The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1894-07-23

any WAS suspended. Afniu tue Jofous l'7'tiee
of bells and the triumphant booming OF
cannon the procession moved OFF.
DIR j. II. Cornelison was Grand Marshal,
and, with his aids, Colonel Alexander Ram
sey. Major Joseph Colgate and W M cor
Nelson led the parade Then came Brlga
dier General E. K. " Wright and his st&if
leading several companies of military. The
Fire Department. under the leadership of
Chief Engineer Samuel A. French, composed
the next division. This was the first annual
parade of the department, and eleven com
panies, with 800 men, turned out. Egh5
companies from New York, numbering 3O0
men, We're also in the procession. One nun
dred carriages followed, i'll which rode tne
Mayors and Common Councils of Jersey
! City. New York, Brooklyn, Newark, Eliza
| bethtown, New Brunswick and Paterson.
the Committee of Arrangements acting as
| escort TO the orator of the day, the Gov
| ernor; the New Jersey delegation in Con-
gress, the Hudson members of the Leglsia-
ture and the Pilot Commissioners
The Shamrock and Hlbernian Benevolent
Societies led the fourth section, in which
were the engineers and officers OF the water
works of Jersey City, New York, Phladei-
phia. Boston, Hartford and Albany; the
Associates of Jersey City. the Sheriff OF
Hudson county and his aides; Town Com
mittees of Bergen, North Bergen, Hoboken
and Harrison; Supervisors of the Town Of
Hudson, Chosen Freeholders of Hudson,
Chief Engineers of the fire departments of
New York, Brooklyn, Williamsburg, Hobo
ken, Paterson, ElizabethtowD, Newark and
New Brunswick Presidents and Directors OF
the New Jersey, Erie and Paterson Railroad
Companies: members of the press and dis
tinguished invited guests from other cities.
Butchers on horseback, cartmen on horse
back and citizens of Hudson county on
horseback brought up the rear
ISAAC SCUDDER'S GRAFTON.
After moving through the principal streets
of the city the procession proceeded to the
reservoir at High Service where the late
Isaac w. Scudder delivered an Grafton. He
spoke of the Importance of a good supply of
pure and wholesome water and congratu-
lated Jersey City upon having at last ac-
quired that boon. He described the great
engine which pumped the water out of the
river at the rate OF 100000 gallons per hour
into the big stand pipe, thirty-six inches in
diameter and l51 feet above the river, and
them over the meadows, under the Hacken-
sack River by an inverted syphon to the
mammoth reservoir on Bergen Hill with
capacity of 50,00O0U0 gallons. Those were
great things in those days, and when the
citizens of Jersey City heard them i'll the
eloquent language of the distinguished law
yer they yelled themselves hoarse and shak-
ing each other by the hand declared that
they were the greatest people on earth.
After the speech making the citizens took
the visitors in hand to show them the hospi-
taiity for which this part of New Jersey has
ever been famous since the days of old Philip
Carteret. The Governor who was poor old
Rodman NJ Price, who died recently under
such distressing circumstances, and the other
distinguished guests, were taken to the old
Hudson House were 400 sat down to an elab-
crate banquet The Mayor, who was the
late David Manners sat at the head of the
table and toasts were responded TO by the
4 had hn
supply of Jersey City settled forever as the
projectors and builders of the works thought.
But they did not foresee the cities and towns
which were in a few years to spring up upon
the banks of the Passaic and pollute their
unexceptionable water supply with refuse
and sewage. As the water became tainted
through these sources numerous schemes for
a new supply sprang up.
EARLY WATER SCHEME.
One of the earliest of these was evolved in
the fertile brain of Delos E. Culver, who in
1866, while member of the Assembly from
Hudson, procured charter for the Hudson
County Aqueduct Company, with Edgar B.
Wakeman, William keeny, isaac B. Culver,
Moses B. Bramhall, John NJ Cornelison and
Jacob r. Schuyler among the incorporators
The capital was fixed at S250,000 and the
company was authorized to take and convey
water into the towns of Bayonne, Greenville
and bergen, the City of Hudson and places
demnation for that purpose. The company
was to draw its supply from the Hackensack
and other streams which might be found
convenient or practicable 1t was also
authorized to enter into contracts with the
corporate authorities of said towns for sup
plying them with water and the sale of their
works or any portion thereof TO these muni-
cipalities or any of them. The company
organized under that law is still
kept alive by Mr.. Culver without exercising
any of its corporate rights. When the
Lehigh Valley Railroad Company secured
possession of the Morris canal for the pur-
pose of killing 1T as competitor for the coal
carrying trade the big ditch became un-
profitable and'the company took steps to turn
it to account financially. In 1878, with the
help of the Jersey City Board of Works, it
secured from the Legislature the passage of
an act entitled IAN act to provide Newark
and jersey City and other places with an am
pie supply of pure and wholesome water"
This authorized the formation by the New
ark Aqueduct Board and the Board of Pu b.
lie Works of Jersey City of joint board
which was empowered to carry out the pur-
poses of the act, including the use, control
and operation of the property to be acquired
under the same. The avoweG OBJ
iect of the act was to supply water
to Newark. Jersey City and such other
places as might desire the same. 1t contain
ed full powers of condemnation with
proviso that the act should not be held to
authorize the taking of any rights of the
"Society for Establishing Usefal Manu-
factures" or the Morris Canal and Banking
Company or the owners of the Boonton Iron
Works, which meant that they should not
take any water except by agreement with
the Canal Company and the sale of the canal
to Newark and Jersey City for So, 1000
The collapse of the Bumsted ring ruined the
little scheme so far as it related to Jersey
City, although it was most carefully ar
ranged.
When Jersey City was thus put out of the
scheme entirely. the Lehigh Valley people
turned their whole attention to Newark. In
the mean time Mr.. John Bartlett, who is
well known in connection with water mat.
ters in Jersey City, perceived what was go
ing on, and determined to get his finger into
the pie. He quietly started out and bought
up the rights along the Pequannock River
Then be enlisted the services of
member or two of the Newark
Aqueduct Board, and when it came to take
vote upon the subject of obtaining a new
water supply by way of the canal, Mr.. Bart
letts friends objected. They were i'll favor
of a new supply, but would vote for nothing
except Peqnannock water, as the State
Water Board had declared that to be the
best. They stood firm and finally the LehiglB
Valley and Bartlett made a combination,
share and share alike, which combination is
the great East Jersey Water Company
which now supplies Newark with water.
KNOW FROM EXPERIENCE.
The West Side Republican League com
muncated with the Street and Water Board