WORLD-CLASS CONVERSATIONS ON FAITH, CLIMATE, FOOD, AND FARMING
SEPTEMBER 24-27, 2025 | PRINCETON, NJ
The Farminary is a 21-acre sustainable farm where theological education is integrated with small-scale regenerative agriculture to train faith leaders conversant in the areas of ecology, sustainability, and food justice. It is designed to help students and visitors to challenge society’s 24–7 culture of productivity by following a different rhythm — one that is governed by the seasons and Sabbath. In 2025, we are excited to celebrate its 10th anniversary with incredible speakers and delicious food.
Expert in American Indian cultures and religious traditions, and crosscultural theologies
of An Altar in the World
Theologian, author of After Method: Queer Grace, Conceptual Design, and the Possibility of Theology
WILLIE JAMES JENNINGS
Theologian, author of Reframing the World: A Christian Doctrine of Creation
For the complete schedule and ticket options, go to
Food Security Network
TIYA MILES MacArthur Genius, historian, author of Night Flyer: Harriet Tubman and the Faith Dreams of a Free People
BARBARA BROWN TAYLOR New York Times bestselling author
JEFF CHU Award-winning journalist, author of Good Soil: The Education of an Accidental Farmhand
MICHAEL TWITTY Chef, author and creator of creator of Afroculinaria
TINK TINKER
HANNA REICHEL
HEBER BROWN, III Founder, Black Church
SHIRLEY SATTERFIELD BY ILENE DUBE
Envisioning a Future that Includes Stories of Princeton’s Past 14
A POOL HOUSE TO CALL HOME BY ANNE LEVIN
In a Contemporary Addition to a Gothic Revival Building, Compatibility is the Key 24
EVERYTHING’S JUST PEACHY THIS SUMMER BY MARY ABITANTO 32
BOOK SCENE BY STUART MITCHNER
Consequences and Coincidences: Books from University Presses and a Butterfly Surprise 44
ELEGANT, ELUSIVE, AND ENDANGERED BY SARAH TEO
Butterflies in Decline 48
ON THE COVER: Shirley Satterfield. (Photo by Andrew Wilkinson)
THE SEED FARM AT PRINCETON BY WENDY GREENBERG Using Heirloom Seeds of the Past to Create Heirlooms of the Future 58
“DOGOYLES” AROUND TOWN BY DONALD H. SANBORN III
ACP Artist-in-Residence Victor E. Bell’s Sculptures and Animal Activism 68
A WELL-DESIGNED LIFE BY SARAH TEO 74
A WELL-DESIGNED HIKE BY SARAH TEO 76
HAPPY TRAILS: NEW JERSEY IS FULL OF THEM! COMPILED BY WENDY GREENBERG AND JEFFREY E. TRYON 78
PUBLISHER
J. Robert Hillier, Lh.D., FAIA
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
Laurie Pellichero
OPERATIONS DIRECTOR
Melissa Bilyeu
ART DIRECTOR
Jeffrey Edward Tryon
GRAPHIC DESIGNER
Vaughan Burton
Stephanie Tan
PHOTOGRAPHERS
Andrew Wilkinson
Mary Abitanto
Sarah Teo
Jeffrey E. Tryon
Aislinn Weidele
CONTRIBUTING EDITORS
Ilene Dube
Mary Abitanto
Wendy Greenberg
Anne Levin
Stuart Mitchner
Donald H. Sanborn III
Sarah Teo
ACCOUNT MANAGERS
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| FROM THE PUBLISHER
Dear Princeton Magazine Readers,
Though this is our Summer issue, I am still feeling like “spring has sprung” because it has been such a beautiful spring with clear days and chilly, rainy nights. This has given us one of the greenest springs ever! In fact, I can’t get over how rich all the green has been this year.
Last week I happened to make a turn west off Princeton-Hightstown Road and ended up in a residential neighborhood that is a spectacular environment. The roads are all “boulevards” with dense landscaping on each side and a central green space that separates the traffic going each way, and within these central greenways are beautiful arrangements of trees that now have 10-inch trunks. I found it hard to believe that such a wonderful environment exists. I then realized that what I was looking at was the result of careful guidance by the West Windsor Planning Board and its staff from 20 years ago.
I so wished that every New Jersey planning board would have such vision, because what comes with it is municipal pride plus increased value in the development housing along such lovely roadways.
In this issue you are going to make a discovery, as I did in my side trip, of a host of wonderful places to visit in New Jersey during this summer. Wendy Greenberg and Jeff Tryon’s “Happy Trails” lists 15 places to visit in New Jersey, and each one is totally distinctive.
Imagine finding an old seed in the drawer of an antique chest or learning from a family of native Americans that they had held onto a seed for generations. Princeton University faculty member Tessa Lowinske Desmond was starting to write a book about seeds when she realized that ancient “heirloom” seeds needed to be cultivated so that new seeds for future generations could be created. Out of this notion The Seed Farm at Princeton was born. Wendy Greenberg wrote this story about the farm and the tremendous volunteer help it gets.
the building of the Arts Council of Princeton, where you never know what you might find. “Dogoyles Around Town” is about current Artist-in-Residence Victor E. Bell and his sculptures that are a mix of dog, dragon, and gargoyle. They are small but stress the importance of animal rescue and the feelings of safety and love that a full-grown dog can provide. As a footnote, on the last page of the article you will find a picture of writer Don Sanborn’s dog Gilbert, who died recently at age 17.
Though it has no gargoyles, the handsome Gothic Revival house on Edgerstoune Road created by architect Alfred Hopkins for himself in 1932 had become rundown and lay vacant for years. Anne Levin’s story is about the two very successful Princeton graduates who decided that Princeton was where they wanted to settle. With the expert help of historical rehab architect Michael Mills, they went to work restoring the house and its 100 leaded glass windows. It is now truly a masterpiece!
Then there was a new challenge — the couple wanted to have an indoor swimming pool, something that did not exist in Gothic times. They added a handsome, very modern pavilion with a roof pitch that matched the original house. Inside is a “swimming tank” that pumps water past you at a desired speed and you swim, but actually go nowhere! The interior walls of the pool building are decorated with one-inch tiles that range from a blue tile density at the bottom to vivid white at the top. This new pavilion and the renewed Gothic mansion do very well together as a composition.
To do the title page for this story, our Art Director, Jeff Tryon, created his own work of art made entirely of seeds on black fabric. Wouldn’t this make a great logo for the farm?
Mary Abitanto is a phenomenal chef, writer of cookbooks, photographer, and forward thinker. Princeton Magazine is so fortunate to have her creativity available for your enjoyment. “Everything’s Just Peachy This Summer” is a terrific example of her many skills and includes several of her recipes. You can finish it off with her Peach Whiskey Smash, but only drink one!
One of the most exciting places to visit in Princeton is
Though Art Director Jeff Tryon’s title page for “Elegant, Elusive, and Endangered” is inspired by the well-known saga of the beautiful Monarch butterfly and the efforts to save it, this story by Sarah Teo is about all butterflies, whose numbers are declining worldwide. This is caused by climate change, pollution, and land development, all of which are due to the increase in the worldwide population. There are other causes and huge efforts to save the butterflies, which Sarah covers for you.
I should point out that this is Sarah’s first full story for the magazine. To date she has been responsible for layout in Town Topics and also the updating and creation of our WellDesigned Life pages and, in this issue, A Well-Designed Hike page.
Stuart Mitchner’s Book Scene is as engaging as ever with his coverage of butterfly books and local author Edward Tenner and his Essays in Unintended Consequences.
Then there is John McPhee and his Tabula Rasa. John McPhee has been a favorite of mine ever since he invited me to accompany him to the New York World’s Fair in the 1960s and comment on the architecture for a Time magazine story he was writing.
With Juneteenth, it is appropriate that we celebrate Shirley Satterfield as the historian and the preservationist of the history of the unique Black community that existed in Princeton from the early 1800s to 1948 when the “Princeton Plan” ended segregation in town.
This year, Shirley received the Betsey Stockton Award, and it is truly a pleasure for us to dedicate this issue of Princeton Magazine to her. In the last decade she created the Witherspoon-Jackson Historical and Cultural Society (WJHCS), which is dedicated to the preservation of the history of the totally self-sufficient community that existed between Witherspoon and John streets from Green Street down to Birch Avenue. WJHCS is responsible for the stainless-steel plaques that mark 29 historical sites in the neighborhood as part of a heritage tour that Shirley has personally led over the decades. Studio Hillier designed the plaques, and I serve as Treasurer of WJHCS.
Five generations of Shirley’s family have lived in Princeton and attended school at the Princeton School for Colored Children at the corner of Witherspoon and Maclean streets. The school was a beautiful piece of architecture that Studio Hillier owns and intends to completely restore the exterior and name the building “The Satterfield” in Shirley’s honor. Ilene Dube has written the cover story on Shirley for this issue.
Our dedicated staff and I hope that you enjoy this issue and all that it has to offer. We also hope that you will “shop local,” especially with our advertisers without whom there could not be a Princeton Magazine.
Respectfully yours,
J. Robert Hillier, Lh,D., FAIA Publisher
SHIRLEY SATTERFIELD
Envisioning a Future that Includes Stories of Princeton’s Past
BY ILENE DUBE | PORTRAITS BY ANDREW WILKINSON
Shirley Satterfield has a dream: to establish a museum of African American history in Princeton.
If ever there was a person suited to the mission, it is Satterfield.
She has been saving historic artifacts such as bricks, signs, stained glass, a barbershop bench, and doors from a house where Paul Robeson once lived. She salvaged pews from the Witherspoon Presbyterian Church — Robeson is reputed to have sat in them — and the Smithsonian Institution acquired one.
She even has her eyes on potential sites in Princeton’s historic WitherspoonJackson neighborhood.
Founder of the Witherspoon-Jackson Historical and Cultural Society (WJHCS), Satterfield originated the first walking tours of the historic Black neighborhood in 1997. Serving as a trustee of the Historical Society of Princeton — she remembers being the only African American on the board at the time — she worked with then Executive Director Gail Stern to bring about exhibitions on Princeton’s Italian, Jewish, and African American communities. That led to her tours, which continue to this day as the Albert E. Hinds Memorial Walking Tours.
So that those tours will go on in perpetuity, her idea for 29 heritage tour plaques throughout Princeton’s 20th historic district was achieved through the WJHCS, commemorating such sites as the Witherspoon School for Colored Children, the Witherspoon YM/YW, and the Paul Robeson House, of which Satterfield is secretary of the board. If not for the plaques, designed by Studio Hillier, “20 years from now Princeton residents won’t know that we existed,” says Satterfield.
“The WJHCS trustees look forward to establishing a museum that will be a lasting tribute to those who have lived in and contributed faithfully to the town of Princeton,” Satterfield continues. “We are pleased to partner with the Arts Council of Princeton, the Princeton Public Library, the Robeson House of Princeton, Not in Our Town, the Historical Society of Princeton, and Morven Museum & Garden.”
Arts Council of Princeton Executive Director Adam Welch has just published
The Witherspoon-Jackson Neighborhood: How One Community Changed Princeton (all sales benefit the Arts Council, Historical Society of Princeton, and Witherspoon-Jackson Historical and Cultural Society). In it Welch outlines how Blacks have called Princeton home since its settlement. “Historian of the local Black community Shirley Satterfield says the free Black community formed as early as the 1790s at the southern terminus of Witherspoon, spreading north as streets were built,” Welch writes.
Satterfield was also the force behind Albert E. Hinds Community Plaza, just outside the Princeton Public Library, honoring Princeton’s legendary African American resident who fought for social justice and civil rights and who died in 2006 at the age of 104. Hinds was the physical director of the Colored YMCA,
as it was then called, teaching youth programs; in the early 1900s he helped pave Nassau Street, transforming it from a simple dirt road to a major thoroughfare. A graduate of Talladega College in Alabama, Hinds was the grandson of a former slave and the son of a waiter at one of the University’s eating clubs. In his life, Hinds did everything from delivering milk and newspapers, shining shoes, and running a taxi business. He took care of the furnace at Bainbridge House when it was the library, served on the Zoning Board and became a trustee of the Historical Society. Hinds was Satterfield’s partner in preserving a piece of Princeton’s history.
Asked, if alive today, Hinds might attend any of the recent rallies held in the plaza that bears his name, Satterfield didn’t hesitate: “Absolutely.”
Opposite, top left: 184 Witherspoon Street was the first home of the Witherspoon Street School, opening in 1873 as the first public elementary and middle school for African American children. Bottom: The school moved to 35 Quarry Street in 1908. Opposite, top right: Witherspoon School children. (Photos courtesy of Shirley Satterfield)
Shirley Satterfield stands next to the apple tree planted by her mother.
This year, Satterfield received the Betsey Stockton Award, which is given annually by the Witherspoon Street Presbyterian Church to celebrate women who enrich the life of the church. Betsey Stockton was enslaved by the Stockton family, taught by Princeton University President Ashbel Green, and later served as a missionary to present-day Hawaii in 1822. Upon returning to the Northeast, Stockton founded a school
for Black children in Philadelphia, taught in Canada, and upon returning to Princeton taught Sabbath School at Witherspoon Street Presbyterian Church. She started the first School for Colored Children.
“Shirley’s vision for a museum dedicated to African American history in Princeton is not just a good idea — it is an absolutely necessary one,” says Princeton Councilman Leighton Newlin. “Princeton boasts a proud historical legacy, yet for too long, the contributions, struggles, and triumphs of Black Princetonians have been overlooked, marginalized, or erased altogether. A museum in the heart of the Witherspoon-Jackson neighborhood would not only preserve the memory of a remarkable community, it would also give future generations a fuller, truer understanding of what Princeton really is.
It would honor the laborers, entrepreneurs, educators, soldiers, and freedom fighters whose lives were and are woven into the very foundation of this town.”
