September 27 Kiwanis Meeting Program: Dick Plambeck presented "Touring National Parks with Grandkids"

This past summer, Dick Plambeck and his wife Barbara took two grandchildren on a 20-day grand tour of Western USA National Parks. Photo shows the travelers posing in front of Jenny Lake in the Grand Tetons.

Dick gave a very interesting talk, illustrated with still  photos and a video. He also passed around two very nice photo books (one with 82 pages and over 380 photos) of the trip. He uses Shutterfly to produce the books.

The kids worked on National Park Junior Ranger projects at stops along the way and earned many badges during the trip.

The group flew to Rapid City, SD where they rented a Ford Taurus which they drove in a circular route, visiting many scenic places in South Dakota, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, Utah, and Colorado. He used two National Geographics books to research and plan the trip - one on the national parks, the other on highways and byways.

 This map shows the route taken during the trip.

This photo of Mount Rushmore was taken at night from the balcony of their lodge, using a telescopic lens.

This is a photo of the Devils Tower in Wyoming. It is the core of an old volcano. People do climb it.

Buffalo traffic jam in Lamar Valley of Yellowstone National Park.

Photo of Old Faithful Geyser erupting. Dick also showed a video of the action.

Zion National Park was discovered by Mormons, who gave religious names to the features. These peaks are named the “Three Patriarchs” – Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

Photo of Hoodoos in Bryce National Park taken from Sunrise Point at sunrise.

Dick took a lot of flower pictures and he put these into a beautiful collage, showing the variety of plants seen during the trip. Most in the collage were from Colorado.

Burro in rear view mirror at Custer State Park in South Dakota. One of the kids was scratching its nose.

The members enjoyed the presentation and Dick was awarded one of the complementary Kiwanis Club ball point pens.

June 28 Program: Jim Peck, Executive Director of Cora Hartshorn Arboretum

Jim Peck, Executive Director of Cora Hartshorn Arboretum in Short Hills spoke on nature areas in New Jersey. An expert on New Jersey parks, he entertained the audience and left us with ideas for New Jersey places to visit. This talk was an encore performance of his excellent February 22, 2011 program.

Jim is pictured on left (with Kiwanis President Dick Plambeck) wearing his 50-million-year-old New Jersey shark’s tooth fossil necklace. He has visited all USA states except North Dakota. He has written a monthly article for a local newspaper for about seven years.

He showed a photo of a recent visit to the arboretum by a couple who had carved their initials in a Beech tree more than 50 years ago. The two were high school sweethearts in 1960. The heart and initials are still at the same height because lower parts of the tree don’t grow higher over the years.

He reminded the audience about some of places described in his February talk. He travels to specific places with a mission to see and learn about something in particular. He travels light, without climbing or special hiking gear.

Big Brook in Colts Neck has a lot of fossils – he found his shark’s tooth there. Visitors should take kids there because they get excited.  Island Beach State Park is one of his favorite places, anywhere. Palisades Park along the Hudson is also nice.

Great Swamp is where the Passaic River begins. The Swamp has Wildlife Management and Natural areas. He showed a winter photo of Great Falls at Patterson. It has the largest volume of water flowing over a waterfall east of Niagara Falls. He described the geology of the Palisades near Patterson Falls and the historical use of the falls to drive local industries.

He showed a photo of the Eastern USA’s oldest old-growth trees located in Bear Swamp West near Millville, NJ (the South Jersey town has a glass factory).  They are Tupelo trees that are hollow and can grow in water. Go in the winter to avoid insects and better see the size of the trees (no leaves). A lot of mistletoe lives in the same area.  Driving and walking to this site takes a long time.

Franklin, NJ is one of the two places in the world (somewhere in Africa is the other) with highest concentration of minerals. Jim showed photos of the Franklin Mineral Museum and nearby zinc mine (with another museum where you can tour the mine). It is the fluorescent mineral capital of the world and many NJ school children have visited the site. (Nancy Boucher mentioned that the local Kiwanis Club helped run the museum.) You can buy Franklinite samples there.

He also described the Edwin B. Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge in Oceanville, NJ. Also, he showed a photo of the Bamboo Forest in Rutgers Garden.

Jim is looking for donations and volunteer workers to support a boat-building outreach program for kids from Milburn and Union. He showed photos of the project which helps children build 12-foot skiffs.

We ran out of time before Jim ran out of places to talk about. It was a great program and we will have to ask him back again. Jim emailed us the following list of places he described and others we could visit.

Places in Jim's talk

Cora Hartshorn Arboretum, Short Hills
Sandy Hook
Hackensack Meadowlands
Snake Hill (in the Meadowlands)
Crooked Swamp Cave
Cheesquake State Park
Sunset Beach, Cape May
Wildcat Ridge (north Jersey)
Delaware and Raritan Canal
Pine Barrens
                Pakim Pond
                Apple Pie Hill
                Town of Chatsworth
                Pygmy Pine Forest
                Greenwood Wildlife Management Area boardwalk
                Canoe to Wading River
Buttermilk Falls, Delaware Water Gap
Helmetta Pond, Helmetta,
Fossil hunting in Big Brook, Colts Neck
Palisades Park
Island Beach State Park
Great Swamp Wildlife Management Area
Great Falls, Patterson
Bear Swamp West – near Peek Preserve in Millville
Franklin Mineral Museum
Sterling Mine
Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge

Naturalist James Peck spoke at the February 22 Breakfast Kiwanis Meeting

Jim Peck, Executive Director of Cora Hartshorn Arboretum spoke about the arboretum and other nature areas in New Jersey. In photo above, Melanie Sze introduced Jim at the meeting.

