VISIT THE COUNTY HISTORY SITES
"Learn about the people and events that helped to shape Burlington County."
The Burlington County Parks program has many preserved historic sites with well-maintained buildings that give you a vivid sense of our past. While the physical reality of that past is rapidly eroding from our historic housing stock, you can still see it in preserved places like Smithville and the Lyceum on High Street.
I visited the Lyceum on Wednesday May 13th to take in one of the history lectures that are regularly given. This one was delivered by Marisa Bozarth, the museum curator. Check this link for more information about the wide array of events the Lyceum and the parks program has to offer.
The May 13th session served as a historical retrospective for the month of May, detailing significant events across the 19th and 20th centuries. The presentation covered architectural milestones, labor history, cultural shifts, and criminal justice.
Here are some highlights:
Industrial Milestones • Volkswagen (May 28, 1937): Founded as a state-owned Nazi enterprise to produce an affordable “People’s Car.” Post-WWII, the brand struggled in the US due to its Nazi origins until a 1960s rebranding as “The Beetle” shifted public perception.
Media & Culture • Death of a Salesman (May 2, 1949): Arthur Miller’s play won the Pulitzer Prize. Miller drew from personal tragedy, including his father’s business failure during the Depression and his uncle’s suicide, to critique the “American Dream.”
Social & Labor History • Haymarket Square Riot (May 3, 1886): A day after police shot and killed labor protestors at the McCormick Machine Company, a Chicago labor rally turned violent when a bomb was thrown into a police line. The subsequent trial of eight “labor radicals” was highly controversial; several were executed, though later governors questioned their guilt and eventually pardoned the survivors, reframing them as “activists.”
Science & Sport • The Ethics of Construction: There was a brief discussion regarding the “creepy” and dangerous conditions for workers on the Empire State Building, noting the lack of modern safety equipment.
Political Scandals: The 1806 duel between Andrew Jackson and Charles Dickinson was highlighted. Interestingly, Jackson’s reputation suffered more from his wife’s technical bigamy (due to an unfinalized divorce) than from the fact that he killed a man in a duel.