To fulfill the dream “it will take hearts committed to justice, just like Shirley’s — people willing to believe that saving this history is saving part of America’s and Princeton’s soul.”
“Ms. Satterfield has never allowed Princeton to forget the hands that built its churches, paved its streets, and shaped its soul,” said Dr. Jonathan Lee Walton, president of Princeton Theological Seminary, at a recent tribute to her. “She is a historian, public intellectual, town curator, and moral conscience. Yet it is in her storytelling that Shirley shines most brightly.”
The descendant of six generations of the Van Zandt-Moore/May family, Satterfield grew up in the WitherspoonJackson neighborhood and returned to raise her children there. Although an educator and guidance counselor by training, she likely knows more about Princeton’s African American history that anyone else. When she talks, dates and names pour forth. Ironically, she didn’t like studying history in school — “I never learned anything about Black history,” she says.
Today, Satterfield has so many stories to tell, beginning with the segregated school she attended through second grade. At one time known as the Witherspoon School for Colored Children, the building has been turned into residences. Known as The Waxwood, it is just across the street from the home where Satterfield now lives.
Filled with papers, photographs, and other archival materials that are essential to preserving a cornerstone of Princeton’s past, the house was once owned by her uncle, Bryan VanZandt Moore, an attorney who was the first African American on the Princeton Board of Education and the first African American Mercer County Prosecutor.
An apple tree in the backyard was planted by Satterfield’s mother, who inherited the house in 1979. That tree was in full bloom on the day of the interview — also the day of the photo shoot — as if the spirits of her ancestors were smiling down.
Seated at her backyard table, Satterfield pulls out vintage photos. One can see that Satterfield was always glamorous, always
Witherspoon Street Presbyterian Church. (Photos by Andrew Wilkinson)
Shirley Satterfield’s great-grandfather, Oscar May, at 85. At the end of the Civil War in 1865, the former enslaved May came North from Lynchburg, Va., and settled on Mapleton Farms in Kingston.
Shirley Satterfield’s great-grandmother, Reba May, wife of Oscar May.
John Stanton, a relative who fought at the Battle of Gettysburg.
Aunt Elizabeth Moore Taylor
VanZant women on Birch Avenue, with Shirley Satterfield in front. The house was moved from Baker Street to Birch Avenue before the construction of Palmer Square.
Feb.-July 1960 sit-ins started at Woolworths in Greensboro, N.C. The sit-ins led to the formation of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC).
Great aunt Martha VanZandt Blackwell, who was born on Edgehill Street in 1857.
Uncles Oscar Joseph May (Army), James (Brud) Wayman Moore (Navy), and Bryan VanZandt Moore (Secret Service).
Great-grandparents Wayman and Martha Boile VanZandt.
Furhman-Stanton Family
Mother Alice May Satterfield
Satterfield’s Bennett College portrait.
Albert E. Hinds, Shirley Satterfield, Penelope Edwards Carter, and Alice May Satterfield in a photo by Henry Pannell.
Satterfield at 3 years old. Top: Louise Holland May, Alice May Satterfield, Bottom: Annie VanZant Moore May, Shirley Satterfield
Shirley, left, and her mother Alice May Satterfield.
Shirley’s father Claude Wayne Satterfield. Shirley Satterfield and Carol Johnson on Clay Street.
Monetta Harris, Deanne Graham, Shirley Satterfield, and Joyce Jackson at camp.
Shirley Satterfield enjoying the desert in Las Vegas.
Shirley Satterfield at her PHS Senior Trip to Washington, D.C.
stylishly dressed with coordinating jewelry.
“I was brought up where I had to look nice, I was always in these pretty dresses, I always had to present a certain image to the public,” Satterfield says in an archived interview.
When she steps out her front door, she is joined by Newlin, Paul Robeson House President Benjamin Colbert, and architect J. Robert Hillier (publisher of Princeton Magazine ), who also serves as treasurer of the board of the Witherspoon-Jackson Historical and Cultural Society. They are waved at and greeted by neighbors and passersby. People stop their cars and roll down windows to chat.
“All the dignitaries are here,” beams a cyclist.
Hillier first met Satterfield when he was converting The Waxwood into condominiums in 2004. The building had served as the Princeton Nursing Home in the intervening years since it was a school, though Hillier recalls that Satterfield still wanted to search for artifacts. Hillier named his new complex in honor of Howard B. Waxwood, principal of the school before the 1948 Princeton Plan that integrated Princeton’s schools. The Princeton Plan became a national model for schools following the Brown v. Board of Education ruling in 1954.
Newlin got to know Satterfield when she asked him to join the effort to have the Witherspoon-Jackson neighborhood designated as Princeton’s 20th historic district. “From the very beginning, Shirley’s commitment was clear: she wasn’t just fighting for buildings or streetscapes — she was fighting for the soul of a people and a place. Week after week, along with a small group of determined citizens, Shirley led the charge to tell the story of a neighborhood built by descendants of enslaved people, a neighborhood whose labor and spirit helped to build both the town and the University.” They celebrated together when Princeton officially recognized the Witherspoon-Jackson neighborhood in April 2016.
Satterfield’s own story is a key part of Princeton’s 20th and 21st century history. Her grandmother taught Paul Robeson before he went on to become an athlete, actor, singer, and activist. Robeson’s father, the Rev. William Drew Robeson,
baptized Satterfield’s grandmother at the Witherspoon Street Presbyterian Church. Satterfield remembers Robeson coming back to visit her grandmother after his family was forced to move away from Princeton (his father was dismissed from the church for his activism on behalf of migrant workers, Blacks, workers, and against Jim Crow Princeton). She also remembers when he came to perform at McCarter Theatre.
After completing second grade at the Witherspoon School for Colored Children in 1948, Satterfield started third grade at the Nassau School, now the site of the Lewis Center for the Arts Program in
Visual Arts at 185 Nassau Street. Once there, she found that the white teachers did not expect the same level of academic success from the African American students as the white students.
She recalls an incident from a home economics class where she’d been laughing and someone said, “look at Shirley blush” and the teacher responded by saying “Shirley can’t blush, Negroes don’t blush.” It was one of many incidents, and the first time in her life that she felt she was different. In fact, it was integration that made her understand what segregation was. “We were disciplined differently, and felt we didn’t have the same level of caring as we’d had” from our Black teachers, she
said in a 1998 documentary The Princeton Plan: 50 Years Later.
“But we still had our culture when we came home from school,” she says, sitting in her garden, where arbors bear the names of relatives who created pathways.
During the segregated years in Princeton, African Americans were not welcomed to shop in stores on Nassau Street. “We had our own beauty parlors, barbershops, ice cream parlors, and candy stores on Leigh Avenue,” she recollects. “Ice cream was a real treat because we didn’t have a refrigerator at home to keep it from melting.”
Shirley’s mother, Alice May Satterfield, worked at the Institute for Advanced Study. She often took Shirley, who was about 6, with her to work. It was at this time that Albert Einstein was at the Institute, and he would take Shirley for walks. She remembers how he looked, she remembers holding his hand, but she doesn’t remember what he said. She didn’t know he was famous, she just knew he was a nice man who took her for walks.
Alice May Satterfield’s other jobs included working in a gift shop at the Princeton Shopping Center and as a server at the Institute for Advanced Study and the Princeton University eating clubs. She worked as a janitor at Princeton High School, working her way up to switchboard operator and ultimately an administrator of substitute teachers. Through these jobs she was able to put Satterfield through college.
Shirley’s father, Claude Wayne Satterfied, a photographer, came from Philadelphia to Princeton to work at the Tenacre Foundation. With Alice, he moved back to Philadelphia where Shirley was born. Alice longed to return to her hometown, so she left Philadelphia for her home on “old” Clay Street. Her aunt, uncle, cousins, grandmother, and mother all lived together. “All the families knew one another and took care of each other. Almost every home in the Witherspoon-Jackson community had porches,” Satterfield says. “When our mothers and grandmothers came home from working hard as domestics, they would sit on the porch and have a cold drink and conversation with the neighbors, telling stories about their day while the children played in the street. It was a community of faith and hope.”
Councilman Leighton Newlin, Shirley Satterfield, and architect J. Robert Hillier.
Later, when the former Witherspoon School for Colored Children became an integrated junior high school, Satterfield once again sat in its classrooms. “But parents of the white children didn’t want them coming to this neighborhood and sent them to Miss Fine’s School and Princeton Country Day.”
In eighth grade, Satterfield remembers, counselors were preparing students for high school. She was in her gym uniform when she was called to the principal’s office. Terrified that she had done something that got her in to trouble, she found her mother there “to demand that I be changed from general to academic to prepare for college.”
And yet Satterfield says she was never given the chance to meet with a guidance counselor or even know about SATs. Her mother sent her to what was then Rider College in Trenton for secretarial skills, but it soon became apparent that wasn’t a good fit and enrolled her instead at Bennett College in Greensboro, S.C. “It was (known in the Black community) as the Vassar of the South,” she says. “We had to wear gloves and a hat and stockings and we had to carry a pocketbook.
You could always tell a Bennett woman.”
From there the family moved back to New Jersey, first to Murray Hill and then East Windsor — Satterfield and her husband had gone their separate ways, and she took back her family name. While teaching seventh and eighth grade English at Kreps School and seventh and eighth grade English and history at Grace Norton Rogers School, Satterfield earned a master’s degree from Trenton State College (now The College of New Jersey) and worked as a guidance counselor at Hightstown High School for 14 years.
Although Satterfield never had the benefit of seeing a guidance counselor
Bennett students took part in the ultimately successful campaign in Greensboro to integrate lunch counters at five-and-dime stores. “We were spat on and called the N word and heckled, but we were trained to fight segregation through non-violence,” she says of her experience at the Greensboro Four sit-in.
After graduating from Bennett, Satterfield was recruited to teach in Las Vegas, where she met her husband. The newlyweds moved to Syracuse, where he was getting a doctorate in polymer chemistry. Daughters Tracy and Dawn were born in Syracuse, and while Satterfield was at work her daughters attended preschool at a JCC. “They came home singing ‘Hava Nagila’ and ‘Dreidel Dreidel Dreidel,’” Satterfield remembers.
has changed,” she says. “African Americans can’t afford to stay in their homes. I get calls every week asking if I want to sell my home.”
Tracy graduated from Swarthmore and works as college advisor at Friends Select School in Philadelphia. Tracy’s daughter — Satterfield’s granddaughter — Ayanna is a 2020 Princeton University graduate and is completing a doctorate in biophysics at the University of Chicago. Dawn went to The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and UCLA Law School, working for two law firms as equity partner before establishing her own firm with a partner. She, too, is returning to the Witherspoon-Jackson neighborhood.
when she was a student, she gave her all in advocating for her students. When a valedictorian was not accepted to Harvard, she drove to Cambridge, Mass., to investigate why. “And it wasn’t even my student,” she adds.
She spent summer vacations going to colleges, advocating for students, making sure colleges knew about the quality of the students at Hightstown High School.
Eventually she was invited to be a guidance counselor at Princeton High School. In 1981, along with her two daughters, Satterfield returned to the Witherspoon-Jackson neighborhood.
“It used to be that I could talk to my neighbors over the fences as they were growing greens or hanging laundry — everyone knew everyone’s name — but now the complexion of the neighborhood
Satterfield’s legacy is already entrenched. The Shirley Satterfield Scholarship Fund, in partnership with Princeton Children’s Fund, is given annually to provide financial assistance to Black middle school and high school students in the Princeton Public Schools district who face economic barriers preventing them from participating in various school activities.
Hillier is naming one of his current projects The Satterfield. The building on Witherspoon and Maclean streets was at one time the First Witherspoon School — Princeton’s first segregated school.
“If you are blessed enough to call Shirley Satterfield your friend, you know that her heart is vast, her spirit generous, and her thoughtfulness unmatched,” says Newlin, who calls her Sister Shu-Shu, “a name filled with affection and respect. It says everything about Shirley that, without fail, she will remember you — your milestones, your joys, your losses. Shirley gives from the heart in all things — whether she’s guiding a student, comforting a neighbor, preserving a piece of history, or simply reminding you that you matter. She carries the Witherspoon-Jackson community in her soul, and through her tireless work, she ensures that our stories, our families, and our contributions will never be forgotten.”
Left: The Witherspoon-Jackson Historical and Cultural Society (WJHCS) installed 29 Heritage Tour plaques in the Witherspoon-Jackson neighborhood, Princeton’s 20th Historic District, in 2021. (Photo by Andrew Wilkinson)
Right: The Witherspoon-Jackson Neighborhood: How One Community Changed Princeton, by Arts Council of Princeton Executive Director Adam Welch.
Witherspoon Verse Speaking Choir
Satterfield and Benjamin Colbert, president of the Paul Robeson House.
(Photo by Andrew Wilkinson)
Satterfield with daughters Dawn Collins, Esq., and Tracy Collins Matthews.
Satterfield at Princeton Theological Seminary, 2025. (Photo by Kevin Birch for Princeton Theological Seminary)
Witherspoon-Jackson Historical and Cultural Society Board of Trustees. (Photo by Adam Welch)
Phylicia Rashad, Shirley Satterfield, Alice May Satterfield, and Albert E. Hinds.
Princeton friends through different stages of Satterfield’s life.
Reunion of Witherspoon School for Colored Children, Princeton High School Class of 1958.
Friends at Witherspoon Street Presbyterian Church. Granddaughter Ayanna May Matthews.
Nassau Club, October 24, 2001, Herb Hobler, Albert Hinds, Paul Robeson Jr, Shirley Satterfield, and John Tucker.
Classmates honoring women who made significant contributions — with Bessie Paragoe and Alice May Satterfield.
