I Have been working on perfecting converting black and white (gray scale) photographs and engravings. The above is an old Trenton Evening Times photo of the Auto Exhibition Building.
  

I colored this photo which was originally black and white in order gain a more realistic view.

 

Tracy's was a very popular establishment,back in the 40's 50's and early 69's. I hand colored this formerly black and white photo.

I recently learned how to color BLACK & WHITE photographs. Here's an example which was formerly a full page photo of former Trenton Mayors.

 

Fashion Stud Farm

Here's A Currier and Ives engraving which  I hand colored showing a harness racing horse similar  to the one "Goldsmith Maid" had when she became a world champion trotting horse. A memorial tribute to "The Maid" was installed at N.J. State Fair, and is today located at Kuser Park.

Racetrack at the Interstate Fair, 1907
 

19XXH0790 R.C. MAXWELL 1946 ROUTE 25 SOUTH

R.C. Maxwell So. Broad approaching Frizzell's Men Shop

This was a very familiar piece of mail back during WWII. My oldest brother Len Glover was in the 8th Air Force in England and we received these emails regularly, return address "Somewhere in England."

FARMINGDALE SCHOOL

It was so sad to see this old school demolished as it was for the Maple Shade school. The middle of the 20th century marked the demise of maay of these 20th century schools.

DAVE PULLEN'S GARAGE - NOTTINGHAM WAY

THE DOUGLAS DC-3 AND MILITARY C-47

The National Recovery Act.,This R.C. Maxwel sign appeared on Perry & No. Broad.St.

These two merchants were located on the,corner of So. Broad & Greenwood Ave;

WE DIDN'T HAVE MISSISSIPPI RIVER BOATS, OUR PLIED THE DELEWARE!

Remember those great movies where the riverboats sailed up and down the Mississippi River? Remember one of my favorite movies, "Show Boat" with lovely Kathryn Grayson and Howard Keel? Well this is just to inform you the we here in the Trenton area had a showboat of our own! Check out this information from my "NAUTICAL" folder in the Hamilton Township Public Library Local History Collection or my glover320.blogspot.com website.

CATHEDRAL GIRLS BUY A GRUMMAN AVENGER FOR THE WAR EFFORT!

I find this article to be incredibly interesting! Remember, during those dark and scary years of World War II, America was forced to convert hundreds of manufacturing facilities into war material. The fact that these girls raised enough money to acquire this donation to the war effort is unbelievable but true.

1789: GEORGE WASHINGTON AT THE MILL HILL TRIUMPHAN ARCH

1789: George Washington at the Assanpink "Arch." I am having an incredibly wonderful time doing "deep diving" into early Trenton. I put together the vignette combining 3 separate graphics from the Hamilton Library Local History Collection "MILL HILL" folder. Perhaps one of my viewers can explain the strange engraving of the bridge that shows a strange exit from the bridge. It looks like it could be a dirt street.

1904: JACKSON STREET LOOKING NORTH FROM MARKET

How I love these vintage photos! I have a little booklet from 1904 which illustrates a number of Trenton neighborhoods.  This graphic is one of them; a delightful view of the newly re-surfaced street.

1945: ST. JOACHIM GRAMMAR SCHOOL GRADUATING CLASS

THE LALOR TRACT 110 YEARS AGO

My son lived on Home Avenue ten or more years ago before moving to Medford Lakes in Burlington County.

1947: This was the Trenton of my youth.

This incredibly clear photo from the R..C. Maxwell collection (CALL NUMBER XXH1658) recalls Trenton as it was before the societal changes that resulted in "white flight," suburban malls, and inadequate on street parking. Very sincere thanks to the many informed civic minded lovers of this grand old town who are making real strides in bringing back a sense of revival; a revival which is seemingly centered not on State and Broad, but moving a block westward to State and Warren. I love Trenton and always will. I have dedicated my retired years to bringing local history of Trenton, Hamilton, Ewing and other local areas who are keeping that spirit alive.

ANTIQUE NEWSPAPERS: ONE OF THE BEST HISTORY SOURCES!