Jim Peck authors the “Trail Mix” nature column published in the Home News Tribune, a central New Jersey newspaper. In six years he has visited 70 or 80 places and has written about beautiful places from High Point down to Cape May. He has given tours in the Pine Barrens. During the talk he showed beautiful pictures from Island Beach State Park, Cheesquake State Park, and other nice places.

Jim described the Cora Hartshorn Arboretum, which was started as a non-profit in 1961. There is a beautiful stone house and beautiful woodlands on the 16 acre property. It is a nice open-space park within Milburn, NJ. Most educational programs are for children, some of whom come from other cities like Newark and Union. They have an observational beehive and also have raised Monarch Butterflies. The Arboretum is open dawn to dusk and there is no admittance charge. Click on this link to visit the website.

There is a large range of topography in the state of New Jersey. The small area between the inner and outer coastal plains is called a cuesta. Rainfall on the south side ends up in the ocean. On the north side, it goes to large New Jersey rivers. Water is clean and pure in the south side of the cuesta.

A little known fact: the highest point on the USA eastern seaboard is Highlands, near Sandy Hook. He described the history of Sandy Hook lighthouse and other features on the Sandy Hook spit. He also mentioned Dismal Swamp in Edison, Rutgers Gardens, Delaware and Raritan Canal, Hackensack meadowlands and Lakota Wolf Preserve near Delaware Water-Gap. There are so many nice places to see, people should focus on places in the state that match their interests (birds, trees, etc.). For example, there are 700-year-old Black Gum trees in South Jersey. You can watch the sun rise in Cape May and then at the end of the day go over to Sunset Beach to watch the sun set into the Delaware Bay in the West.

The audience thoroughly enjoyed the talk.

Dr. Jude M. Pfister: “Not your Father's (or Mother's) Morristown National Historical Park."

On May 11, Dr. Jude M. Pfister (see blog posting for May 8, 2010 just below this one) gave an entertaining, comprehensive overview of the Morristown National Historical Park to the luncheon meeting of Kiwanis held at Broccolini’s restaurant in Madison, NJ. He described many little-known facts regarding the collections and plans for the Park and told interesting stories about the history and objects in the collection. Photo shows Dr. Pfister on left with Kiwanis President Rich Behling.

Improvements to the Park have been made over the years and the work continues. The Ford Mansion (Washington’s Headquarters) is getting a new roof and fire safety sprinkler system – the building will be closed until the work is finished. The museum is open to visitors with three galleries open, the most recent being the Military Gallery. The Park includes four general areas: Morristown, Fort Nonsense, Jockey Hollow and Cross Estate/New Jersey Brigade Encampment Area.

The history started with construction by Jacob Ford, Jr. of the Mansion in 1772. In 1779-80 the Mansion was George Washington’s headquarters while the Army wintered in Jockey Hollow. The Ford family owned the Mansion until 1873 when it was sold at auction by the estate of Henry A. Ford to the Washington Association of New Jersey (WANJ), an organization formed to own and manage the property (the organization still exists). In 1933 the WANJ transferred the property to the National Park Service and the Morristown Park became the first National Historical Park. Jockey Hollow was donated by Lloyd W. Smith and Fort Nonsense by Morristown (with the help of Mayor Clyde Potts). Famous architect John Russell Pope designed the museum and gardens behind the Mansion. Another wing was added to hold the huge collection of historical books and manuscripts contributed by Lloyd Smith.

The Park has an original Gilbert Stuart painting of Washington. In the 1920s the arms and face of a woman started appearing on the portrait. It seems that Stuart used the canvas from a prior painting of the wife of Rufus King, a Federalist from Massachusetts. The image of the woman is bleeding through the image of Washington.

Many interesting images were shown by Dr. Pfister during his talk. There was an active Q and A session. At the end, he described his book and members bought all the copies he brought. Funds from sale of the book go entirely to NPS. The members and all who read this blog are invited to visit the Park and see the many new improvements. Some links for more information:

Morristown: Where America Survived. NJN video available on-line.

Web Site for the Morristown National Historical Park (Be sure to look at the new blogs. Links to the blogs are posted on the Park home page.)

Dr. Jude M. Pfister speaks on Morristown National Historical Park

At the May 11 regular Kiwanis luncheon meeting in Broccolini's Restaurant, David Lloyd will introduce Dr. Jude M. Pfister, Chief of Cultural Resources at the Morristown National Historical Park. He will present a talk, “Not your father's (or Mother's) Morristown National Historical Park." He has written a book, “The Jacob Ford Jr. Mansion: The Storied History of A New Jersey Home”. Come and learn more about the national treasure in Morristown, almost in our back yard. Click here to see the Morristown National Historic Park blog.  Dr. Pfister oversees the museum, archival, and library programs at Morristown.