A POOL HOUSE TO CALL HOME
In a Contemporary Addition to a Gothic Revival Building, Compatibility is the Key
BY ANNE LEVIN | PHOTOGRAPHY BY AISLINN WEIDELE
Contemplating retirement, Georgia Nugent and Tom Scherer decided that Princeton would be the ideal spot for their home base. Princeton University graduates with distinguished careers in academia (Nugent) and international finance law (Scherer), the couple looked forward to putting down roots in — or around — the town they knew and loved.
The hunt began in 2013. After seeing “every house in Princeton,” says Nugent, they settled on a stone Gothic Revival dwelling with 100 leaded windows, just behind the Hun School, that had served as a designer showhouse the year before. It had a distinctive pedigree — architect Alfred Hopkins had designed it for himself in 1932. But the house had been on the market for more than five years. It needed work.
We knew we had to identify an architect who did historical buildings,” says Nugent. “As it turned out, there were two we considered. One was from my [Princeton] class, and the other was from Tom’s.”
The successful candidate was Michael Mills, a classmate of Nugent’s and a principal with Mills + Schnoering Architects in Princeton. Mills did the entire renovation, inside and out. More recently, the firm returned to the Edgerstoune Road site to design an indoor pool pavilion, which is attached to the main structure by a glass passageway.
The house presented a special challenge in the original renovation, because the clients were not exactly fans of its Gothic style. But it reminded Nugent of Princeton’s Graduate College.
“It is the farthest thing from what we could have imagined for ourselves,” says Nugent. “We’re very interested in design. Our taste is mid-century modern. I felt like we had looked at every house in Princeton — a zillion. Nothing worked. But then a friend who is a realtor decided, somehow, to show us this. Tom says that I just felt like it had to be rescued. That’s partly true. But I could see the integrity of the work, and the design really spoke to me even though it wasn’t my particular style.”
Mills and his wife had actually checked out the house themselves, years before, just after marrying, at the suggestion of late architect Bill Short, with whom Mills worked early in his career.
“I don’t know how Bill thought we had the resources to buy a house in Princeton,” Mills says. “But I thought that maybe a low offer would carry the day. Actually, my wife wasn’t thrilled about the idea of taking on the house at that time. It needed a complete redo, which we ended up doing with Georgia and Tom.”
As a written description of the project from Mills + Schnoering puts it, “The design approach involved restoring and presenting the original fabric of the house as a historic backdrop to an eclectic, modern interior to showcase the owners’ collections of Italian and handmade American craft.” Nugent was an assistant professor of classics at Princeton (the first alumna to hold a fulltime faculty position) before serving as president of Illinois Wesleyan University and Kenyon College. As a scholar of Greek and Latin, she and Scherer have spent a lot of time in Tuscany and Italy. She admired what she saw.
“In the Tuscany area, about 20 years ago, people started buying these entire farm complexes with multiple structures,” she says. “They were very old, but they’d furnish them with contemporary
pieces. When we bought the house, I decided that would be my vision, too.”
Alfred Hopkins was “a gentleman architect” known for designing sprawling farm complexes during the Gilded Age, for clients in places like Hyde Park and Rhinebeck, N.Y.; Newport, R.I.; and Greenwich, Conn. When it came to building his own home, Hopkins had a hard time deciding on a location. He searched for 20 years before settling on Edgerstoune Road.
“Here was an acre in an arboretum with all the practical elements at hand,” he wrote in a lengthy article in a 1933 issue of House and Garden magazine. “I wandered among the trees looking at this place and that place, while the ghost of my old urge to build followed at every footstep. We had several preludial rambles in the arboretum, the ghost and I, and with each one he grew stronger and bolder … until he had sold it to me — he and the real estate man.”
Hopkins wanted a court “with four definite determined boundaries, and in it there must be the feel and sense of enclosure.” Also in the plan: “no ugly right angles.” He wrote on, “I wanted to live with structure, with bare, solid, substantial stone and mortar, inside and out, [and] particularly within did I seek the strength of rugged masonry.”
Left: Mr. and Mrs. Alfred Hopkins in their garden.
Below: Design plan for the property of Mr. and Mrs. Alfred Hopkins by landscape architect Ellen Shipman.
Bottom: Building model, top view.
to yield surprises for the owners. “It’s so quirky and fascinating,” says Nugent. “Just yesterday, Tom showed me something I’d never seen before: an elaborate carving above the outside door that opens onto the patio. In the corner on each side is a little engraving with the names of the company that did the engraving, as well as Hopkins’ name. Everywhere you turn, you find these little people or flowers in the plaster.”
The parapet stones on the exterior that Hopkins so favored required considerable work during the renovation. The maid’s room on the second floor, which had a private entrance, was turned into a larger primary bedroom suite, bath, and dressing room. All of the casement windows had to be restored by a leaded glass conservation shop.
The project, Mills says, “was kind of a revelation of a great house in Princeton that I really didn’t know that much about. I think that the massing and the materials and the relationship to the landscape were all really great.”
Hopkins’ penchant for engravings in the plasterwork continues
After the renovation, Nugent and Scherer kept in touch with Mills. The architecture firm did some additional work on the exterior and interior over the next few years. Mills traveled to New York with Nugent to pick out furniture and light fixtures. The firm designed the casework in the former music room to turn it into a library. When the couple decided to build an
indoor exercise pool for Scherer, they turned to Mills again.
“It was intended to be a contemporary structure, and not taken as a part of the original house,” Mills says. “It went through a lot of iterations of what that meant for this house. It was very carefully done. We saw this as a design opportunity we wanted to be known for. It could show our philosophy that it was possible to do a new addition in contemporary materials that was different and compatible. That was the goal.”
The written description from the architecture firm says that the new pool wing “attaches to the main structure via a glass-walled passageway that allows both new and old to stand apart and preserves their individual identities. The pool house is intentionally more delicately detailed than the main house, utilizing a lighter wood-framed construction with sustainably sourced, modified timber siding, a standing seam zinc roof, and a stucco foundation.”
Left: The house was nothing like the midcentury modern style that Nugent and Scherer prefer. But Hopkins’ design spoke to them — inside and out.
Below: Courtyard view looking into poolhouse.
Opposite: The tiles in the pool house were designed to echo the water theme, with dark blue at the base to white at the top.
“The back of the building facing the lawn is [made of] very large pieces of glass, to bring the outdoors in,” says Mills. “It’s the horizon toward which Tom swims when he’s in the pool. They also have protection on the Hun School side. The park property line is very close. The Hun building is right next door, and there was a need to have some level of privacy on that side of the building. That was another thing that generated the design.”
The pool pavilion’s interior is lined with mosaic tile from floor to ceiling laid in a pattern that plays off the water theme, with dark blue at the base to white at the top. The building is meant to engage the surrounding landscape. At the same time, it shields the users from neighbors and the street, and opens onto the rear yard.
Obtaining approvals for the project took years. Luckily, the couple were otherwise engaged with their professions. They were also understanding.
“They were great to work with, and very patient,” says Mills. “These are wonderful people.”
Nugent and Scherer moved into the house last year. “The house is a project,” Nugent says. “But we feel like it was made for us. We think it’s beautiful. And we are so impressed by the way the pool house is so connected to the architecture of the house, yet distinctly modern. Especially if you come up from the back, it’s so wonderful the way the whole composition works together.”
So what would Hopkins think?
“I think he would hate it,” Nugent says, with a laugh.
EVERYTHING’S JUST PEACHY THIS SUMMER
BY MARY ABITANTO
Photos by the author
ertain foods evoke a happy childhood memory. For me, it’s peach pie. It triggers blissful and comforting feelings and conjures up a strong connection to the past. When I was growing up, my mom hosted gatherings with her Trenton State College (now The College of New Jersey — TCNJ) friends — “the gang,” as she referred to them. In the summer, when we hosted at our summer home, one of her friends would make homemade peach pie. I always excitedly
anticipated her arriving with the pie, which she made on a baking sheet so it could feed a large crowd.
These strong, well-read women, mostly teachers, were also All-American college athletes on the field hockey team and part of the Theta Phi sorority while at Trenton State College. They became teachers and administrators, raised their children, and then became empty nesters. Over the years, they gathered for afternoon tea, lunches, dinners, bridal and baby showers,
weddings, and eventually traveled the world together. I have fond memories of them and the peach pie!
My peach pie recipe is a magnificent way to showcase juicy, ripened summer peaches. The crust is buttery, flaky, and not too sweet, and the perfectly sliced yellow peaches with the red, pink, and gold blushing are then tossed with a hint of apricot jam to further enhance the taste. Take one bite and it’s a glorious combination of flavors, especially paired with some homemade ice cream on a hot summer’s day. Try my favorite lavender mascarpone, found at the bent spoon. They have the most inventive pairing combinations.
A LOCAL ICE CREAM SHOP
I was curious about what other summer flavors would pair well with peach pie, and asked Gab Carbone, the co-owner at bent spoon. “We have created over 750 flavors,” she says, “and the summer is just a bounty! I agree that lavender mascarpone would be so amazing paired with peach pie. Just delicious! Some other popular ice cream flavors we make that people love Trenton State College (Now TCNJ) AllAmerican hockey players, left, and the Trenton State College graduating Class of 1950.
with peach pie include cardamom ginger, organic thyme, fresh ginger, cinnamon, garam masala, cream vanilla bean, creme fraiche, smoked vanilla bean, black tea ice cream, organic raspberry sorbet, vegan coconut, and vegan gingersnap, just to name a few.”
She continues, “Depending upon how many peaches we can get, we make so many fresh peach flavors while in season: classic peach, fresh peach sorbet, peach cinnamon, peach raspberry, peach melba, peach crème fraiche, and many other peach combos.” They also have a wide variety of other flavors.
PEACH PRODUCTION IN NEW JERSEY
Let’s delve into New Jersey peach production, which is a booming business that reaps a bountiful harvest for our farmers. New Jersey was the fourthranked state in peach production in 2023. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), New Jersey farmers harvested 28.4 million pounds of peaches on 3,300 acres for a production value of $29 million that year.
Jeff Wolfe, the public information officer at the New Jersey Department of Agriculture (NJDA), says that, according to the USDA and New Jersey Peach Promotion Council, “The peach season for New Jersey lasts through the end of September. There are approximately 80 peach orchards in New Jersey with growers producing more than 100 different varieties of peaches. About 90 percent of those peaches are the yellow and white.”
Peach season starts late June. Peaches are sold at retail supermarkets and community farmers markets all over New Jersey as well as local farms. According to the New Jersey Peach Promotion Council,
“Gloucester, Cumberland, Camden, Atlantic, and Salem Counties are the state’s major peach growing areas. Gloucester County has the state’s most peach trees, but peach orchards are throughout New Jersey.”
PEACH PERFECT
Maggie Applegate, the manager at Battleview Orchards in Freehold, says, “Our peach season starts mid-June through beginning/mid-September. We move into our most popular peach varieties like yellow freestone peaches, which run late July through the beginning of September, some might say that’s prime peach season! You will know when a peach is ripe when it no longer has any green coloring and presents a blush color. We have white peaches too, but for baking things like peach pie, we recommend yellow peaches for a stronger peach flavor.”
Tannwen Mount, co-owner of Terhune Orchards, says that their annual Just Peachy Festival in August is “a fun family festival filled with games, live shows, and activities for all ages. You can enjoy delicious peach treats including, for adults 21 and older, peach wine slushies and award-winning Just Peachy Wine.”
PEACH ORCHARDS AN HOUR OR LESS AWAY
Before you make the trip, call or check the website to see when your favorite peach variety will be available and confirm the picking times.
TERHUNE ORCHARDS
330 Cold Soil Road 609.924.2310
Just Peachy Festival August 2 and 3, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Read & Pick Peaches Program
August 5, 9:30 and 11 a.m. (Registration required) Peach season runs July-August. terhuneorchards.com
LEE TURKEY FARM
201 Hickory Corner Road, East Windsor 609.448.0629 leeturkeyfarm.com
GIAMARESE FARM AND ORCHARDS
155 Fresh Ponds Road, East Brunswick 732.821.9494 giamaresefarm.com
Open mid-June through beginning/mid-September for peaches. battlevieworchards.com
EASTMONT ORCHARDS
321 Route 537, Colts Neck 732.542.5404
Open mid-July through early to mid-September for peaches and nectarines. eastmontorchards.com
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.
Making the Pie Crust.
PEACH PIE
SERVES 10
Use my homemade pie crust and pair with slices of fresh peaches (hopefully handpicked at a local orchard!) and bake it to golden perfection. Add a dollop of ice cream from one of our local ice cream shops.
Pie Crust Ingredients:
2 ½ cups all-purpose flour (extra for dusting)
A pinch of table salt
Other Essentials:
Rolling pin
9 x 13 baking sheet
Food processor or stand mixer with hook attachment (or by hand)
A good paring knife or allpurpose knife
Soft-skin peeler
Pie Filling Ingredients:
½ cup apricot jam
In the food processor add the flour, a tiny pinch salt, sugar, and pulse. Add the diced butter and pulse a couple of times to break up the butter. Slowly stream the water into the food processor and mix until the dough forms together.
Alternatively, leave the diced butter on the counter for about 30 minutes, so it softens slightly. Then add it along with the rest of the pie dough ingredients to the stand mixer bowl and mix on medium speed. The dough should come together seamlessly.
Once the dough forms together, place it onto a clean floured work surface. Work the dough with your hands until the butter is well incorporated throughout the dough.
With a rolling pin, shape the dough into a rectangle on parchment paper. The dough should be about ½-inch thick. Transfer the pie crust with parchment paper to a baking sheet and use your fingertips press it into the pan. Pinch all around the edges of the dough to create a little rim, so the juices do not leak off the sides. You may also crimp the edges and add more details to make it pretty. Refrigerate the crust while you slice the peaches. Wash and dry the peaches. Peel off the skin (or you may leave skin on) and thinly slice the peaches. They don’t have to be perfect.