Look closely at the black and white engraving of the gentleman sitting at his desk in front of shelving filled with vintage (antique) BOUND newspapers. The graphic on the right shows just a very small portion of my 100+ year collection of Trenton newspapers dating from 1869 to the 1940's. There are literally millions of pages in that incredible collection. Back in the 1970's and 80's most libraries made a serious error in using microfilm copies of these old papers in order to save the large amount of space that is required to store these volumes. Microfilm is fine for normal viewing, but the digital scanner can reproduce a copy of the original photo or article that can be reproduced in many cases in better condition than that from the original newspaper page.

SPLENDID VINTAGE PHOTO OF ROUTE 33 IN THE DEERWOOD SECTION.

I love this 1964 photo of Route 33 in the Deerwood section of Hamilton. Many familiar signs including the legendary "Tony Cal's" This graphic is from the "RESTAURANTS AND EATERIES" folder in the Local History Collection of the Hamilton Township Public Library.

IMPORTANT NOTE FROM TOM: Your comments are welcome and needed to add to the local history library. I find that the "COMMENTS" page is confusing. Here's how to enter a comment:

If you want to comment, the easiest way is to choose "Anonymous." Leave your comment and sign your name in this comment block, (unless you wish to remain anonymous,).
Tom Glover
                                    Hamilton Township Public Library (Local History Collection)

I will be transferring many of these Duke University R.C. Maxwell photos from my Facebook pages. Here's one from my era when I waited her for the Trailways bus that would take me to the U.S. Army Security Signal School at Fort Devens, Massachusetts for 9 months of schooling in cloak and dagger security for my 3 year U.S. Army career.    

This is my favorite view of downtown Trenton. Mostly because it has a very nice glimpse of Yard's 
where my dear wife Judy worked in the Infants' Wear section from her teen years up to our 1954 wedding. Note the clarity on this incredibly beautiful photo. Good things are happening in Trenton with many positive people working very hard to bring back what was a very friendly city. God bless them all. It seems that South Warren Street is now the area that has been the focus of a Phoenix rising from the ashes. Do you remember when South Warren Street ran straight south before the detoured it to South Broad Street? I sure do. Tilden Brakes, Penn Jersey Auto stores, etc. This is a "segmented" photo; meaning it has been enlarged and separated from the original in order to zero in on the Yard's store.

RE: "COMMENTS." Google ha managed to make the process of  making a comment difficult. Here's a suggestion: Choose "Anonymous;" then on the screen, type your comment and your name if you wish to be identified.

THE FACSIMILE: A MIRACLE OF THE AGE

"Telephoto" news photos from around the world in just 7 minutes!  Look how far we have come from the now primitive "facsimile"(Fax) machine of the 1940's!

1934: AN EXCELLENT ARTICLE ON OLD NOTTINGHAM SQUARE/HAMILTON SQUARE!

It's not easy being an historian! This article took the better part of 2 hours to re-format for viewing on a typical computer screen. It was 37-1/2" "column inches" on the feature page of a 1934 Trenton Times article relating to Hamilton Square. It is one of the best chronicles of Nottingham Square and now Hamilton Square. There is a treasure trove in history converted herewith into digital form for posterity! Enjoy, Nottingham Square students, scholars, and history lovers!

1882: FRANKLIN SCHOOL AREA

I recently came into possession of a rare 1882 wall map of the city of Trenton and parts of Hamilton Township. It is a fascinating map showing the area from today's St. Francis Hospital eastward to Olden Avenue as open land owned by Davit Quintin and Samuel Wilson.

1988: HAMILTON HIGH CLASS OF 1938 50TH REUNION

These were our big brothers and sisters. I knew many in that class including my lifelong friend Webster (Webb) Grimm whom I first met as a young boy of 6 or 7 when he and my older brother Len were involved in a local boys club known as the Lynx Club. (It was my first experience with  a text copying process known as the "Hectograph;" a jell laid in a flat 8-1/2 x 11 pan that receives type from a typewritten page and permeates the gel which results in a duplicate page with purple ink text. Years later I again became acquainted with Webb whe he made one of his visits to Miss Louise ("Ouise" Baird's 1420 Hamilton Avenue apartment, where Judy and I were nightly visitors. Webb was Ouise's insurance agent and Judy and I signed up with Webb for our home insurance which we kept until he retired. Such pleasant memories!

