Griffis Collection at Rutgers University. For permission to use any of these images, contact Rutgers University Special Collections. The New Brunswick Free Public Library does not own these images, nor can the library give permission for their use. Broadside of Commodore Matthew Calibraith Perry (1794 - 1858) Woodblock print of the Black Ships Photograph of Yokoi Shonan's Nephews Photograph of Kusakabe with the Yokoi Brothers Photograph of Kusakabe Taro Photograph of Kusakabe Taro Photograph of William Elliot Griffis Photograph of Kusakabe Taro Photograph of William Elliot Griffis Letter to Mrs. Maria Van Arsdale from Taro Kusakabe Letter to Mrs. Maria Van Arsdale from Taro Kusakabe Photograph of Four Japanese Men Paying Their Respects at Kusakabe's Tomb. Willow Grove Cemetery Photograph of Kusakabe's classmates Tribute from Kusakabe's Classmates to Rutgers President, William H. Campbell Photograph of Japanese students at Rutgers Photograph of Matsudaira Shungaku Griffis's Fukui Contract in Japanese Scrapbook Page with Photograph of Griffis's House in Fukui Scrapbook Page with Two Fukui Photographs Annotated in Griffis's Hand Photograph of Three Notebooks Used by Griffis While in Fukui Photograph of Three Notebooks Used by Griffis While in Fukui Matsudaira Shungaku's Signature, A Gift to Griffis Yagi Signature and Gift Cards, Presented to Griffis Manuscript Map of Fukui Made for Griffis Tokyo Contract in English Tokyo Contract in Japanese Photograph of Griffis and His First Science Class, Kaisei Gakko Photograph of Griffis and "My Fukui Boys" Page 3 circa April, 1872 from Journal No. 10 Page 9, July 25-Aug 2, 1872 from Journal No. 10 Kai Sei Gakko Roll Book Margaret ("Maggie") Griffis (1829-1913) and Students. Photo Enlargement, "Maggie" center; Sugi Yo second from the right Essays Written in English by Kaisei Gakko Students from Fukui for Griffis. "The Effect of Theater upon the People of a Country", Myasaki Essays Written in English by Kaisei Gakko Students from Fukui for Griffis. "The Effect of Theater upon the People of a Country", Myasaki The Mikado's Empire , First Edition. Volume The Mikado's Empire , First Edition. Volume Broadside Advertising The Midado's Empire as a Guide to the Japanese Exhibit at the 1876 Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia William Elliot Griffis's Japanese Record. Order of the Rising Son Photographs in the Griffis Collection Dr. and Mrs. Griffis in Japan. Photograph of Dr. and Mrs. Griffis with the Matsudaira Family Dr. and Mrs. Griffis in Japan. Fukui Celebrations Photograph of Dr. Ardath Burks, Professor of Asian Studies, Emeritus, The Modern Griffis The William Elliot Griffis Collection: Friendship and Scholarship. Journals of William Elliot Griffits, The Fukui Journal 1871-1872. The Modernizers: Overseas Studetns, Foreign Employees, and Meiji Japan. Foreign Employees in Nineteenth-Century Japan. The William Elliot Griffis Collection: Friendship and Scholarship. An American Teacher in Early Meiji Japan. Griffis and Japan. Fukui Jaunts. "W.E Griffis and the New Scientific Curriculum in Rutgers College," Kagakusi Journal of History of Science, Japan Taro Kusakabe Phi Beta Kappa NYTimes 1870 Apr 1