In the meantime, add the jam to a tiny pot and heat it on low. Add a few tablespoons of water and stir, turn off the heat, and let it cool. Then gently toss the fresh peaches into a clean bowl, pour in
2-3 tablespoons granulated sugar (feel free to add more)
6-8 large firm yellow peaches
Or 16 peach halves, jarred (or
Other Essentials:
Pastry brush
the cooled jam mixture, and add a few tablespoons of sugar and toss
Note: You may use peach halves in syrup, which taste equally good. In this case, drain them and thinly cut them. Do not add sugar. Brush on the jam.
Remove the pie crust from the fridge and pour the peaches onto the crust and spread with a spoon. For a more artful presentation, transfer each sliced peach half with a spatula onto the pie crust and place downward facing, keeping all the slices together. In this case, brush on the apricot jam mixture. This looks more like French tart. Place the pie in the oven for roughly 55 minutes. It is done when the edges and bottom are golden brown. Oven temperature can vary. If it’s browning too quickly, lower the oven temperature to 350 degrees after 20 minutes.
Don’t have time to bake? Go see Walter at Pie’d Piper at the Trenton Farmers Market for a delicious peach pie available JulyAugust, when peaches are in peak season. Their summer hours are Wednesday-Sunday. Tell Walter I sent you!
This peach pie recipe is featured in my cookbook, Food From My Heart & Home, where I also feature a delicious collection of healthy recipes. Vegetarian dishes are infused throughout the book, as are many wonderful spring and summer options. You can also follow me on Instagram @marioochcooks where I post daily cooking videos. My website is marioochskitchen.com.
Peach
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
Making the Granola.
On a cutting board lined with parchment paper, chop the almonds into tiny bite-sized pieces. Add the almonds to a bowl along with the oats, seeds, maple syrup, almond butter, and spices including a pinch of salt. Mix well. Reserve the raisins.
Add the mixture to a parchment-lined baking sheet. Bake in the oven for 10 minutes, and then press down the granola with the back of a spoon. Place it back in the oven for an additional 10-11 minutes, until golden. You don’t want it to burn, so after 21 minutes, take a look.
Note: to make this granola sweeter, add a good drizzle of honey to the granola once you place the mixture onto the pan and right before baking. Also, if the almond butter is hard, put it in a microwave-safe bowl and microwave for 20 seconds. If you are adding coconut flakes, do so halfway through baking, so they don’t burn
Let it sit on the counter untouched for 45 minutes, then add the raisins or chocolate chips or both! and break into chunks. This granola is so crunchy and delicious with an earthy undertone. The honey will add a bit of sweetness.
Store on the counter in a Mason jar with a tight-fitting lid for up to 1-2 weeks. You may also store it in the freezer for up
to 3 months. I freeze everything — granola, cakes, cookies, and cheesecake.
Baking tip: Simply add a piece of bread to your hard as rock brown sugar, tighten the lid, and leave it until the next day. It will be as smooth as sand!
Making the Yogurt-Peach
Parfait.
In a non-stick pan, melt the butter on medium low. In a bowl, add the sliced peaches along with the brown sugar and a pinch of cinnamon. Mix well. Pour the peaches into the warm pan and heat on medium low for 5 minutes. You may flip the peaches and heat an additional 4 minutes until they are caramelized. Optionally, after you take them off the heat, add a squeeze of lemon to brighten up the flavor.
Next, add some peaches to the bottom of the Mason jar, top with a little granola, then add the yogurt, more peaches, and top with more granola to your liking. A little drizzle of maple syrup would be a nice addition and enhance that caramelized flavor.
Any leftover peaches can be stored in the fridge or paired with some vanilla ice cream from Thomas Sweet Ice Cream or Halo Pub. Thomas Sweet has a wonderful variety of ice cream flavors. Halo Pub has over 50 crafted ice cream flavors and was the Town Topics Readers’ Choice Award Winner in 2023 for Best Ice Cream.
PEACH WHISKEY SMASH
Makes 3-4 drinks
My newly developed Peach Whiskey Smash combines perfectly pureed peaches, lemon, and a hint of brown sugar with whiskey or bourbon then muddled blackberries and basil leaves and topped off with ginger beer. Garnish with a peach slice, blackberries, and fresh basil leaves. This is so refreshing!
Ingredients:
1 cup fresh peeled and halved peaches (or canned halved peaches, no juices)
1 ½ organic fresh lemons, squeezed
1 tablespoon light brown sugar
4 ounces rye whiskey or bourbon
2 bottles of ginger beer
1 pint blackberries
Fresh basil leaves
Garnish: peach slices, blackberries, and basil leaves
Other essentials:
Shaker
3-4 lowball or whiskey glasses
Long toothpicks for securing peaches and blackberries
Cocktail muddler
High-speed blender
Ice cubes or 3 large square ice cubes
Add the peaches, lemon juice, and sugar to a blender. Blend on high until puréed. Next, add the peach purée to a shaker along with the rye whiskey (or bourbon) and some ice cubes. Shake for 20 seconds.
In each glass, muddle 3 blackberries and a basil leaf. Pour the peach mixture evenly into each glass. Add the ice or a large ice cube and top off with ginger beer. Be generous with ginger beer because it adds sweetness and nice flavor to this drink.
Lastly, garnish with peaches and blackberries secured on a toothpick. Add a few basil leaves for a pop of color.
Note: For a non-alcoholic version of this drink, simply follow all the steps, omitting the alcohol. Equally delicious!
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$2,195,000
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Timeless 1920's residence on 13 acres with pool, pool house, and detached 3 car garage Includes a 1 bedroom apartment with separate utilities and the potential for one additional building lot Main residence features 5 bedrooms and 4.5 baths.
20 Willow Street
$1,295,000
Downtown Princeton
Contemporary townhouse designed for a true lover of literature, the unit is lined with custom, floor-toceiling bookcases in nearly every room, currently home to a remarkable 20,000-volume collection. If you've ever dreamed of living inside your personal library, this might just be the one. Offering 3 bedrooms, 2.5 baths, 2 car garage and garden.
Q&A with Dr. August Leming, Founder and Creative Director of The Living Room at Princeton
Interview by Laurie Pellichero
What is The Living Room at Princeton, and what led you to start it in 2023?
Traditionally speaking, the Living Room at Princeton (TLR) is an outpatient substance use disorder and mental health treatment facility for adolescents and adults. In actuality, it is immeasurably more. TLR is a sacred space that invites both our members and team to directly meet and engage with the reality of their current moment experience from a place of unconditional friendliness. It is this unconditional friendliness that eventually leads to love in its truest form and true love includes everything, excludes nothing, and sees love behind all things. TLR was born of its creators’ commitment to their own daily practice and as a disruption to an industry in dire need of change.
What programs do you offer, and for what ages?
TLR currently offers daytime and evening Partial Hospitalization, Intensive Outpatient, and Outpatient programs for adolescents and adults suffering from mental health concerns and substance use disorders. TLR can work with people as young as 13 years old. TLR offers group and individual counseling, family therapy, psychiatric services including medication assisted treatment, and med management. We provide on-site educational services for adolescents as well as transportation for all members. The Living Room also maintains relationships with sober housing for adults.
What sets The Living Room at Princeton apart from other substance abuse and mental health treatment centers?
TLR is an insight-oriented retreat more than a treatment facility. We see behavior change as a consequence of insight as opposed to an outcome of behavioral intervention. Essentially, we take an insideout approach, inviting our members to live more skillfully, motivated by love for self and others. This experience is driven by classically trained clinicians who, more importantly, are deeply committed to self-exploration, unconditional love, and celebration of the perfectly imperfect human experience. I began my Buddhist studies at Columbia University 36 years ago. With over 25 years of continuous sobriety and an equal amount of time teaching and consulting internationally, I am uniquely positioned as perhaps the only owner and operator with this unique breadth of experience, education, and commitment to the wisdom traditions. As the creative director, my primary focus
is on the continued development of the entire team and the delivery of a therapeutic experience designed to open the minds and hearts of everyone blessed enough to call TLR home.
How do Eastern practices inform your approach?
Largely informed by Buddhist psychology, our clinical approach emphasizes the inescapable reality of present moment experience. The skillset required to connect more directly and remain open to the qualities of our current moment experience is foundational to the TLR approach. While we fully accept and celebrate the wisdom of Western psychology, we recognize that living successfully unavoidably equates to working with all the elements of the here and now.
How does the interior design of The Living Room contribute to each individual’s therapy program?
TLR was designed by a world renowned Disney Imagineer to repeatedly invite our members into the experience of awe and wonder. As the only constant contributor to the therapeutic experience, our physical space evokes feelings of safety, warmth, and curiosity. These attitudinal energies serve our staff and members well as they continually meet with and eventually come to know places and parts within themselves previously blocked by fear, confusion, and resistance.
What is the first step prospective patients should take when considering a treatment program at The Living Room at Princeton?
We invite anyone and everyone interested or even curious about what mental health or substance use treatment could be to set up a tour to meet our team and experience our space. Having given hundreds of tours to members, their loved ones, and the recovery community, we are repeatedly met with awe-inspired responses like “I never imagined recovery could look or feel like this,” “I never thought anything like this is possible, but it really is,” and “I wish I found you years ago, but I am thrilled to have found you now.”
The Living Room at Princeton 239 and 243 Wall Street, Princeton 732.276.2828;.livingroomnj.com
Dr. August Leming
CONSEQUENCES AND COINCIDENCES Books from University Presses and a Butterfly Surprise
BY STUART MITCHNER
Ever since binge-reading “Risk,” the 93-page-long first part of Why the Hindenburg Had a Smoking Lounge : Essays on Unintended Consequences (American Philosophical Society Press $34.95), I’ve been planning a Book Scene featuring Edward Tenner’s magnificent new collection. According to APS Press, the book is named “for one of the paradoxes that can result from the inherent contradictions between consumer safety and product marketing.” The author, a Plainsboro resident, puts it more succinctly: “The very idea of a smoking lounge immediately under 7 million cubic feet of flammable gas, advanced
precautions or no, seems ludicrous to generations familiar with the horrifying imagery of the airship’s end.”
Reviewing Our Own Devices: The Past and Future of Body Technology (2003), one of my first pieces for Town Topics , I used the term “Balzacian” to suggest the obsessive intensity with which Tenner explores every aspect of every subject he pursues. That same command of informative narrative explains how he’s managed to construct a page-turner from four decades of pieces for journals unlikely to make an everyday reader’s heart beat faster, such as The Miliken Institute Review , the Wilson Quarterly , and Technology Review
LOOKING FOR CONSEQUENCES
My “unintended consequence” has much in common with the old boyhood alibi “accidentally on purpose,” which is why I’m writing about Butterfly Moments in an issue of Princeton Magazine containing an article on butterflies in decline. Another article in the Summer issue, on New Jersey walking trails, gave me the cue for The Art of Walking: A History in 100 Images (Yale University Press 2 023). Call it coincidence or consequence, after beginning with Tenner’s book, published by APS, which joined forces with University of Pennsylvania Press in 2023, I’m adding new work by two local
university presses, Looking for a Story: A Complete Guide to the Writings of John McPhee (Princeton University Press 2025) and Raritan On War: An Anthology (Rutgers University Press paperback 2025).
BUTTERFLIES IN PRAGUE
A beautiful little volume published in Prague in 1954, Max Svabinsky’s Butterfly Moments is one of the most unlikely guests ever invited to a Book Scene. What attracted me when I first found it was the pen and ink sketch on the cover showing a pretty woman in an ankle-length dress with a butterfly net in her hand, her eyes fixed on the winged beauty she’s about to capture. That was even before I saw the 20 striking water colors by Svabinsky, who describes chasing “like a young savage” the Red Admiral, the Uuritcae, the Polychroros, the Atalanta, and the Antiope, and finally the “Parnassius Apollo, a butterfly of graphic beauty, white, the edges of its wings transparent as the thinnest of ricepaper,” its head “like that of a lamb with large black eyes.”
The woman on the cover reappears in the front and back endpapers like Svabinsky’s muse, his ideal, the love of his life. At first glance the front endpapers show nothing but the pond, dragonflies in flight, reeds bending, everything in a soft-leadpencil haze. Then you see her, up to her knees in the water, still with the net in hand, but without the dress.
On the rear endpapers she’s back in the dress, sprawled barefoot on the bank of the pond, dozing, hugging the grass, breathing it all in, the net flung to one side, the air alive with butterflies.
WALKING THE WALK
According to the publisher’s commentary, Barnard professor William Chapman Sharpe’s The Art of Walking is “the first book to trace the history of walking images from cave art to contemporary performance .... Whether sculpted in stone, painted on a wall, or captured on film, each detail of gait and dress, each stride and gesture has a story to tell, for every aspect of walking is shaped by social practices and environmental conditions. From classical statues to the origins of cinema, from medieval pilgrimages to public parks and the first footsteps on the moon, walking has engendered a vast visual legacy tightly intertwined with the path of Western art. The path includes Romantic nature-walkers and
urban flâneurs, as well as protest marchers and cell-phone zombies. It features works by artists such as Botticelli, Raphael, Claude Monet, Norman Rockwell, Agnès Varda, and Maya Lin.”
The New Criterion says Sharpe’s book has something for every rambler,” as it ranges from “early Egyptian wall paintings to Turner’s depiction of rubble tourists visiting Tintern Abbey to Christo & Jean Claude’s Floating Piers in Italy’s Lago d’Iseo.”
MCPHEE AS A CONSEQUENCE
Call it coincidence or consequence, at this moment I’m reading the fifth and latest of John McPhee’s Tabula Rasa , a “project meant not to end,” which appeared in the January 20, 2025 issue of The New Yorker . As Noel Rubinton points out in Looking for a Story , McPhee also calls it his “old man’s project.” So far, the highlight of the 2025 piece has been the section titled “The Pitted Outwash Plain.”