1904: 'TRENTON THEN AND NOW

This intriguingly fascinating photo taken at the intersection of Hamilton and South Clinton Avenue looking east (1904) will challenge those of us who are familiar with that very urban location in this year of 2017. It is a 20 page pamphlet published by the "Republican County Committee" revealing the many improvements that their organization took credit for accomplishing during the years when they were in office. Schools, fire houses, streets and roads, burying wires in order to remove the countless poles and wires, etc. It took a bit of Photoshop magic to digitize, brighten and finish this photo. It is one of many others that will be published by the Hamilton Library Local History Collection.

1882 - 1890's: Monsignor Hogan: The Monsignor McCorristin of the Victorian era

I think I qualify as a veteran of the art of scanning historical photos and documents. Way back in the early years of scanning I purchased a "Bearcat" scanner with the hope of being able to get a beautiful reproduction of some extremely interesting historic local history subjects. At the time, I had just moved from the old "MS Dos" computing to the new Windows 3.1. Wow, what an improvement in technology! Along came "Corel" with their graphics program along with the software that I have been using for over 30 years: Photo Shop; and incredible graphics program with a very steep learning curve. I climbed pretty high on that learning curve but still have much to learn. However, what I have learned, along with accumulating 80 plus gigabytes of digital news photos and articles, is the remarkable ability to find older posts and combine them with more recent posts and put them together in the graphic shown here. It's an exciting journey and there's never a dull moment. My only problem is that age old problem credited to the Pennsylvania Dutch: "Ve get too soon old und too late schmart!"

TRENTON LANDMARKS: FORT RAWNSLEY

I am currently working on long forgotten Trenton and area landmarks. One of them is the FASCINATING story of South Trenton's "FORT RAWNSLEY." This historic edifice was an extremely popular gathering place back in the 12800's, and many a politician stood on that balcony and spoke to the public that gathered there at the triangular intersection of South Warren, Fadtory, and Lamberton Streets. That extract above is from the 1882 map of the city of Trenton and parts of Hamiton.

From a huge and very rare "Nol 1882" map that came into my possession, I am learning some very enlightening tings about who was where during the year 1882 in Trenton and a tantalizing glimpse of the Hamilton suburbs including a street map of Greenwood Cemetery. I never knew those many roadways had names.
Here's 1882 showing Villa Park before it became Villa Park and was subdivided between two huge parcels of land owned by Samuel Wilson and David Quintin. The property is shown from Chambers Street on the left of your screen and down to the Olden area community of Bismarck, Centennial Avenues. Mr. Quintin's historically famous race track took up a large part of the property.

1882: FROM TRENTON IRON COMPANY TO TRENTON IRON WORKS

This historic district in Trenton today is being largely converted into upscale loft apartments and a museum. Cooper Hewitt, Trenton Iron Works, Trenton Iron Company have all occupied this site at one time or another. This rare map from 1882 shows the Trenton Iron Company before Mr. Cooper acquired it and changed the name to Trenton Iron Works.

1938: PART OF THE South WARREN STREET BUSINESS DISTRICT

Many of the younger generation who are familiar with today's city of Trenton have asked me about South Warren Street when it used to traverse southward all the way to the southern area of the city. Today it is a one way street heading south from Perry Street from whence it takes a left curve in the road to connect to South broad Street.

1882: CHAMBERSBURG FROM MOTT STREET TO BAYARD STREET TO HAMILTON AVENUE

For all my Chambersburg friends who lived in this area of "the Burg;" here's your chance to see who lived in your house on Mott, Elmer, Butler and Bayard Street back before the Italian population began to occupy the area.

