April showers bring Meadowbrook neighborhoods

The neighborhood's existence really began this month of April in 1936 as the concept of converting the Netherwood Farm and Estate, aka Mali Estate, was presented and socialized in advance of the "Opening Day" in November 1936.  Here is a collection of published articles, maps, and aerial photos that frame these early moments of the Meadowbrook neighborhood starting in April.  As always, a reminder to click to enlarge the images or articles.  

Published 16 April, 1936

Zoning notifications and such, published on 21 and 22 April, 1936

And then after all of the above mentioned meetings, on 28 April, 1936 was the published map of the proposed neighborhood.

1862 map, before Netherwood (note: Long Meadowbrook)

the Berckmann's sold the land to the Johnston's 

Berckmann then moved famously to farm in Augusta, GA which became where the Master's Golf Tournament is played today

here is a current day road overlay.... you can see how they moved the railroad from this eary map
into what became Fanwood Station as we now drive on Midway.

in the Bird's Eye drawing below
Netherwood Farm is at the top along Mountain Ave 

with Netherwood Estate at the bottom, just above Johnston Ave.... 

1878 map of the Farm and Estate...

1931 aerial map... Farm top left, estate and Green Brook right side

... in 1929 the estate almost became a park!

... early sketches of the top half... 

and the bottom half...
Union county proposed study map for the Johnston Estate in 1929 by Olmstead Brothers

But this is what was proposed in 1936 ....... 

Highlighted here is Boatcroft Lane's location . . . 

Here are some of the streets that were imagined for the Union County side on the brochure... 

and some of the proposed roads on the Somerset County side

described in this 1936 article, the road names made it as far as a 1949 map below, but were never built.

1947 progress in an aerial photo

Look how little the trees are, some only just 10 years old - time to refresh and plant more!

... back to the roads ... 

comparing a 1956 aerial photo

a neat nearby neighborhood view
East End school is the blue squre in the middle, Farragut is on the far right, Mountain Ave at the top.

Published 27 June 1936

Published 25 July, 1936, ground-breaking announced for the Meadowbrook neighborhood

this photo was for the Meadowbrook Village garden apartments ground breaking in 1938 But a similar cast of charachters eg. George Wells (3rd from left) with FHA directors

notes about the FHA requirements.... 

details published as an "invite" August 1936...

and the brochure details.... 

Also . . . 

FHA ratings...... 

Source for discovering other red-lined neighborhoods: https://dsl.richmond.edu/panorama/redlining/...

this was published mentioning the planned development in Union County, which never happened, 

... wonder if the Councilman got a "refund" ?

Meadowbrook Seal - 1936

Well, now the only thing to do is wait for November...

and be sure to plant a tree for Arbor Day April 25th ... or plan now for planting one in November to celebrate the neighborhood opening!

in summary...

the overall Meadowbrook neighborhood vision from architect George E. T. Wells . . .

and here's a hat also named Meadowbrook from the 1920s that has nothing to do with this post because I forgot to include as an April Fools

Meadowbrook: A Residential Neighborhood

11 April, 1968: Happy Birthday to the Fair Housing Act (Title VIII of the 1968 Civil Rights Act) only 57 years young.

Our Meadowbrook residential neighborhood was initially created with Restrictions on loans backed by the Federal governtment in 1936 and thankfully, with this legislation, those restrictions (discrimination in housing based on race, color, religion, sex, national origin, familial status, and disability) have since been removed and are illegal.

Many sections of the Fair Housing Act have been elliminated from our Federal websites ... go ahead, try and click through the links: https://www.hud.gov/stat/fheo/rights-obligations

Let's then celebrate the reversal in unfair restrictions, reflect on our residential neighborhood, and remember this important moment that has helped bring us altogether that mere fate would not have allowed otherwise. 
https://www.justice.gov/crt/fair-housing-act-1

More FHA related reading pertaining to Meadowbrook and vicinity on this blog are here for further reading.
Shareable link:  https://tinyurl.com/3wzvnhj4

Meadowbrook Mystery Entrance - The way out is through

A few early ads indicate where the Meadowbrook neighborhood entrances were - remember, this was an undeveloped Estate and Farm; there wasn't a nearby shopping center or other homes to reference as shown in this link to a bird's-eye map view today.

This early ad below has a landscape photo, which a keen viewer suggested might have been the entrance gates on Route 29, which is Route 22 today.  I had thought because the ads referenced Route 29 and Mountain Ave, that the ads meant an area what today is a traffic signal cluster of jug-handles and merge lanes.  

But our keen viewer highlighted a now developed section  of homes where instead that Gate Entrance might have been, before the aforementioned cluster-intersection existed.... so to the aerial photo time machine I went to do some compare and contrast. 

And while not proof positive, it sure enough appears there was an entrance construction on what today are homes, but back then were remnants of the former Netherwood Farm, that had a road that connected directly to Route 29, and which is today opposite the entrance to the Watchung Square Mall.

Above is a 1931 aerial view before the Netherwood farm was removed (1935) and where the gate entrance may have been constructed later.

Compared below to a 1947 aerial view when the neighborhood was still quite under construction 11 years after the Opening Day in 1936, but a clear indication of a perhaps a stone wall or gate?

Pretty neat stuff!

Oh, what is Route 29 you may be asking?  Ironically, in 1929 (almost 100 years ago) this happened....

Zoom in view.... 

Article referencing, highlighted in yellow, the Mali Estate.