Embedded Files
New Jersey Book Club- Co-Sponsored with the Middletown Public Library
New Jersey Book Club- Co-Sponsored with the Middletown Public Library
July 13, 2026 from 12pm-1pm
Hybrid
To register for the book club discussion: https://mtpl.libcal.com/calendar?t=d&q=new%20jersey%20book%20club&cid=-1&cal=-1&inc=0
Join NJSAA and the Middletown Public Library for the monthly New Jersey Book Club as we discuss David Rosenfelt's "Andy Carpenter" series
July 26, 2026 at 2pm
July 26, 2026 at 2pm
This interactive, multi-media talk provides a look at the iconic music that helps us understand our shared history as we approach the 250th anniversary of American independence. Special emphasis is given to Thomas Edison, Paul Robeson, James P. Johnson, Frank Sinatra, Whitney Houston, Paul Simon, Bruce Springsteen, Queen Latifah, Bon Jovi, and others from NJ who have contributed so much to the American music landscape.
Melissa Kozlowski is a longtime educator and the Curator of the Bruce Springsteen Archives & Center for American Music at Monmouth University.
New Jersey Book Club- Co-Sponsored with the Middletown Public Library
New Jersey Book Club- Co-Sponsored with the Middletown Public Library
August 10, 2026 from 12pm-1pm
Hybrid
To register for the book club discussion: https://mtpl.libcal.com/calendar?t=d&q=new%20jersey%20book%20club&cid=-1&cal=-1&inc=0
Join NJSAA and the Middletown Public Library for the monthly New Jersey Book Club as we discuss TWO books about the 1916 New Jersey shark attacks: Michael Capuzzo's "Close to Shore" and Richard Fernicola's "Twelve Days of Terror".
August 23, 2026 at 2pm
August 23, 2026 at 2pm
How much drinking was going on in early New Jersey? This talk will explore the habit of drinking in New Jersey during the Revolutionary era and Early Republic – from commercial brewing to temperance advocates.
Michele Rotunda is an Associate Professor of History at UCNJ Union College of Union County, NJ. She earned her PhD in History from Rutgers University, and is the author of A Drunkard’s Defense: Alcohol, Murder, and Medical Jurisprudence in Nineteenth-Century America.
Tara Maharjan is an Electronic Records Archivist for the New Jersey State Archives. She holds Master's degrees from Simmons College in History and Library Science with a concentration in archives. Before working at the State Archives, she worked for Rutgers University's Special Collections and University Archives where she curated the New Jersey Beer Collection, the Internet Archive, and as a cookbook librarian for America's Test Kitchen.
September 27, 2026 at 2pm
September 27, 2026 at 2pm
Have you ever wondered about the Bonnell Tavern, the building built in 1738 that has been vacant for 75 years that is perched next to Interstate 78 at Exit 15, Pittstown Road in Clinton and Union Township? Do you have a connection to the militia regiment or minuteman regiment formed there? If you’ve lived in Flemington, Union or Clinton for a long time, here is your opportunity to hear more about your possible connection to the building. If you are new to the area and are interested in learning about the importance of this building to the area, here is your chance!
October 25, 2026 at 2pm
October 25, 2026 at 2pm
In December 1776, local Patriot Cornelius Vermeule allowed the construction of a militia post and fort on his plantation – the largest in the area. This encampment was key to protecting the southeastern flank of Washington’s Middlebrook encampment and played a noteworthy role in the 1777 Battle of Short Hills.
Nancy Piwowar is an independent local historian and President of the Historical Society of Plainfield who lives in the area of the lost fort. She has been searching for over forty years for the exact location of the fort, and in 2019 created a local committee with Rich Palmatier, a local historian from Scotch Plains. His expertise is in the Battle of Short Hills and in local area historic maps. Through the efforts of this local committee, they, along with John Daniel, have created new primary source documentation about this fort.
November 15, 2026 at 2pm
November 15, 2026 at 2pm
Historic preservation is underway “Down the Brook” at Wallace House & Old Dutch Parsonage State Historic Sites for Revolution NJ, the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution in New Jersey and New Jersey’s first Constitution.
Learn about the significance of Wallace House & Old Dutch Parsonage to New Jersey and the American Revolution, explore the work taking place under the scaffolding as preservation architects and contractors reintroduce traditional techniques and sustainable materials to the historic structures, and contribute your own comments to inform the State of New Jersey and Wallace House and Old Dutch Parsonage Association’s Revitalization of Wallace House & Old Dutch Parsonage State Historic Sites as a legacy of Revolution NJ.
The historic rehabilitation of Wallace House & Old Dutch Parsonage is supported in part by Semiquincentennial Grants from the Historic Preservation Fund administered by the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior.
The Wallace House and Old Dutch Parsonage Association, Proud Partner of Revolution NJ, supports the preservation and interpretation of Wallace House & Old Dutch Parsonage State Historic Sites. The Borough of Somerville and Somerset County are Revolution NJ Communities.
Paul F. Soltis is the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection's historian for Wallace House & Old Dutch Parsonage State Historic Sites, George Washington's Middle Brook Headquarters and historic home of the founder and first president of Rutgers in Somerville.