After describing “countless themes” that the title covers, from “the ride home in the school bus” to “the creation of the Great Lakes,” McPhee returns to his home on the Princeton Ridge: “I not only live on the pitted outwash plain, I am one.” His account of what that entails is a hoary AARP delight, ending thus: “I attribute my antiquity to dark-chocolate almond bark.”
Looking for a Story is, in the publisher’s words, “a complete reader’s guide to McPhee’s vast published work ... including remarkable early writing for Time magazine published without his name.” Beyond detailing more than 70 years of McPhee’s writing, Rubinton recounts his half century as a Princeton University writing professor, a littleknown part of his legacy. He “inspired generations of students who wrote hundreds of books of their own, also catalogued here.” As New Yorker editor and McPhee’s former student David Remnick comments, “With his exacting bibliography,” Rubinton “draws the map with the care and precision of his subject,” leading you “again and again, to where the gold is.”
RARITAN LIVES ON
Among Tenner’s strongest pieces in Why the Hindenburg Had a Smoking Lounge are the ones that first appeared in the quarterly review Raritan : “Confessions of a Technophile,” “Adam Smith and the
Roomba® ,” “Constructing the German Shepherd Dog,” and the volume’s concluding essay, “The Shadow: Pathfinder of Human Understanding.”
Raritan’ is Late Spring 2025, he and Karen Parker Lears have selected work that “typifies Raritan’
Raritan on War
Heuvel, editorial director and publisher of relevant collection of writings revealing the human, geopolitical, and moral costs of America’s long engagement with perpetual global war. War intervention in its revelations of the human consequences — at home and abroad — of the bipartisan commitment to war making.”
2024 introduction: “We are, once again, a world at war. Geopolitical elites are deploying the implacable forces of ethnocentric hatred and religious nationalism; ordinary people are paying a fearful price. Not for the first time: this has been the characteristic pattern of war for more than a century. Every selection in this anthology (except for the timeless casts light on modern war, observed or directly experienced. Most are grounded in particular places—Stalingrad, Halberstadt,
Budapest, Baghdad, Algiers, the Tamil ghost towns of Sri Lanka, the sixby-twelve-foot cell in Belmarsh maximum security prison where Julian Assange is held without bail for the act of revealing U.S. war crimes. Some recapture the actual look and feel of war, such as the sound of a Mozart concerto in D Minor, heard by a family hiding in a cave, played on their own piano by a Serbian sniper. Others take aim at the vast and vapid abstractions used to justify armed conflict, down to and including the use of nuclear weapons.”
THE BUTTERFLY SURPRISE
smiling on the Eurodisc cover, surrounded by butterflies.
•ELEGANT•ELUSIVE• AND ENDANGERED Butterflies in Decline
• BY SARAH TEO •
The Silver-Bordered Fritillary butterfly found itself reclassified this year on the New Jersey endangered species list, moved from “threatened” to “endangered” — but according to Sharon Wander, “It’s already gone. Those lists lag far behind reality, unfortunately.” Wander, an environmental consultant and past president of the New Jersey Butterfly Club (NJBC), says warming temperatures statewide are to blame, since the small orange-and-black insect prefers cooler climates. “Over time, it’s been found in higher and higher elevations … and in New Jersey, you quickly run out of elevation.”
She warns that other species will likely disappear statewide in the coming years, including Leonard’s Skipper, Indian Skipper, and Common Roadside Skipper.
The trend continues nationwide, across all butterfly species: the U.S. has seen a 22 percent drop in populations over a 20year time period (2000-2020), as published this past March in the journal Science
The same is true globally, according to the study’s writers, “especially in Europe.”
“Acting threats” include the usual suspects impacting biodiversity: climate change, habitat loss, and pesticide use.
have a fascinating life cycle: egg to caterpillar to chrysalis to butterfly. They’ve also been the muse of poetry and stories for centuries, and they’re part of many terrestrial ecosystems, both as a food source and as a pollinator.
A world without butterflies is hard to fathom. There are around 17,500 species worldwide in a rainbow of iridescent colors, and their annual appearance is almost synonymous with summer. They
“Butterflies may transport pollen farther than bees on average, due to not nesting and just traveling more widely. Long-distance pollination is important for plant species, so they don’t become inbred,” says Dr. Rachael Winfree, a professor in the Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Natural Resources at Rutgers University, New Brunswick. In her lab, Winfree and her team research changing biodiversity with a focus on the role of pollinators. When asked to comment on a paper she co-authored that addressed pollinator contributions to global crop yields (“Wild insects and honey bees are equally important to crop yields in a global analysis,” Global Ecology and Biogeography ), Winfree says, “There weren’t any crops where Lepidoptera [the order that includes butterflies and moths] made up a majority of visitors, but they did contribute a small number of visits to
Sharon Wander
Butterfly life cycle
New Jersey Butterfly Club field trip to Colliers Mills Wildlife Management Area. (Photo courtesy of NJBC)
Silver-Bordered Fritillary
many different crops”; some of the those included coffee, buckwheat, blueberries, and watermelon.
Fortunately, local conservation groups outside of the research lab give citizens the chance to engage with butterflies. In the early 1990s, biologist and author Jeffrey Glassberg founded the North American Butterfly Association (NABA), and Wander has been with the New Jersey chapter — one of 24 across 14 states — ever since. Monthly in-person meetings of the New Jersey Butterfly Club are at the Morris County Library, and members keep busy with field trips, talks at garden clubs, and participation in annual Butterfly Counts. “Counts are very intense,” says Wander. “You count every single butterfly you see within a 15-mile diameter circle during a one-day period, which is just like an Audubon Christmas Bird Count. Our submitted reports were part of that national study
published in Science ; we’re very proud of that. Unfortunately, it’s pointing out a sad fact of life, but it’s important to know what’s happening.” During field trips, participants use close-focus binoculars like the Pentax Papilio to see butterflies at close range, and many take photos. In addition, two “Recent Sightings” pages (under the “Butterfly” tab at their website, njbutterflies.org) allow residents to report sightings that include date and location.
Though the club is a rewarding community, Wander admits that a big challenge is attracting younger members.
“It’s very hard to pull younger people away from screens, and many kids don’t have an interest in the natural world. It’s a failure of our educational system that there’s virtually no nature education. And by the time they’re teenagers, it’s almost too late. We’ve given programs at schools and are happy to do it.”
In order to enjoy butterflies as a lifelong hobby, Wander says that “you really have to — no pun intended — get bitten by the nature bug!”
In central New Jersey, staff and even visitors to The Watershed Institute in Pennington take to the surrounding fields with nets in search of butterflies as well, intending to help populate the Kate Gorrie Butterfly House.
The popular outdoor structure, free and open to the public from mid-June to early October (during Watershed Center hours of operation), launched in 2000 and is an annual sanctuary for the butterflies brought there, seen in various stages of their lifecycle: egg, caterpillar, chrysalis, and fully formed insect. Sometimes Black Swallowtail Caterpillars (the state butterfly) are even transplanted from the parsley at Chickadee Creek Farm, an organic operation located on the reserve. “We have good neighbors around here,” says Alison Novobilsky, a Watershed Institute educator and naturalist. As a result, the Butterfly House is nearly always populated with butterflies from the reserve itself.
Red-spotted Purple. (Butterfly photos courtesy of NJBC)
Eastern Comma
Red-banded Hairstreak
Appalachian Brown
Common Buckeye
Northern Metalmark
How U.S. butterfly Populations changed by region, 2000-2020
A review of more than 76,000 surveys from across the contiguous U.S. found butterfly populations fell in almost every region from 2000 to 2020, and across almost every species.
Source: Colin Edwards, et al., Science 2025. MIDWEST MOUNTAIN-PRAIRIE
Watershed Institute educator and naturalist Alison Novobilsky engages the public at a butterfly festival. (Photos courtesy of The Watershed Institute)
Monarch caterpillar and butterflies. (Photos courtesy of The Watershed Institute)
“Our Butterfly House is made up of host plants, which are what butterflies lay their eggs on for caterpillars to eat, and nectar plants, which provide food for fully-emerged butterflies throughout the season,” says Novobilsky. One of her favorite things is to educate the public on these plants, in hopes that they’ll shop at nurseries and bring butterflies to their own garden. “And the same summer, you can have them visiting. You’re supporting them immediately.”
You’ll never find an Eastern Tiger Swallowtail in the Butterfly House (their host plants are trees), or a Mourning Cloak, since their caterpillars also feed off trees. But Black Swallowtails and Pearl Crescents are in residence annually, as well as Monarchs, which “are like the poster child of butterflies,” says Novobilsky. The Watershed Institute has partnered with Monarch Watch for over 20 years, tagging the well-known butterflies with the help of local school groups, corporate volunteers, and other adult programs. In the fall, the Monarchs living in southern Canada and the northeastern U.S. will migrate south,
headed to mountainous forests in central Mexico — a journey totaling somewhere between 2,500 and 3,000 miles. While the first non-migrating generations have an average lifespan of only two to six weeks, this last set will live up to an amazing eight or nine months. Overall, says Novobilsky, “Monarchs are speaking up for the other butterflies — they’ve all lost habitat due to people using too many pesticides and not planting native.”
Weekly Thursday morning Butterfly House tours begin June 26, and the Institute’s annual Butterfly Festival is the first Saturday in August. But in the meantime, Novobilsky encourages homeowners to reference the “Host Plants List” document located at thewatershed. org/butterfly-house, which provides a list of butterflyto-host and nectar plant matches. Those without gardening space shouldn’t be deterred, she points out: “Even if you have plants in patio pots, you can bring the butterflies!”
neonicotinoids. These are systemic and infiltrate the entire plant from root to pollen and nectar. Any caterpillar that eats the leaves can possibly die; any butterfly that drinks the nectar may not be killed outright, but it has a neurological effect on the insect.”
Before making a purchase, however, ask how the plant was grown, cautions Wander: “Many growers inoculate their plants with a class of insecticides called
Of course, this also translates to homeowners cutting out pesticide use on their own property so that the butterflies aren’t poisoned. In an episode from The joe gardener Show podcast from February 2024, “How Pesticide Regulations Fail Pollinators,” pollinator conservation specialist Emily May shares that “Home and garden use represents upwards of 25 percent of all insecticide use in the United States, so it is a really big sector and a place where we can make a big difference. Because a lot of that use is going in for aesthetic reasons, and not for economic reasons, like it is in agriculture. It’s not for a bottom line, it’s just to make a space look a little prettier.” May works for the Xerces Society, a nonprofit founded in 1971 and named after the Xerces Blue, the first American butterfly known to go extinct due to urban development. Multiple
Perennial Hibiscus
Purple Coneflower
Blue Mistflower
Spring Azure Butterfly
New England Aster
Perennial Sunflower
Monarch
Eastern Tiger Swallowtail
PHOTOS
resources can be found on their website, xerces.org, including more details on the harmful impact of pesticides and tips for ecological pest management.
In the podcast episode, May also shared some alarming information regarding agricultural pesticide use: In corn treated with neonicotinoids, about 2 to 3 percent of the active ingredient ends up in the plant, and more than 90 percent ends up elsewhere in the environment, including soil, air, water, and plants. Wildflowers growing around crop fields take up neonics and express them in their pollen and nectar. She shares, “And there
may lighten the load of toxins enough to keep the Monarchs (and other butterflies) flying.
Plus, other lawn care approaches help. Since butterfly species overwinter under leaf beds as caterpillars and pupae, a slow approach to spring lawn cleanup allows those butterflies-in-process time to safely emerge. In addition, the No Mow May movement allows grass and wildflowers to grow and thereby create habitat and forage for early season pollinators when floral blooms can be less common.
On a broader scale, concerned citizens can support a local or
a focus on bee conservation, but any bee-friendly landscape is also friendly to butterflies). Or try using a citizenreporting tool, like the one found at monarchmilkweedmapper.org. There’s often work to be done in HOA pesticide policies, and one can vote for government officials who will support initiatives that combat climate change.
In a world where influential people often don’t prioritize the planet and all of its creatures, it’s never been truer that, as Jane Goodall says, “What you do makes a difference, and you have to decide what kind of difference you want to make.”
Wander notes, “The home gardener is able to help species
BUTTERFLY
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AT PRINCETON
Using Heirloom Seeds of the Past to Create Heirlooms of the Future
BY WENDY GREENBERG
SEED ART BY JEFFREY E. TRYON PHOTOS COURTESY OF THE SEED FARM AT PRINCETON
“The care of the Earth is our most ancient and most worthy, and after all, our most pleasing responsibility. To cherish what remains of it and to foster its renewal is our only hope.”
― Wendell Berry, writer, environmental activist, and farmer.
ome years ago, Hopewell Township farmer and Princeton University faculty member Tessa Lowinske Desmond set out to write a book about seeds. While conducting research, she realized that although books can be useful, what the world really needs are more regionally adapted, resilient seeds. That realization led to a commitment to preserving culturally meaningful seeds with community partners, seeds that often go back generations and centuries.
The result is The Seed Farm at Princeton a 3.5-acre farm nestled amid the woods at the Stony Ford Research Station, a 99-acre property given to, and managed by, Princeton’s Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology. The unassuming farm, hidden off Pretty Brook Road on the edge of Lawrence and Hopewell townships, sits apart from the University’s many world-class research labs and state-of-the-art facilities. But for Desmond and her team, the contrast is an important aspect of the project.
that is shared across projects at the research station. Bucolic and serviceable, and, as Desmond described it, “unpretentious.”
It’s telling that an item on the farm’s wish list is a refrigerator working or not that they can use to incubate germinating seeds. “We don’t need a state-of-the-art appliance for that job, we just need an insulated box with shelves and a door,” says Desmond. “Farmers are efficient people, tinkers, and hackers who like to reuse. Out here, we’re farmers.”
