NEWARK HEIGHTS BRANCH

From what can be ascertained, Keller and his associates had two main reasons.

First, location. While the Township of Union and the surrounding areas were still quite rural, they sat right on the edge of two booming industrial centers: Newark and Elizabeth. These cities were exploding in population — Newark and Elizabeth each grew about 40% between 1900 and 1910, and another 20% by 1920. As those cities filled up, it was inevitable that homes, factories, and all the infrastructure that supported them would start spreading outward. And where would they go but out to the farmland.

In looking at the below 1923 map, it perfectly illustrates how industry and transportation were expanding in concentric waves around Newark. In 1892, the Pennsylvania Railroad built its West Newark Branch, in a right angle running along what was then the fringe of Newark’s industrial district (the white line on the far right-hand side).

Then, in 1905, the Lehigh Valley Railroad extended its Irvington Branch from Lyon Farms — present-day Hillside — up into Irvington, anticipating the next outward push of industrial development. Before long, it became a busy freight corridor, and industrial firms flocked to sites along it.

In looking at the proposed Rahway Valley extension - shown on the above map in orange, from Union up towards Hilton - it fits neatly into that same pattern. The branch was envisioned as the next logical "rung" on the ladder of outward industrial expansion from Newark.

When you view these three lines together — the Pennsylvania’s West Newark Branch, the Lehigh Valley’s Irvington Branch, and the Rahway Valley’s proposed Newark Heights Branch — you can actually see the pattern of development like ripples spreading out from Newark itself. Each new railroad became the spine of a new wave of growth. Keller and General Manager J. Spencer Caldwell hoped the Rahway Valley’s branch would capture the next one.

The second reason for building the Newark Heights Branch was trolleys.

All of the pink lines on the same 1923 map, below, show the extensive trolley network that crisscrossed this area by the 1920s. But in the early 1900s, these lines were still being developed. Two main systems were expanding here — the Morris County Traction Company, which came in from the west toward Elizabeth and Newark, and several independent local lines that were later absorbed into the Public Service Corporation.

The Morris County Traction Company reached Summit in 1907, then pushed east to Springfield, where the line split. One branch turned north into Millburn, looped down into Maplewood, and connected with the Public Service Springfield Avenue Line to Newark in 1908. The other branch continued along Morris Avenue, through Union, and reached the Central Railroad of New Jersey station in Elizabeth by 1910.

Meanwhile, the Public Service Corporation had lines that crisscrossed the state, including a line that came into Kenilworth. Their Springfield Avenue Line had extended westward out of Newark to a loop at Cypress Avenue and Millburn Avenue, right on the Maplewood–Millburn border.

Louis Keller saw an opportunity here. He envisioned a partnership with Public Service, where a connection could be made at Hilton. His plan was to build a second track on the proposed branch line, then continue double-tracking up the Rahway Valley’s main line all the way to Summit, creating a extension of Public Service's electric trolley network.

Keller wasn’t exactly a shrewd businessman. This proposed trolley route would have run almost parallel to the Morris County Traction line, creating a kind of redundant competition.

There’s good reason to think Keller may have been motivated by a bit of spite. The Rahway Valley and the Morris County Traction Company had already squabbled over rights-of-way in Summit just a few years earlier. And when Morris County Traction extended its line eastward through Springfield, it not only became a direct competitor to the Rahway Valley’s own passenger service, but also tore up a section of Morris Avenue that Keller had personally paid to macadamize.

So, in a way, this proposed extension might have been Keller’s way of settling a score—while also trying to partner with the trolleys rather than compete with them.

Keller incorporated the Rahway Valley Line on August 14, 1914, to construct and own the branch line. By making it a separate corporation, the branch would not be subject to the indebtedness (the $400,000 mortgage secured in 1907) of the Rahway Valley Railroad Company. The new company was wholly owned by Keller.

The first section of the branch — known as the Morris Avenue Extension — took about a year to build. Much of the right-of-way was purchased in the name of Dennis Long, a well-known local figure who had earlier been involved with the New Orange Industrial Association, served on the Union Township Board of Education, was friendly with State Senator John Kean, and even served as a trustee of the Connecticut Farms Presbyterian Church.

Unfortunately, early in the process, Long passed away, which caused a considerable delay in transferring the land from his estate so the railroad could move forward.

The initial 0.85-mile section of track — stretching from the main line to Morris Avenue — was completed in September 1915. Even before construction wrapped up, the project had already begun attracting new business. In June 1915, the Holzapfel’s American Composition Company, a paint manufacturer, purchased a parcel along the right-of-way and began building a factory. That company would eventually become International Paint.