December 6, 2026 at 2pm
December 6, 2026 at 2pm
Coined the “Crossroads of the American Revolution,” New Jersey was a hotbed of political unrest during the War for American Independence and witnessed more conflict than nearly any other state. In the years following the war, campaigns passed into the realm of history and mythology. The injured were treated, the dead buried, and towns ravaged by war began to rebuild. The first of four Revolutionary War veteran pension acts were passed in 1818. Widows of veterans were first allowed a pension under the act of 1836. Through an examination of Revolutionary War pension files, this presentation will illuminate the diverse and vital experiences of women during the War for Independence.
Nicole Skalenko holds a master’s degree in American history from Rutgers University, Camden. She specializes in military and political history of the American Revolution in New Jersey and eighteenth-century print culture. Nicole has contributed to a number of public history projects including the American Philosophical Society’s The Revolutionary City: A Portal to the Nation’s Founding, The Encyclopedia of Greater Philadelphia produced by the Mid-Atlantic Regional Center for the Humanities (MARCH) at Rutgers-Camden, and Kean University’s William Livingston’s World. Nicole serves as a Historian/ Architectural Historian with Hunter Research, Inc. and as a Historical Researcher on a project titled “Re-Investigating the Battles of Connecticut Farms and Springfield.”
New Jersey Book Club- Co-Sponsored with the Middletown Public Library
New Jersey Book Club- Co-Sponsored with the Middletown Public Library
Second Monday of each month from 12pm-1pm
Hybrid
To register for the book club discussion: https://mtpl.libcal.com/calendar?t=d&q=new%20jersey%20book%20club&cid=-1&cal=-1&inc=0
Join NJSAA and the Middletown Public Library for the monthly New Jersey Book Club!
September 14, 2026 - "American Pastoral" by Philip Roth
October 12, 2026 - "The War of the Worlds" by H.G. Wells
November 9, 2026 - "In the Unlikely Event" by Judy Blume
December 14, 2026 - In celebration of the 239th anniversary of New Jersey statehood (18 Dec. 1787), choose any subject about the great Garden State to discuss!
If you are working in New Jersey studies and would like to present your current research, please contact program coordinator Melissa Kozlowski (mkozlows@springsteencenter.org).
Past Lectures
Katie Singer, “Laboring in Obscurity: Louise Epperson and Her Battle Against Urban Renewal”
Dr. Jen Janofsky, Uncovering History: Red Bank Battlefield and the Discovery of Hessian Remains
Dr. David Blake, Department of English at The College of New Jersey, "Liking Ike: Eisenhower, Advertising, and the Rise of Celebrity Politics"
Gordon Bond, author, “My Patron: The Friendship of James Parker and Benjamin Franklin”
Carla Cielo, historic preservation consultant, "Domestic Outbuildings of Northwest Central New Jersey”
John Delaney, Princeton University Library, “Nova Caesarea: A Cartographic Record of the Garden State, 1666-1888”
Eleonora Dubicki, reference and instruction librarian at Monmouth University, "Carnegie Libraries in New Jersey, 1900-1923" (co-hosted with the Union County Cultural & Heritage Commission)
Frank J. Esposito & Donald Lokuta, authors, "Victorian New Jersey - Photographs by Guillermo Thorn from the Kean University Collection"
Brad Fay, filmmaker and board president of the Millstone Valley Preservation Coalition, "Farming in the Millstone Valley"
John Fea, Messiah College, “Philip Vickers Fithian: An 18th Century Jersey Boy”
Raymond Frey, Centenary College, “The History of Centenary College in Hackettstown”
Catherine Hudak, educator at Morris Hills Regional District, "The Ladies of Trenton: Women's Political and Public Activism in Revolutionary New Jersey" (co-hosted with the Alice Paul Institute)
William Kroth, president of the Sterling Hill Mine Museum in Sussex County, "Great Zinc Mines of Sussex County"
Maxine H. Lurie & Richard Veit, authors, "Envisioning New Jersey: An Illustrative History of the Garden State" (co-sponsored with the Trenton Free Public Library)
Bill Marsh, Monmouth University, “Why Lincoln Lost New Jersey Twice”
Robert McGreevey, The College of New Jersey, "Trenton's Early Civil Rights Activists" (co-hosted with the Trenton Free Public Library) and "Borderline Citizens: The U.S., Puerto Rico, and the Politics of Colonial Migration"
Lucia McMahon, William Paterson University, “Mere Equals: The Paradox of Educated Women in the Early American Republic”
Sandra Moss, M.D., past-president of the Medical History Society of New Jersey and the American Osler Society, "1916 Polio Epidemic"
Phillip Papas, Union County College, "Renegade Revolutionary: The Life of General Charles Lee”
Joanne Hamilton Rajoppi, author and former journalist, "Northern Women in the Aftermath of the Civil War" (co-hosted with the Monmouth County Library Headquarters) and “The Brunswick Boys in the Great Rebellion”
Brian Regal, Kean University, "The Jersey Devil: The Real Story"
Gary Saretzky, Monmouth County Archives, "Photographers of Middlesex County" and “New Jersey’s Civil War Photographers”
Jean Soderlund, Lehigh University, "The Lenape Indians and Colonial West Jersey"
Bob Vietrogoski, Rutgers University’s George F. Smith Library of the Health Sciences, “How New Jersey’s Governors Created the State Medical Education System”
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