The farm, which has no road sign, is marked by a field expanse, a plastic-covered high tunnel currently filled with heirloom collard greens setting their seeds, a shed, and a simple main building
What could be its most valuable asset is a committed group of students and community partners who regard the soil and the culture of growing with respect and admiration, or learn to do so. And this is crucial for taking good care of the Earth.
One of the aspects that appeals to seed keepers is mutualism the idea that plants complement each other, the practice of “companion planting” where one planting benefits another.
“It’s a model that nature gave us. Mutualisms happen in nature,” says Desmond, offering the example of the Three Sisters in which corn, beans, and squash exist in a symbiotic relationship practiced by Native American planters. Plant the corn first so it grows tall; encourage the beans to use the corn as scaffolding; and the beans, in turn, will provide nitrogen to the soil. The large squash leaves will shade the ground to reduce weeds, adds Desmond, who recommends Robin Wall Kimmerer’s book, Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants as essential reading.
Mutualism, in addition to being a result of companion planting, is also a metaphor for social interactions, something that very much aligns with Desmond’s way of life. “We can have different models for give and take with each other,” she says.
Tessa Lowinske Desmond
The high tunnel at The Seed Farm at Princeton.
TENDING RELATIONSHIPS
The Seed Farm’s website opens with the words, “Planting seeds, tending relationships,” and continues: “Though we come together from a wide range of disciplines and life experiences, we share a common focus: our work deals with questions of repair and mutualism including repairing relationships with land, soil, plants, the environment, and each other and thinking about the essential role that mutualisms play in processes of repair.”
Although Desmond has recollections of her grandparents’ Minnesota farm, she didn’t always devote her academic life to seeds. She was a member of her neighborhood’s community garden as a student at the University of Wisconsin, where she earned a Ph.D. in multi-ethnic American literature. Landing at Harvard, she created a course on food justice and the cultural impact of food while serving as a lecturer and the administrative director for the Committee on Ethnicity, Migration, and Rights. In 2018 she came to Princeton, where she built upon that course to increasingly focus her research on food, farming, and social movements. Desmond is currently a research specialist in the School of Public and International Affairs where, in addition to directing The Seed Farm, she also helped to found and co-leads
the Princeton Food Project and serves as co-principal investigator for the Heirloom Gardens Oral History Project.
When Desmond moved to the Princeton area, she started a homestead farm with her family and joined the Northeast Organic Farming Association of New Jersey (NOFA-NJ). Through NOFA-NJ, she met local farmers who were actively working to revitalize heirloom crops and develop open-pollinated local varieties that are adapted to grow well in this region, she says. The farming conferences she attended often ended with seed swaps, where attendees pulled seeds out of their pockets. “I was showing up emptyhanded,” she recalls. Others seemed to notice too, and, eventually, elders in the community asked her if she would start growing seeds with them. Knowing that she had limited capacity at her homestead farm to partner with seed keeping communities, she asked colleagues if it would be possible to designate a place on campus to grow seeds with students and other faculty.
The response was overwhelmingly positive, she says, and support from campus was warm and enthusiastic. Within a few months, land was being cleared and student interns recruited. The farm aligns with the mission and values of the University.
A seed farm is different from a campus garden, as seed farms are more suited to the academic calendar. “Seed farming doesn’t
Bagging okra flowers to manage cross-pollination for an okra oil seed study.
Service Focus cohort members at the Ujamaa Cooperative Farming Alliance Fall Convening.
require the attention that market crops require,” Desmond says. “In fact, you want the most resilient crops for seed instead of the ones that require perfectly weeded rows and ideal conditions.” To harvest seeds, the produce should be left in the field long after it would be if it were being harvested as food. At The Seed Farm, “when students return in the fall, the beans are on the vine, the squash is in the fields setting their seeds . . . seeds come at the end of a plant’s lifecycle.” Eggplants, for example, should be “brown, squishy, practically rotting before we harvest seeds. String beans — so tasty when they are young and green — are left to dry in pod,” she says, adding that they are harvested in October for seed instead of their July or August as they would be for food. “I can bring the dried beans to class with me in February,” she says. “Students can interact with the fruits of their labor.”
However, Desmond doesn’t know of another college with an established seed farm. That might change eventually, as she is interested in writing about how this farm can be a model for others. But for now, The Seed Farm at Princeton “is the only model like this in the country,” she says.
and determines the urgent research questions that are important to them regarding each crop.”
COMMUNITY PARTNERS
Nathan Kleinman, the co-director and co-founder of Experimental Farm Network Cooperative in Elmer, which works to emphasize collaboration among farmers and plant breeding as a whole, and Bonnetta Adeeb, the founder of Ujamaa Cooperative Farming Alliance which supports Black, Indigenous, People of Color (BIPOC) gardeners in distributing heirloom seeds are two longstanding community partners.
The Princeton model has community partners who bring seeds to cultivate. “We don’t decide what is rare or culturally important,” Desmond explains. “Our partners know that. Each organization identifies in spring what they would like us to grow,
For Kleinman, working with The Seed Farm was a “no-brainer,” he says. He had worked with Desmond before the farm existed, with Nanticoke winter squash seeds, which Kleinman got from an exchange in Iowa.
The Seed Farm at Princeton, he says, was the “perfect situation” because it is isolated from other farms, which he says is a major consideration. With Maycock summer squash (of the Nanticoke people), for example, a half mile from other plantings in the same family, like zucchini and orange pumpkin, is the distance necessary to try to maintain the character of the squash. The plants are pollinated by bees, which can move
Akhila Bandlora (PU ’24) planting a squash seedling.
Okra pods from the seed oil study drying in a greenhouse atop Maycock squash.
pollen a half mile. “If there is orange pumpkin next door, one could end up with crossed plants in the next generation, and there is no way to unwind that,” he says.
The now-called Maycock and Nanticoke Squash Revitalization Project was an example of collaboration between the Experimental Farm Network, Native Roots (which rematriates the squash to Nanticoke communities in New Jersey and Delaware), The Seed Farm, and Ujamaa (Adeeb’s seed cooperative and farming alliance).
“There’s nothing I know of that’s quite like The Seed Farm, Kleinman says. “Seeds are not on a lot of people’s radar. “
Adeeb’s involvement with the farm has been equally rewarding. Her seed journey began with the Garden Commission Cooperative in Philadelphia, where she met Kleinman, she recalls. During the pandemic, she set up an online store for heirloom seeds and received many donations offering free seeds to anyone in the country who could be reached by post office, realizing that many at that time did not have access to nutritious food. The challenge, she says, was that people were requesting meaningful seeds, often from the locales of their ancestors, and seed companies didn’t carry seeds like Scotch bonnet or okra. Seven growers became 20 growers, and became Ujamaa Cooperative Farming Alliance, now Ujamaa seeds.
touch the soil,” she says. “They want the oral history, to talk to the elders, offer support.” And there is the social aspect of community sharing.
She is now exploring polyculture at The Seed Farm, seeing what African seeds can be set up like Three Sisters, designing trials to find the best combinations and nutritional value.
Additionally, an okra breeding project with the Utopian Seed Project and Princeton University’s Conway Lab is developing a highoil seed variety which has entailed growing hundreds — and sometimes thousands —of okra plants, harvesting the seeds and analyzing them using NMR (nuclear magnetic resonance) technology available in chemistry labs.
In our projects with both okra and collards, says Desmond, “We’re making something new. We’re using heirlooms of the past to create the heirlooms of the future.”
THE FUTURE OF THE SEED FARM
Seeds are a teaching tool, notes Adeeb. “Young people want to
It is these collaborations that Desmond envisions when she thinks of the future of the farm and expanding it — not necessarily in major infrastructure or artifice, but the partnerships that are at the heart of the project. She wants more students to have the opportunity to engage with the farm, plants, and community
Sophia Stewart (PU ’24) and Gina Talt planting Lenni-Lenape blue pulling corn.
Students in the Land and Story in Native America class processing Nanticoke Squash for seed harvest.
Maycock Squash spiralized and dried, served in a Three Sisters soup at the Culinary Breeding Network’s Variety Showcase.
partners. And yes, perhaps expand the team’s staff so they can include more people, but the emphasis will continue to be on showing that a simple, organic project is meaningful.
The team has started to explore how they might include projects on heirloom and traditional perennial crops including fruits, nuts, and berries, and crops that are foraged as seasonal ephemerals in the woods.
One physical improvement on a wish list would be to rebuild an old farmhouse on the property, which burned in a fire last year. “We need a place to gather, host seminars and workshops, cook, and share meals. All of us who use Stony Ford Research Station are hoping to rebuild the farmhouse.”
“We just want to keep doing what we’re doing but bring in more people and expand to more crops,” she says, noting that the farm is still currently supported by seed funding from the University which will run out soon.
A ceremony on the farm has students in a circle holding seeds, a time to be more reflective, and show reverence for the seeds.
They might think about the Lenni-Lenape blue pulling corn that survived traveling from its original soil, was traded and shared, relocated, and made its way back to the Lenapehoking ancestral homeland. The history of a seed might be shared in the circle, and its importance. The circle conversation touches on gratitude, responsibility, and hope.
“When we knew we were going to keep this seed here from year to year, we knew we needed to find a way to set it apart and to be intentional with it, to make it special,” says Desmond, referring to the blue pulling corn. “In May, our seniors lead us in planting the corn. We plant it in a spiral shape on mounds with beans and squash. In the fall, we receive this beautiful blue corn dappled with white kernels.”
The Seed Farm’s purpose goes beyond cultivating seeds. It is a breeding ground for the way people can act. “I have brilliant colleagues and students on campus,” says Desmond. “The more we get out of our buildings, the more we put our hands in the soil, we can see that nature can be a real ally.
“If everyone loved one plant, think about helping to preserve that plant. Gardeners can save seeds. The old varieties change a little every year.
“You don’t need to be high tech. In many different Native American views there is an original agreement, the plants agree to give up wildness, and people agree to care for them. It’s the domestication of plants. I am trying to remind people of that commitment.
“What is very surprising is how responsive plants are to that care. They shift and realign their sensibilities for us. They are so adaptable.”
“I want our future thought leaders to know plants and soil, and have the wisdom that comes from that too,” she says.
Lenni-Lenape blue pulling corn at the Munsee Language and History Symposium.
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“From the beginning of my college search, I knew I wanted a medium-sized school with strong academics, abundant study abroad and research opportunities, and a strong sense of community that would remind me of the one I found here at Stuart. Duke strikes the perfect balance between rigorous academics, high-level research, focused undergraduate teaching, and the joy of a vibrant and energetic community. Ultimately, I chose Duke because it made me the most excited to delve into my interests and explore new ones in an environment that fosters multidisciplinary thinking and a strong sense of community.”
“From the beginning of my college search, I knew I wanted a medium-sized school with strong academics, abundant study abroad and research opportunities, and a strong sense of community that would remind me of the one I found here at Stuart. Duke strikes the perfect balance between rigorous academics, high-level research, focused undergraduate teaching, and the joy of a vibrant and energetic community. Ultimately, I chose Duke because it made me the most excited to delve into my interests and explore new ones in an environment that fosters multidisciplinary thinking and a strong sense of community.”
“From the start of high school, I knew I wanted to play lacrosse at the collegiate level while immersing myself in a challenging academic environment. As I began to define what I wanted from a college experience, a few priorities quickly stood out: the ability to explore a broad range of academic disciplines, the opportunity to build meaningful relationships with professors, and a campus culture grounded in kindness and genuine connection. I realized I was looking for a place where I could thrive both academically and athletically ... which led me to consider Division III programs where that balance is not only possible but encouraged. Throughout this process, I was fortunate to have incredible mentors [at Stuart]. Their wisdom reminded me to stay grounded, stay curious, and stay true to myself. In the end, I chose Williams because it felt like the right place for me—where I belonged, who I wanted to be surrounded by, and how I wanted to grow over the next four.”
“From the start of high school, I knew I wanted to play lacrosse at the collegiate level while immersing myself in a challenging academic environment. As I began to define what I wanted from a college experience, a few priorities quickly stood out: the ability to explore a broad range of academic disciplines, the opportunity to build meaningful relationships with professors, and a campus culture grounded in kindness and genuine connection. I realized I was looking for a place where I could thrive both academically and athletically ... which led me to consider Division III programs where that balance is not only possible but encouraged. Throughout this process, I was fortunate to have incredible mentors [at Stuart]. Their wisdom reminded me to stay grounded, stay curious, and stay true to myself. In the end, I chose Williams because it felt like the right place for me—where I belonged, who I wanted to be surrounded by, and how I wanted to grow over the next four.”
“As a first-generation student, I had little knowledge of the process or potential schools and felt anxious about how it would unfold. However, with Ms. Michalak’s guidance and support, I felt less alone navigating it all. At first, I didn’t have a specific school in mind, but I had a clear list of criteria: location, size, a strong sense of community, civic engagement, service, and global learning opportunities. I had never heard of Tufts, but a close friend recommended it. In the fall, I was accepted into their virtual flyin program. Even though it was online, I felt an indescribable pull towards Tufts. After speaking with students ... I couldn’t stop smiling at the thought of joining such a community where I could explore different avenues. The experience sealed it for me, and I ranked Tufts as my top choice. I am incredibly grateful to say that the day after my 18th birthday, I was matched with Tufts with a full-ride scholarship and will soon call it my new home this summer as a member of their BLAST program.”
“As a first-generation student, I had little knowledge of the process or potential schools and felt anxious about how it would unfold. However, with Ms. Michalak’s guidance and support, I felt less alone navigating it all. At first, I didn’t have a specific school in mind, but I had a clear list of criteria: location, size, a strong sense of community, civic engagement, service, and global learning opportunities. I had never heard of Tufts, but a close friend recommended it. In the fall, I was accepted into their virtual flyin program. Even though it was online, I felt an indescribable pull towards Tufts. After speaking with students ... I couldn’t stop smiling at the thought of joining such a community where I could explore different avenues. The experience sealed it for me, and I ranked Tufts as my top choice. I am incredibly grateful to say that the day after my 18th birthday, I was matched with Tufts with a full-ride scholarship and will soon call it my new home this summer as a member of their BLAST program.”
