The Railroad in Hightstown

The Railroad in Hightstown. . , The Camden and Amboy Railroad was the first railroad in New Jersey. The first section was completed between Bordentown and Hightstown in October 1832. The first service used horse drawn carriages that were similar to stagecoaches. The first freight service arrived in town on January 24, 1833. On September 19, 1833, the John Bull went into service, a state-of-the-art steam engine imported from England., The railroad was an important part of the growth of Hightstown and the surrounding farm lands throughout the rest of the nineteenth century. A later branch railroad to Pemberton completed in 1868 became part of a model for an integrated system of feeder railroads that allowed farmers to easily get their food to market in the large cities and obtain supplies, such as seeds. Hightstown was an important transfer station on that journey. The population of Hightstown grew from 500 in 1834 to 1,747 in 1900 and many of the historic homes in town date to this period of prosperity., By 1871, the Camden and Amboy Railroad was part of a network of twenty three separate railroads under the United Companies, which were then leased to the Pennsylvania Railroad. The remaining bridge abutment along Rocky Brook dates to 1914 when the Main Street Bridge was replaced at the intersection of Main and Franklin Streets., Regularly scheduled passenger service to Hightstown ended in 1938. A special World's Fair train took passengers to New York in 1939 and troop trains traveling to Fort Dix used the line during World War II. Freight service stopped in 1982 when the Conrail notified the Borough that it intended to abandon the railroad. The bridges across Stockton Street and Main Street were removed in 1984., Photo courtesy of The Hightstown-East Windsor Historical Society