Across the tracks, the railroad also tapped into the business of the Fred Stone Company, a coal and lumber yard — a site that today is home to Jaeger Lumber.

That same month, the Union County Board of Chosen Freeholders gave approval to the railroad’s plan to cross Morris Ave., which was a county road at the time, with a bridge. As the railroad worked to source steel girders for the bridge, it received permission from the Morris County Traction Company in November 1915 to erect temporary wooden trusswork over their trolley tracks on Morris Avenue, allowing construction to continue without disrupting trolley service. The concrete abutments for the bridge were constructed in 1915.

During construction of the trusswork, one of the laborers — Michael Castelli of Millburn — fell from the bridge while pushing a wheelbarrow across. He landed between a pile of lumber and several steel girders, suffering a sprained back and multiple cuts, but fortunately survived the fall. Rather than use outside contractors, the railroad built the branch mostly with its own labor forces, which mostly consisted of Italian and eastern European immigrants.

At Morris Avenue, Louis Keller purchased enough land between the new embankment for the branch and the paint factory to construct a freight office and freight house. A team track was built nearly to the curb line — where customers without their own rail siding could have freight cars spotted for unloading directly into trucks for local delivery.

To equip the new facility, the Rahway Valley repurposed two recently closed depots from along its mainline. The former Katemiller station, once located on Liberty Avenue in Union, became the freight house, while the former Doty station, near what’s now the south side of eastbound Route 22, was relocated here to serve as the freight office.

Because this new team track functioned as a shipping and receiving point, it needed an official station name. The railroad refused to use “Union.” Since its incorporation in 1808, the Township of Union had always struggled with its overly common name. The Rahway Valley, connected to the national rail network where dozens of “Union” locales were served, needed something unique. The Post Office also insisted on a distinctive name to avoid confusion in the days before ZIP codes.

After some debate among township officials and residents — with even whimsical suggestions like “Wewanna,” said to honor a supposed local Native American tribe — the railroad finally settled on the name “Unionbury.” The name had no real local significance beyond its simple differentiating suffix, but it stuck. Still, the Rahway Valley continued to battle confusion for years: freight bound for the Lehigh Valley’s nearby Townley station, also in the Township of Union, was often misrouted to Unionbury, and vice versa.

The Unionbury freight office was eventually replaced by a new structure in 1929, and the original one was moved to Kenilworth to be used as a storage building.

After a prolonged search, Keller and Caldwell finally located suitable bridge girders from the New York, Westchester & Boston Railway, an interurban electric line that operated in The Bronx and Westchester County in New York. They purchased 61-foot girders for the Morris Avenue Bridge, along with two pairs of 47-foot girders intended for the planned crossings at Vauxhall Road and Stanley Terrace. The girders had originally come from bridges the New York, Westchester & Boston had replaced about a decade earlier. The Morris Avenue Bridge was completed in February 1916. 

While the Morris Avenue Bridge was under construction, property acquisitions for the branch’s right-of-way to the northeast were still underway. The proposed line would cut across numerous privately owned parcels, requiring the railroad to negotiate with many landowners and also secure approval from the Union Township Committee to cross Vauxhall Road and Stanley Terrace with overhead bridges.

Keller, Caldwell, and the railroad’s attorney, Elmer L. McKirgan, worked diligently to assemble the right-of-way piece by piece—purchasing pieces of properties owned by Anna Louise Williams, Henry Herpers, James A. and Edward M. Burnett, Henry Kubach, George Kubach, Mary Poysher, the Headley Estate, the James O’Mara Estate, the Hollywood Cemetery, H. Kriegsman, and James T. Looby. 

Acquiring the necessary land through the Burnett farm proved somewhat problematic. The property was owned jointly by brothers James A. and Edward M. Burnett, and the railroad’s planned route—running from just west of Morris Avenue to roughly Stanley Terrace—required a substantial elevated fill. The fill material was hauled in from an excavation site in nearby Kenilworth.

For the Burnetts, this new embankment presented a major problem: it would bisect their farm, effectively cutting it in half and limiting access between their fields. Negotiations with the brothers dragged on, as Keller and Caldwell worked to find a solution that would allow construction to move forward without alienating their neighbors or delaying the project further.

By September 1915, Keller finally reached an agreement with the Burnetts. To resolve their concerns, he agreed to construct and maintain a small passageway — essentially a cattle pass — beneath the new embankment, allowing the brothers to move between their fields on either side of the railroad. It was a simple but practical solution that satisfied the Burnetts and allowed the branch line construction to continue.

