Great Egg Harbor River National Scenic and Recreational River

The Great Egg Harbor River corridor illustrates the intricate links between life and landscape in southern New Jersey. From the days of native Lenape Indians and early Dutch settlers, the river and surrounding sandy flatlands have shaped and been shaped by farming, ironmaking, shipbuilding, fishing, and glassblowing. Some trades have disappeared over the years, but many still reflect traditional ways of life tied to the land and the waterways.

John James Audubon Visits: Oysters and Birds, Birds, Birds

"Many a drawing I made at Great Egg Harbor, many a pleasant day I spent along its shores," painter-naturalist John James Audubon wrote in his diary.

After failing at a few business ventures, Audubon wandered about the United States producing paintings of different bird species, which he later published as The Birds of America. His travels included visits to New Jersey.

In 1829 he bargained with a fisherman to take him across the bay to the Great Egg Harbor area to sketch and do some "shooting and fishing, with long excursions in the surrounding swamps and marshes." He stayed at the "house of a veteran fisherman and gunner" whose daughter was as "wild as a Sea Gull" and whose wife served a meal of oysters "as large and white as any I have eaten."

"Dawn in New Jersey in June is worth a better description than I can furnish," Audubon wrote. "…the moment the sunbeams blazed over the horizon, the loud and mellow notes of the Meadow Lark saluted our ears…. I saw several Fish Hawks’ [ospreys’] nests on the tallest trees…. Except for the Florida Keys, Great Egg Harbor probably affords the naturalist as varied a field as any part of our Atlantic seaboard. Birds, fishes, and testaceeous [hard-shelled] animals abound….

"I passed several weeks here…one day in search of Herons breeding in the swamps…another among the joyously crying Marsh Hens…or among the Whitebreasted Sea Gulls….or watched the gay Terns dance in the air before they plunged after tiny fry in the waters." And, as indicated by these paintings, he closely observed a variety of sparrows and native plants.

Today, the family estate is the Mill Grove/Audubon Wildlife Sanctuary, and the Great Egg Harbor River area remains one of the best bird watching spots on the east coast.

Fishing, Iron and Glassblowing in the Garden State

Long before Europeans arrived in North America, the Lenape settled in this region and traveled about the waterways in their canoes. The Lenape hunted deer and elk, caught herring and shad in fish weirs, gathered berries and fruits, harvested clams and oysters, and raised corn, beans, and squash.

The Dutch first settled along the coast and up the riverways in the early 1600s and made their living primarily from fishing, trading, and, later, shipbuilding. The discovery of swamps full of rot-resistant cedars bolstered the shipbuilding and timbering industries in the Pinelands. Mays Landing was founded in the 1740s as both a port and shipbuilding town. Swedes and other Europeans moved into the area. During and after the American Revolution, pacifist Quakers, bootleggers, smugglers, and pirates sought refuge in the pine forests. Individualism became an enduring characteristic of Pinelands residents.

After the discovery of bog iron ore, furnaces were established to produce pig iron from which cast iron products were forged. Trees were harvested to make charcoal to burn in the furnaces. Gradually the settlers formed villages and built roadways to transport their goods. The iron industry thrived until the mid-1800s when higher quality iron ore was discovered in Pennsylvania, where coal could power the furnaces.

With so much sand in this region of New Jersey, it is no wonder that glass-making blossomed in the mid-1700s. Glass manufacturing flourished for nearly a century and continues in varying degrees today in a few nearby communities.

In the early 1800s entrepreneurs started making paper from grass fibers and from rags, but that industry lasted only about 100 years. While some industries have come and gone, agriculture continues to be the area’s main economic force. With such extensive flatlands and so much water close to the surface, it is not surprising that the area has many farms raising vegetables, fruits, and berries and that New Jersey is known as the Garden State.

As the riverway flows on and the tides move in and out, the evolving lives of plants, wildlife, and humans continue to be linked inextricably with the subtleties of the land.