http://mapmaker.rutgers.edu/356/nj_place_names_origin.pdf So if you ever wonder on a NJT Station got its unusual name well here is the source courtesy of the hard working folks way back in the the WPA days aka known as the New Jersey Writers Project
Interesting! Thanks! I’m an old Jersey Guy myself and always wondered about some of the more unusual place names.
How would this sound in Jersey-ese?
“This is Baba Wawa* at the Mahwah WaWa.**”
*Barbara Walters, as some people said she prounounced her name
**N.J. grocery store chain
At least I learned how that town in Bergen County got its name.
Well with MY North Jersey accent it would be pronounced EXACTLY as spelled! [swg]
And Mahwah? That’s an old Lenne Lenape Indian word for “Mahwah.” Translated it means “Let’s see if the White Eyes can figure that one out!”
And Lenne Lenape is pronounced “Lenny Lenapi,” who some folks in the area nowadays think is a guy who owns a carpet outlet on Route 17 in Mahwah! [;)]
And this little treasure of a song will tell you how to pronounce some of those names. (3:30)
I sampled this song in many places for a total of about a minute or so. I regret every single second of it.
That was painful. He’s no Bruce Springsteen.
He’s no Uncle Floyd either!
He’s certainly no Frank Sinatra,either! Now there was a New Jersey guy!
Here’s an informative link to New Jersey’s importance in American music:
https://www.state.nj.us/state/historical/assets/pdf/it-happened-here/ihhnj-er-sinatra.pdf
But my favorite song about New Jersey is this one:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgzib59HA40
I’m sorry I never got to that wonderful place. What about you, Flintlock?
Don’t feel bad, Dana Andrews never got there either!
Seriously, we went to Palisades Park once when I was a kid, maybe eight or nine years old. It was fun but I don’t have any clear memories of what we did there. Maybe I was overwhelmed by the place?
I’m sure we “Ate and ate at the hot dog stand!” though. [C=:-)]
A bit of history. Palisades Amusement Park opened around the turn of the 20th Century and like a lot of amusement parks it was intended as a weekend destination for a trolley line that ultimately became part of the Public Service trolley system. Eventually the trolleys disappeared but buses took over the routes and Palisades Park was still a destination. Here’s a radio commercial from around 1960 or so.
The way I remember Palisades Amusement Park is this:
Not being from New Jersey, I do have an odd memory of the place. Palisades Park used to place ads in DC Comics that invited you to the park as a guest of Superman. A cut-out coupon was included in the ad.
Thanks for the memory! I remember those comic book ads! No wonder when the song came out (1962) I had some familiarity with the place, although I was a Clevelander with a favorite amusement park of my own, Euclid Beach Park, which closed two years earlier than Palisades Park.
Taking your girl to a local amusement park on a summer’s evening in the 1950’s & '60’s, and holding her close on the different rides, reminds me of these lines from Wordsworth: “Bliss it was in that dawn to be alive, but to be young was very heaven.”