Of the old settlers there were the houses of Sandford, Munn, Melius, Colonel Cumming, Stimis, John McDonald, Coeyman and Weiler, on the River road; Mr. Alfred Hardwick Gibbs on the high ground north of the Gully road, known as “Thornhill”; the “Cedars”, built by Frank Forester (H. W. Herbert), which had been bought by Mr. Sanchez y Dolce, and was then occupied by him, and also a group of houses about the junction of Washington and Grafton avenues and Halleck Street, which is treated of elsewhere.
On the west side of Belleville avenue near Second river was the interesting old house occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Jonathan Bird and Mrs. Bird’s two sons by a former marriage, Lewis and George Ashmun. This was a most delightful house, and the hospitality of the Birds was renowned. Mrs. Bird was a daughter of the Rev. Dr. Strong, of Massachusetts, and inherited her gracious manner and charm of conversation from a long line of ancestors who were among the best people of New England.
They entertained with the grace of the early part of the nineteenth century, before the advent of that class of plutocrats that brought ostentatious pomp and more or less bad manners into society. Mr. Bird was a gentleman of the old school, and Mrs. Bird one of the most gracious and beautiful of women. It was always a delight to attend their evenings at home. One was sure of meeting all the charming people of the surrounding country and Newark, and there was no lack of brilliant conversation. When the gatherings were not too large and the company could assemble around the hospitable board the table-talk was sparkling with wit, while matters of graver import were freely discussed.
It is impossible to say when this old house was erected; it bears every evidence of having been a very fine place in its day. One informant recalls having heard Mrs. Bird state that the house was built before the Revolution by an Englishman who sympathized with his king and was consequently compelled to leave the country when war was declared. This information Mrs. Bird secured from a daughter of Harry Coeyman, who had received it from her father. Presumably this is Henry M. Coeyman, a son of Minard, who is said to have served in the Revolution, and the son would thus have come on the scene early enough to know the facts.
The records do not go beyond 1790. On July 5, 1790, James H. Maxwell conveyed the property to Alexander McComb who, on May 21, 1792, conveyed it to Daniel McCormick who, on July 18, 1792, conveyed to Thomas Bennett. The next transfer is a sheriff’s deed dated June 24, 1812, to Jacob Stout, and on April 9, 1825, his widow, Frances, conveyed to the President and Directors of the New Jersey Bleaching, Printing & Dyeing Company. On September 10, 1829, a sheriff’s deed conveyed to Samuel Wright et als. Then follow the names of owners as follows: Andrew Gray, Bolton et als., Edward Dwight et als., American Print Works, 1835; James K. Mills, 1853; George Bird, 1853, and Jonathan Bird, 1859.
During the time that the house was occupied by Mr. Bird the place was approached from Mill street by a bridge across Second river just above the present Washington avenue bridge.
INTRODUCING MR. ANANIAS.
After the many years of unclouded friendship that have existed between the families of Hine and Winser it is difficult to realize that there could ever have been any other state of feeling, but at the outset conditions were just the reverse and the cause of it is rather an interesting little story.
Both homesteads were situated within what was once a Stimis apple orchard and each contained several magnificent apple trees that were probably over one-hundred years old, and it was one of these trees and an unruly tongue that caused the trouble. The tree in question was a picturesque old giant that stood on the Winser premises near the street and near Mr. Hine’s line.
A neighbor of both families, whom we will call Mr. Ananias, took a dislike to Mr. Hine, even before his house was finished, and undertook to make trouble for him. Knowing that both families admired and valued the trees which adorned their places he pitched on this particular apple tree, and first called on Mr. Winser and during a conversation managed to introduce the subject of the new neighbor, incidentally remarking that Mr. Hine, who was a new-rich upstart from the west, had taken a dislike to the Winser family and, having learned of its love of trees, had announced that he was going to have that apple tree down, Winser or no Winser, under the pretense that it interfered with his view.