LOLA, DUKE UNIVERSITY
LOLA, DUKE UNIVERSITY
“Dogoyles” Around Town ACP Artist-in-Residence
Victor E. Bell’s Sculptures and Animal Activism
BY DONALD H. SANBORN III
A “magical mix of dog, dragon, and gargoyle” is how the Arts Council of Princeton (ACP) describes the sculptures of Victor E. Bell, its Spring 2025 Anne Reeves Artist-in-Residence.
Bell’s signature “dogoyles” are on display through September at locations around town and the area including the Princeton Public Library, Small World Coffee, and SAVE — A Friend to Homeless Animals (each dogoyle features a QR code on its label linking to SAVE, in hopes that viewers will donate to the animal shelter).
When I ask Bell about his connection with SAVE, he notes that his own dogs, despite having been rescued, are not from that shelter. However, “I’ve known people … who have rescue dogs from SAVE, and I really love the organization as a part of our community” he says. “So, I felt that they were a good organization to give back to, as far as a community fixture that everybody cares about.”
On the ACP website Bell explains his passion for sculpting dogs. “In 2018, my family rescued two dogs and they changed our lives. The unconditional love that a dog teaches us is truly otherworldly. This feeling of spiritual protection is what I am trying to capture in my sculptures. Similar to how a gargoyle protects a space by scaring off bad spirits, my gargoyle-esque creatures bring forth the same feeling of safety that a dog provides.”
He adds, “The art serves functionally as a vessel for love … my hope is these whimsical beasts can inspire others to create with their hands, hearts, and minds. By placing them throughout the community, I wish to remind people that while we are all different, we share the same feelings of love. These shared experiences are important to celebrate and are what will bring us all closer together.”
Victor E. Bell. (Courtesy of the Arts Council of Princeton)
AN ARTISTIC FAMILY
“Having grown up in Princeton, I was lucky enough to experience the magic of the Arts Council and the community from an early age,” Bell recalls on the Arts Council’s website. “My parents were both inspirational to me in their passions for creation, from my artist mother, Victoria, and my inventor father, Howard.”
Among the most recent creations by Victoria is a map of all the dogoyle locations, which is available on the ACP website at artscouncilofprinceton. org/victor-e-bell. Printed maps are available for pick up at the ACP and some participating merchants.
In college Bell’s major was in management information systems. “I graduated from Rowan University in 2019 with a Bachelor of Science in MIS,” he explains on the ACP website. “During my last semester, I took one ceramics class but did not plan on ever doing it again. I work for my family’s small business and until recently, I did not consider myself to be much of an artist.”
“I haven’t really had too much of a background in sculpting,” Bell tells me.
But he inherited from his mother, who is a painter, a passion for creating art.
Bell credits another important person in his life with inspiring him to pursue sculpting. “When I visited my girlfriend Amelia at her alma mater Vassar she was the vice president of the ceramics club,”
he recalls. “One weekend when I visited I went with her to the studio and made my first dog sculpture. In that moment I was hooked, I was so excited to see the piece come out of the kiln.”
Bell now lives in Jersey City. However, his parents still live in town, and at the time of our Zoom interview he was dogsitting the family’s two dogs: Penny (a dark brown hound with a white snout, who is one of Bell’s first muses and models); and Dibz (a mostly beige and white boxer). He explains that Dibz is so named because he “was a rescue, and we had ‘dibz’ on him.”
Samples of Bell’s early work, inspired by Penny, are at his parents’ house. Aiming the camera at a few of them, the sculptor explains, “These pieces are my beginning into sculpting; this was the journey.”
One of the pieces is a mostly light red dog, with a white stripe running down the middle of its head. “This is the first piece that I made at the Arts Council,” Bell says. Pointing to another sculpture — also with a white stripe, but generally a darker, brownish color – he continues, “This piece was the first dog that I made with my girlfriend, Amelia, when we started dating.”
Bell continues, “I happened to take a class where [one of the teachers] had sculpted dogs, and she helped me progress in depicting the form of the dog. At the Arts Council there were some great instructors who helped me get a solid base for what I was trying to accomplish.”
“It’s great to be able to think an idea, and make it with my hands,” he adds. “That’s what’s drawn me to the medium of ceramics.” He is quick to emphasize that he is grateful for the opportunity to “run ideas off of other artists in spaces like the Arts Council.”
ARTIST-IN-RESIDENCE
Bell explains that his residency with the Arts Council came about when Artistic Director Maria Evans “saw the sculptures that I was making at the Arts Council, and told me that I should have a show. At that point, I had already thought of the idea of doing this project for SAVE, so I brought that up to her. She was looking for an artist-in-residence for the spring, so it worked perfectly at that time.”
The residency entailed completing the 12 dogoyle sculptures that are placed in different venues around Princeton. They were completed by Memorial Day weekend.
A map of all the dogoyle locations by Victoria Bell, the sculptor’s mother. Cobalt Dibz. (Courtesy of Victor E. Bell)
Asked how long it took to sculpt each dogoyle, Bell responds that “each part takes a different amount of time. Sculpting takes about 15 hours for each piece, and the glazing takes at least another five. So, I’m going to say 20 hours on each of the 12 sculptures.”
When I asked him to describe how his wish to evoke a dog’s “spiritual protection” translates into his creative process, Bell replies, “As a dog owner yourself, I’m sure you know the feeling when you look at them, and they look at you. I don’t think I could capture it in art. But I try to capture that feeling when you look at a dog, and I hope that my sculptures are a vessel for people to be able to put that feeling into an object, into space — to see something and have it be comforting.”
He reflects, “The love of an animal, and the love that we feel for an animal, is something that ties us all together as a shared experience. As humans, when we look at a dog, we all have the same feeling. That’s a unifying idea which brings us all together.”
Regarding the process of blending dogs and gargoyles, Bell says that a dog lends itself to becoming “a mystical being. When you look at your dog, you notice that it has these funny ears, and this face that is so sweet that it’s almost magical. I try to
capture the magic of the dog, and then add some features that are otherworldly.” He adds, “As a new artist, I don’t know if I’m able to fully do a realistic dog; but I can caricature the dog’s expression and energy.”
DOGOYLES
Bell tailored each sculpture to the venue at which it was to be be displayed. “Hoagie Haven has a dog who’s lying on top of a hoagie,” he explains. “The library has a dog who’s sitting on top of three books.”
“For the Garden Theatre, I made a dog who’s sitting on a popcorn bucket; the popcorn is sort of like a dragon’s hoard of gold,” Bell continues. “For Labyrinth Books I did a minotaur bulldog — the minotaur in the labyrinth.” He adds, “The labyrinth is a solvable maze!”
“I’m trying to make it fun for people to see what can be possible,” Bell says when I observe that he seems to have a distinct sense of humor. “I haven’t been doing this too long, and it’s fun to be able to think of ideas that will bring a smile to people’s faces.”
We discuss individual pieces, beginning with one that has a distinct blue hue. “This is the first dogoyle to which I added more detail in the horns and wings, and played
with the glazes a bit more than I had in the past,” Bell says. He explains that it was an early attempt “along the path that has led me to the ones that I’m making now.”
Bell adds that some of the sculptures, including this one, are designed to be “bud
(Courtesy of the Arts Council of Princeton)
Kona the Kind. (Courtesy of Victor E. Bell)
Works in progress. (Courtesy of Victor E. Bell)
vases. The piece is hollow, so it has water inside; the flower sits in his horn.”
Another sculpture, which depicts a dog climbing a tree, was created “for my mom. Dibz loves to chase squirrels, so he stood up on the tree, and was looking at the squirrel.”
“This piece is titled I Wish I Had Wings, because I wanted to capture how the dog comes close to nature,” Bell continues. “It comes close to the magic of being a beast in the wild. But he still can’t climb the tree and be the hunting animal that he feels he is inside. He dreams of catching the squirrel, [echoing] the dreams that we have about life. I want to capture
the joy of humans through the joy of animals; that’s what I’m trying to do with the magical dogs.”
Bell’s dogoyle sculptures will be on view in local businesses through September. Subsequently there will be a show at the Arts Council in December.
Asked what he most wants readers to know about his work, Bell says, “I think the important thing that I’m trying to capture is the joy of creating, and the joy that a dog can inspire in you. When you see a dog, it inspires a feeling of love — which is important to have every day. It’s important to recognize the stuff that brings us together as people — that connects us all.”
Dedicated to the memory of the writer’s dog Gilbert (2008-2025).
I Wish I Had Wings. (Courtesy of Victor E. Bell)
Princeton Public Library
Princeton Record Exchange Labyrinth Books
Princeton Garden Theatre
(Courtesy of the Arts Council of Princeton)
(Courtesy of the Arts Council of Princeton)
A WELL-DESIGNED LIFE
1) Esme sunglasses, starting at $95; warbyparker.com
8) Loving Pets Blue Bella travel bowl; $9; concordpetfoods.com
9) Danner Women’s Trail Junction in bracken/peridot; $140; roadrunnersports.com
10) MSR PocketRocket stove kit; $120; rei.com
Mount Tammany at the Delaware Water Gap.
For hikers, and hikers in the making, New Jersey has it all — the Appalachian Trail, hikes by waterfalls, beach hikes, rocky hikes, grassy meadows, state parks, overlooks, challenging hikes, strolling ... It’s all there for the adventurous and the mindful walker.
AllTrails.com lists 1,478 hiking trails and 1,032 walking trails in New Jersey. Here is a sampling of popular hikes transversing New Jersey from north to south.
These summaries include information from alltrails.com, njhiking.com, and other websites. To supplement the briefs, these sites list mileage, photos, how to get from point A to point B, where there are restrooms, benches, and sometimes nearby restaurants.
On a clear day you can see Pennsylvania: Hike to the highest elevation in New Jersey and enjoy panoramic views of New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and New York. Anthony and Susie Dryden Kuser donated a monument and 16,000 acres of land to create High Point State Park. A memorial to New Jersey veterans, the 220-foottall obelisk has 291 steps inside to the top, and at 1,803 feet marks the highest elevation in the state. A 3.8-mile trail goes from the Appalachian Trail lot to the monument and back, and there is a shorter version, both with varying rocky and smooth terrain. On the way to the monument, a raised observation platform offers panoramic views. Parking is available at multiple lots; however, the office lot has a two-hour limit.
Buttermilk Falls
Delaware Water Gap
Milford Bluffs
Goat Hill Preserve
Sourland Mountain Preserve
Hacklebarney State Park
MOUNT TAMMANY VIA RED DOT TRAIL/ MOUNT MINSI (PA.) AND DELAWARE WATER GAP TRAILS / DELAWARE WATER GAP NATIONAL RECREATION AREA
Mind the Gap: At the border of New Jersey and Pennsylvania, the Delaware River has cut through the Kittatinny Ridge leaving a gap, with Mount Tammany on the New Jersey side, and Mount Minsi on the Pennsylvania side. Awaiting you are nearly 70,000 acres of breathtaking scenery along 40 miles of the Delaware River, winding through the Appalachian Mountains. The
Palisades Interstate Park
Herrontown Woods Lawrence Hopewell Trail
length is 3.5 miles to Mount Tammany on the Jersey side; Mount Minsi, 5.5 miles round trip. The terrain is slightly steep, but the payoff is a spectacular view. Photos of Mount Minsi are often mistaken for Mount Tammany, and one can see one from the other. Mount Minsi is known for rhododendrons that bloom in July. Parking may fill up early on nice weekends, but there is a Hiker Shuttle, if running, from Memorial Day through August 31, between Kittatinny Point Visitors Center and the DWG Park and Ride just over the bridge in Pennsylvania. Check gomcta.com for schedules and routes.
View from Mount Tammany. (Photo by Jeffrey E. Tryon)
High Point State Park Monument. (Photo by Jeffrey E. Tryon)
Rancocas State Park
Island Beach State Park
Cape May Point State Park
Wharton State Forest (Pine Barrens)
NEW JERSEY PORTION OF APPALACHIAN TRAIL (WITH BOARDWALK SECTION) AND SUNFISH POND, STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN
443 Vernon Warwick Road, Vernon Township takeahike.us/stairway-to-heavenwawayanda-state-park
The views! After a short approach to Sunfish Pond via Garvey Springs, this hike yields expansive views along the Appalachian Trail, through some beautiful forests to a glacial lake 1,000 feet above the surrounding area. The terrain at Garvey Springs is a short but steep way to get to Sunfish Pond, but the steep climb is at the beginning. Few species live in Sunfish Pond because of its natural acidic composition, but among them are yellow perch and pumpkinseed sunfish. The Stairway to Heaven hike is a 1.3-mile section of the Appalachian Trail in Wawayanda State Park that climbs Wawayanda Mountain and leads to the Pinwheel’s Vista viewpoint of the Vernon Valley, the Kittatinny Ridge, and even the Shawangunk and Catskills. High Point Monument might be seen on a clear day, across the valley along the Kittatinny Ridge, so bring binoculars. Nearby is
a hike across a marshy area on a long boardwalk to the Pochuck Suspension Bridge, where there may be turtles below.
BUTTERMILK FALLS IN SUSSEX COUNTY
Mountain Road, Layton, Walpack Township
visitnj.org/article/nj-waterfalls
How high is Buttermilk Falls? Answers vary, from 70 feet to 200 feet. But it is generally agreed to be New Jersey’s tallest waterfall. The falls are actually steps away from the parking lot, so it isn’t actually a hike to view it. But elaborate stairs can be climbed to get views from the side and top of the waterfall. Visitors will find a small wheelchair-accessible lot adjacent to the falls, along with a viewing platform that allows one to get close to the cascades. The name is believed to come from the frothy, white appearance of the water as it tumbles down the rocks, resembling buttermilk. For hikers, the 1.4-mile Buttermilk Falls Trail in the Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area starts with a steep stair climb to the top of Buttermilk Falls and the Appalachian National Scenic Trail for spectacular views of the valley below.