1882: A TANTALIZING GLIMPOST OF JUST ONE SECTION OF HISTORIC MILL HILL

My dear friend, the late Georgiana Phillips Smith passed this very rare 1882 ap of the city of Trenton and portions of Ewing, Lawrence and Hamilton. This graphic is extracted from the HUGE wall map. How I wish I had an 8 x 8 foot scanner to capture this historic treasure. Current Mill Hill residents will be delighted to see who lived where they and as their neighbors in this 130 year old map. When one works on rare historic specimens such as this, "HANDLE WITH CARE" becomes "HANDLE WITH EXTREME CARE," and I am!

1882: STATE AND GREEN STREETS A VERY RARE VIEW

How many hours I will spend referencing the residents of the State and Greene (Broad) Street area of downtown Trenton as it was 135 years ago! This rare map came into my possession as a gift from the late Mrs. Georgiana Phillips Smith who was a Hamilton Educater for many years during the 1930's and 40's. It is a true historic treasure and a gold mine for historic research.

1899: MAKE WAY FOR VILLA PARK!

This rare wall map recently came into my possession and I immediately placed in the Hamilton Township Public Library's. Local History Collection. It is a very rare wall map and wouldn't be surprised if it wasn't in one of Hamilton's one room schools back the the 1800's. My speculation is based on the long and loyal contributions of my dear friend the late Georgiana Phillips Smith as a long time teacher in the Hamilton School system and her incredible record as a charter member of the Hamilton Township Historical Society. You will note that I added a comment in the gray open space on the map. Were you able to see the complete map, you would see the two farms of David  S.Quintin and Samuel K. Wilson whose combined land holding occupy the entire Villa Park area over as far as Chambers Street which is shown on the map (not in this scan). A lonely corner plot on this map is shown on the corner and marked: "Chapel and St. Francis Hospital." FASCINATING and very interesting view of Villa Park before it was laid out in 1899!

Ca. 1880'S THE CHAMBERSBURG BEFORE THE ITALIAN IMMIGRATION

It took me the better part of 2 hours to stitch this incredible graphic together from a very rare and quite huge and VERY DELICATE wall map that has been in my collection for a long time. There is no date on the map but I place it in the 1880 before the influx of Italian immigrants began to move into the area. Over the years, I have written much about the Chambersburg of the post Civil War 1860's when it was basically corn fields and apple orchards and other vestiges of a farming area.As can be seen by the little article below from May, 1884, the number coming from the old country was growing rapidly. As the article also says, "A few years ago there was hardly an Italian in Trenton outside the manipulators of the hand organ.."

1916: The SWAMP ANGEL NEIGHBORHOOD AS IT LOOKED IN 1916

My friends from Camp Olden Civil War Round Table will enjoy these graphics that how an R.C. Maxwell photograph showing the intersection of Clinton and Lincoln Avenue on a bright sunny day, That young fellow walking in the photo could be a 57 year old Civil War veteran walking only a few feet away to the historic Swamp Angel which was on Perry, Clinton and Lincoln Avenue intersection.
The original of that Maxwell photo was "cloudy" and a bit dark and easily enhanced. I hand colored the Swamp Angel from an 1897 engraving. Truly a beautiful relic of the war between the states.

1912: HAMILTON TERRACE FROM THE "NEIGHBORHOOD DEVELOPMENT" FOLDER

Years ago I created a "NEIGHBORHOOD DEVELOPMENT folder in the Hamilton Township Public Library digital Local History Database. Here is a plat map of Hamilton Terrace which is in the Chambers St, Howell, William Street area and was laid out in 1913. The newspaper article was extracted from a 1912 ad advertising homes in that area. FASCINATING!

1966: A BREATHTAKING VIEW OF "JUNIOR 4;" AKA GRACE DUNN MIDDLE SCHOOL

We should pay full attention to these BEAUTIFUL examples of QUALITY architecture and do all in our power to see that they do not deteriorate and require replacement with glass encrusted replacements. Every time a pass by my original Hamilton High School on So. Clinton Avenue, I realize the quality that was the hallmark of the generation that built these beautiful red brick neighborhood schools. The shameful neglect  of Trenton Central High School, Trenton's most beautiful high school should never have happened.  PREVENTIVE maintenance should have been the order of the day instead of "kicking the can down the road" until the mold, mildew, rust and lack of attention resulted in its demise.