Continuing on, the railroad needed to construct bridges over Vauxhall Road and Stanley Terrace. Unlike Morris Ave., these two roadways were township roads thus permission was required from the Township Committee. The railroad’s plans for the bridges were submitted on November 1, 1915.

The Township Committee was deeply concerned about the hazards posed by constructing the Vauxhall Road Bridge at the base of a sharp curve in the roadway, as well as a hill. To improve safety, the Township aimed to acquire small parcels of land from Burnett, Kubach, and Poysher to straighten the roadway.

The acquisition of that land dragged on into 1916. The Township Committee refused to grant permission to construct the Vauxhall Road and Stanley Terrace bridges until the land was secured to straighten the roadway. Additionally, the Committee required the railroad to straighten Vauxhall Road at its own cost.

Eventually, permission was secured and the Vauxhall Road bridge was constructed in 1916. Originally, the bridge only had an under clearance of 12’ 5”. The railroad struggled with bridge strikes, by over height trucks, for years. Eventually, in the late 1970s, clearance was increased to 14’ 4”.

Evidently, the railroad was slow to fulfill its commitment to straighten Vauxhall Road. The Township Committee even threatened legal action to compel the railroad to complete the work. Nevertheless, the roadway was not fully straightened until the 1930s.

The old roadway became part of a driveway to the warehouse that was built there in the 1950s. In fact, most of that driveway is still there today on the route of the old Vauxhall Road, at the entrance to the building at 2345 Vauxhall Road.

The tracks continued, curving through the property of Hollywood Memorial Park and climbing a 1.5% grade up a hill that became known as “Hind’s Hill,” named for the nearby Hind Steel Company. A culvert was built to allow a small brook to pass beneath the tracks, located just behind the William L. Thomas junk yard. For years, the railroad faced problems with debris sliding down the bank and clogging the culvert—sometimes even entire automobiles—which had to be cleared by railroad crews. Eventually, the railroad enlisted Mayor Biertuempful’s help to get the junk yard to stop blocking the culvert. From there, the bridge was completed across Stanley Terrace by August 1916.

Beyond Stanley Terrace, construction of the branch proceeded fairly quickly. Tracks were laid as far as Menzel’s Woods between modern day Rutgers Street and Boyden Ave. Grading completed to Boyden Avenue, near the intersection of present day Newark Way, where the railroad intended to construct a terminus. Per newspaper accounts, the Irvington & Hilton Coal Co. constructed coal pockets, to unload coal cars, near Boyden Ave. in anticipation of the railroad’s arrival. The company was located on Springfield Ave. in Irvington.

In late November 1916, the first train to run the Newark Heights Branch into the Hilton was run. The train consisted of a locomotive and several flatcars loaded with rails and ties to complete the line to the Boyden Avenue terminus.

Despite running its first train into Hilton, there were not yet any customers on the Newark Heights Branch to serve outside of the paint factory in Union. Louis Keller continued his acquisition of property to support the branch’s development. Parcels were acquired near the present-day corner of Boyden Ave. and Newark Way to construct a freight office and scales.

The railroad constructed terminal facilities at 361 Boyden Ave. in Maplewood, where it established its Newark Heights freight agency. The freight agent’s office was built around 1917. This building was replaced by a second building, likely in the late-1920s, that was perfectly square and of wooden construction. 

The freight house was supposedly built in 1903 and brought to Newark Heights in 1916 from someplace else, but its origin is unknown. The building sat on blocks. It was removed in 1922. There was also a Fairbanks wagon scale located alongside the freight house, built around 1917. It had a weighing capacity of 15,000 pounds. 

Newark Heights was also a team track facility where local businesses could come and offload freight cars or local residents could pick up package freight. 

The Rahway Valley Line was leased to the Rahway Valley Company, Lessee, in March 1918. According to the Newark Evening News, the first carload of revenue freight brought to Hilton in December 1918, it contained coal for the Irvington & Hliton Coal Company.

The Irvington & Hilton Coal Company eventually relocated from Irvington to the corner of Burnett Ave. and Tuscan Road. This became the Woolley Coal Company in 1924, and is now today’s Woolley Fuel Company, which still operates from the same location. The Rahway Valley extended tracks from Boyden Ave. all the way to this coal yard, which was the furthest extent of the Newark Heights Branch.

Keller did attempt to extend the Newark Heights Branch further. Throughout 1917, there was wild speculation in the newspapers about the efforts being made to connect the Newark Heights Branch with the Public Service trolley line on Springfield Avenue.

To make the connection, the Rahway Valley proposed to cross Boyden Avenue – Louis Keller wanted to cross it with an overhead bridge – and link up with Public Service at their 43rd Street loop.