PALISADES INTERSTATE PARK
Henry Hudson Drive, Alpine njpalisades.org/trails.html
Riverside to rocks: From strolls to challenging rock scrambles, there is a lot of variety on the Palisades trails. The park is about 12 miles long and half a mile wide, with 2,500 acres of wild Hudson River shorefront, uplands, and cliffs. The Giant Stairs at The Palisades are not to be confused with Stairway to Heaven. The Giant Stairs is a long section of huge boulders that have tumbled from the Palisades. Surfaces range from flat to very rocky, including a mile of scrambling over large boulders. Hikers are warned that it is steep down and back up from the Shore Trail with steep cliff drop-offs: avoid when wet or icy. But it is said to be a fun and unique hike that features the largest rock scramble available in New Jersey. If you use trekking poles for the steep descent/ascent to the shoreline, be sure to have a way to stow them or strap them to your pack — you need both hands to be free on the Giant Stairs. The Peanut Leap Cascade is a short but steep hike section of the Giant Stairs that avoids the more challenging rock scramble.
HACKLEBARNEY LOOP TRAIL
LONG VALLEY, BLACK RIVER
119 Hacklebarney Road, Long Valley nj.gov/dep/parksandforests/trailguides/ docs/Hacklebarney-Trails.pdf
Along the river: Great for viewing multiple cascades along the Black River, this popular 2.1-mile loop trail near Long Valley is considered a moderately challenging route, good for beginners or for quick hikes. The trail is open yearround and is beautiful to visit anytime. Dogs are welcome and may be off leash in some areas. This loop hike is said to be relaxing and will take you down into the Black River as well as along Rhinehart Brook, hemlock ravines, and mature hardwood forests. The trails are wide with added gravel. There are a few narrower and rockier trails along the Black River that are more like traditional hiking trails. The trails pass benches and picnic areas, not to mention old (not in use) water fountains built by the Civilian Conservation Corps during the Great Depression.
Hacklebarney State Park. (Photo by Jeffrey E. Tryon)
Bluffs Await: Hike to steep cliffs overlooking the Delaware River into Pennsylvania. The Breden Preserve, lauded for its breathtaking views of the Delaware River and beyond, is a mix of forest, fields, and the hot, dry microclimates on the red shale bluff. Unusual for Hunterdon County are the prickly pear cacti found growing along the road at the base of the cliff. Steep cliff edges with crumbly shale rock call for caution. There is a 1.7-mile loop trail, Milford Bluffs Tail, which is considered a moderately challenging route and is great for birding and walking. Leashed dogs are welcome. The Preserve sits atop a plateau and includes woodlots, old fields, and a hemlock-shaded trout stream. With cooperation from a local farmer, late season hay mowing benefits grassland songbirds such as the bluebird, meadowlark, and bobolink that find the high grass to their liking.
GOAT HILL PRESERVE, LAMBERTVILLE
Parking: 20 George Washington Road Coon Path, Lambertville njhiking.com/goat-hill-overlook
High on a hill: This preserve perches on a ridge above the Delaware River just south of Lambertville, offering numerous trails through mature hardwoods and great views of the river to the north, west, and south from overlook points that are dotted along the length of the preserve. Hike to a fantastic view over the Delaware River, Lambertville, and New Hope, Pa. Bowman’s Tower is just visible across the Delaware River in Pa., at the far left. For about 2.4 miles the easy, gravel path is somewhat uphill, and the longer route sports light rocks. The preserve is part of Washington Crossing State Park.
SOURLAND MOUNTAIN PRESERVE
421 East Mountain Road, Hillsborough somersetcountyparks.org/ sourland-mountain-preserve
Hike the Sourland Mountains: The 6,300-acre preserve occupies a portion of the northeast point of the Sourland Region, which stretches southwest across
Goat Hill Overlook. (Photo by Jeffrey E. Tryon)
View from Millford Bluffs. (Shutterstock.com)
Hillsborough and Montgomery townships through southern Hunterdon and northern Mercer counties to the Delaware River. Hike over boardwalks and through the boulders of Devil’s Half Acre and Roaring Rocks for about 5.7 miles in this very rocky area with some slight elevation. Mountain biking, horseback riding, and bouldering are also allowed. A shorter trail (4.9 miles) is easy to navigate, with interesting rock formations. Though the trail requires no scrambling, bouldering is allowed here so energetic hikers can clamber around the big rocks in Devil’s Half-Acre. There are boardwalks over potentially wet areas.
HERRONTOWN WOODS
600 Snowden Lane Herrontown Woods.org
Princeton’s own: Herrontown Woods, part of a large corridor of preserved land lying across the eastern end of the Princeton Ridge, offers more than three miles of trails through a peaceful, mature forest. The preserve includes the headwaters of a pristine tributary of Harry’s Brook, and several rocky streams that join near the parking lot. Boulders increase in size and number as trails rise in elevation and are covered in moss and lichen. The 142-acre property is owned by the Municipality of Princeton and cared for by the Friends of Herrontown Woods (FOHW.org). See the Veblen House, a gift from Elizabeth and Oswald Veblen, who was a Princeton University mathematician. The “barden,” a botanical art garden, is an example of harnessing nature to make art. There are some 57 diverse tree species in Herrontown Woods, and more than three miles of trails crisscross the dense growth in this 100-acre preserve with native flora lining the paths.
LAWRENCE HOPEWELL TRAIL THROUGH MERCER MEADOWS AND THE POLE FARM
The Historic Hunt House 197 Blackwell Road, Pennington lhtrail.org
LHT: a mix of woodlands and fields, the Lawrence Hopewell Trail (LHT) winds for 20 miles through Lawrence and Hopewell townships. The Mercer Meadows–Pole Farm segment of the LHT travels through the Pole Farm district of
the 1,600-acre Mercer Meadows Park for 1.85 miles, with signage explaining that from 1929 to 1975, the Pole Farm District was owned by American Telephone and Telegraph (AT&T) and was the site of a large shortwave radio station used for international communications. From this area, the LHT continues to travel north for 0.60 miles through a mix of meadow and wooded areas, then east along Cold Road as it wraps around a meadow and arrives at Blackwell Road, travelling through the Rosedale Park district, providing a scenic and tranquil setting for picnics, walks, and outdoor recreation, with access to the Stony Brook, Willow Pond, and Rosedale Lake. The LHT continues on the north side of Blackwell Road along the driveway access to Hunt House: built in the 1700s by Noah Hunt, it anchored a prosperous farmstead, now on the National Register of Historic Places in 1988 and the office of the Mercer County Park Commission.
Mercer Meadows. (Photo by Jeffrey E. Tryon)
Sourland Mountain Preserve, Devil’s Half-Acre. (Photo by Cristina and Jeff Tryon)
RANCOCAS STATE PARK NORTHERN LOOP, RANCOCAS STATE PARK CREEKSIDE, AND MOSSY BLUFF TRAIL
Wildlife observation: The sandy trail that runs along the winding Rancocas Creek and passes by the remains of an old house is a little more than 3 miles, with minor hills. The Northern Loop is almost 3 miles, near Hainesport Township and considered an easy route — it takes just under an hour to complete it. A popular area for birding, cross-country skiing, and fishing, it is open year-round and is beautiful to visit anytime. Dogs are welcome and may be off-leash in some areas. The Creekside and Mossy Bluff Trail offer a picturesque hike along a wooded bluff overlooking the Little Red River. As you wind along the path, you’ll be treated to scenic panoramas of the dam and the surrounding landscape. The area is rich in flora and fauna, providing ample opportunities for wildlife observation.
PINE BARRENS — DOUBLE TROUBLE STATE PARK, BATSTO VILLAGE,
A Pine Barrens vista: Double Trouble State Park offers easy, sandy trails
through the Pine Barrens and around cranberry bogs with views of Cedar Creek and several reservoirs near village buildings from the early 20thcentury cranberry industry in New Jersey. The main portion is on wide, packed sand roads around old cranberry bogs, designated an “easy walk,” but the Swordens Pond and Clear Brook trails offer a more vigorous hike. The fresh, pure waters of Cedar Creek, a Pine Barrens ecosystem surrounding a former company town, provided power and raw materials to a sawmill and large cranberry operation at Double Trouble Village. Cedar Creek serves canoeists and kayakers, while hikers, photographers, mountain bikers and horseback riders enjoy the miles of marked trails through pine forests and cedar swamps. An easy loop through the Pine Barrens is along Batsto Lake Trail, about 4 miles of flat packed sand trails. Strolling through the historic village and buildings of Batsto adds a few miles; there is also the option of a long 53-mile Batona Trail. A fee is charged from Memorial to Labor Day. Information on the NJ State Park Pass.
Rancocas State Park. (Photo by Jeffrey E. Tryon)
The Pine Barrens. (Photo by Jeffrey E. Tryon) Historic houses at Batsto Village. (Shutterstock.com)
ISLAND BEACH STATE PARK
2401 Central Avenue, Seaside Park nj.gov/dep/parksandforests/parks/ islandbeachstatepark.html
A Jersey Shore hike: Short trails to the ocean and bay sides of a barrier island, and along an undeveloped beach with views of Barnegat Lighthouse. The terrain is mostly level and varies between easy dirt and deep, soft beach sand. One trail is an accessible boardwalk. Approaching the inlet, conditions can get windy. NJHiking. com suggests hiking to “both the ocean and the bay from the middle of a skinny strip of raw, undeveloped Jersey shore. Bundle up against a brisk wind in winter to avoid the bugs (and crowds) of warmer months.” Tip: walking at the water’s edge you may be dodging fishing poles. There are a series of parking areas with trails leading either to the ocean or the bay side, a boardwalk trail, plus various beach access paths. There is a fee year-round and higher in season (Memorial — Labor Day); covered by the NJ State Park Pass.
CAPE MAY POINT STATE PARK
303 County Hwy 629, Cape May capemay.com/play/cape-maypoint-state-park
See the lighthouse: Cape May Point State Park is a 244-acre park located in Lower Township. The park offers walking, hiking, and nature trails as well as beaches, an exhibit gallery, a ranger office, and is the site of the Cape May Lighthouse. The park is operated and maintained by the New Jersey Division of Parks and Forestry and is considered one of the best places in North America to view the fall bird migration to the south, as birds await favorable winds to cross the Delaware Bay. The park has three hiking trails, all start and end at the parking lot. The Red trail, a boardwalk trail that is wheelchair accessible, is a half mile long and has several observation platforms. The Yellow trail is part boardwalk and part dirt. The blue trail includes part of the beach. The park’s trails and beach connect to the adjacent 200-acre South Cape May Meadows owned by The Nature Conservancy. There are no park or entry fees.
Island Beach State Park dune trail.
(Photo by Jeffrey E. Tryon)
Cape May Lighthouse. (Shutterstock.com)
Oystercatcher. (Shutterstock.com)
Woodrow Wilson’s Meticulously Preserved Family Home
82 Library Place, Princeton, New Jersey | callawayhenderson.com/id/R45ZB9 | $6,500,000
Presenting the meticulously restored home of President Woodrow Wilson, a spectacular Tudor Revival on the most iconic block in Princeton’s coveted Western Section. The award-winning project by architect Ron Berlin and Baxter Construction was a seven-year labor of love that created a welcoming home for future generations and rescued an irreplaceable piece of history. Burnished woodwork was revived, leaded glass windows repaired, fireplaces retiled, systems modernized… the list is endless and the result is stunning!
BARBARA BLACKWELL Broker Associate c 609.915.5000 o 609.921.1050
bblackwell@callawayhenderson.com callawayhenderson.com 4 Nassau Street, Princeton, New Jersey 08542
Legacy Oak Farm
Legacy Oak Farm | 2727 Aquetong Rd, New Hope, PA | $5,949,000
When the gates open at Legacy Oak Farm, you immediately recognize that you not only entered a grand estate and equestrian property, but a property that has been meticulously planned and designed. The stone home is traditional in some ways, but incorporates modern and expansive changes when you enter the welcoming foyer with its limestone flooring with onyx inlays, it sets the stage for what is coming before you. The massive living room/Great Room to the right features a wall of glass, 20-foot ceilings, and twin massive crystal chandeliers. The built-in bookcases and gas fireplaces add to the enchantments as you look through the French doors to the stunning barn in the distance. To the left of the foyer is the dedicated dining room that is banquet-size. It features crown moldings, custom millwork, and an ornate ceiling design. The kitchen is a suite unto itself. Natural light flows in from all directions. The nucleus of the gourmet kitchen is the 50-foot limited edition La Cornue hunter green and gold double oven.
River Breeze Farm
River Breeze Farm | 119 Federal Twist Rd, Stockton, NJ | $2,875,000
In the heart of beautiful Hunterdon County, spanning the townships of Delaware and Kingwood, sits one of the most spectacular agricultural properties in our area—RIVER BREEZE FARM. This remarkable estate welcomes you via a long private drive that leads to TWO CONTRASTING HOMES: a HISTORIC FARMHOUSE circa 1800 and a striking MODERN FARMHOUSE with open-concept design. Gracefully positioned across 110 ACRES—60% pasture with the balance forming a wooded natural perimeter—this extraordinary property is ideal for an equine facility or farm with sheep, cattle, or alpacas. The farm is under preservation, with an exception that permits continued use and enjoyment of the existing homes and barns. Delaware Twp and Kingwood Twp - Hunterdon County. Carle Robbins, Broker/Salesperson: 215-534-1639.
110 Acres with Two Homes RiverBreezeFarmNJ.com
550 Union Square, New Hope, PA 18938 • AddisonWolfe.com
