History of Shrewsbury Borough Municipal Complex Property

(This article originally appeared in the Fall 2013 Edition of the Shrewsbury Historical Society Newsletter)

The Tallman family has long been associated with the property on the southwest of the Four Corners intersection in Shrewsbury New Jersey. And while Tallmans played a significant role in the area, and Monmouth County in general, they are not the first family to own the land where the Municipal Center is today. In fact it wasn’t until the mid-19th century that George D. Tallman first acquired almost 51 acres here. Part of his home survives in the Center.

Recent research paints a complicated and surprising history of the Municipal Center property. In the early days of the founding of Monmouth County, the vast new lands passed quickly from one hand to another, as they were subdivided into farms or plantations. In 1665, Gov. Richard Nicholls of New York granted land to Twelve Monmouth Patentees. However, James, Duke of York had granted land Patents a year earlier to Berkeley and Carteret - land which overlapped the Nicholls Patent. Years of litigation followed as petitioners tried to unravel conflicting claims.

Though no deed has been found to clarify how Bartholomew West acquired the land, he moved from Rhode Island to Shrewsbury around 1670, and bequeathed his farm to his son William two years later. After William West married Margaret Wardell, they lived opposite Christ Church in the Village of Shrewsbury. William was High Sheriff of Monmouth County. Although we’re uncertain about the specific transactions after he died in 1746, we do know that Margaret’s nephew John Wardell owned the southwest corner of the major intersection in the Village in 1778.

John Wardell lived just south of what had been Quaker Judah Allen’s property. When Allen sold to a New York City merchant, Richard Stillwell erected his new home on the corner around 1740. A newspaper described it as “A Good large Dwelling-House, two Story high, containing several Fire-Rooms well finish'd, with a good Stone Cellar under it, and a large Kitchen and Milk-House joining to it. The Lot belonging to said House, consists of near four Acres of choice Land, upon which there is a very good young bearing Orchard, two Gardens, a good Stone Well, a large new Storehouse, Chaise House, Stable, and several other Outbuildings...”

Both the Stillwell and Wardell properties fronted the road to Tinton Falls. Their eastern boundaries were on the main road which led south to a mill owned by the husband of John’s Aunt Johanna, a man named John Eaton.  John Wardell witnessed the construction of a new Christ Church on the other side of this main road between 1769 and 1774. He may even have purchased lottery tickets which helped fund the building project. He also welcomed a new neighbor, Stephen Tallman Jr., who purchased the old Stillwell house across the road.

As the Revolutionary War got under way, the Wardells remained fiercely loyal to the British Crown. In the most intriguing of the transactions we’re reviewing, that family would pay a high price for their loyalty. The Council and General Assembly of New Jersey had passed “An Act for forfeiting to and vesting in the State of New Jersey the real Estates of certain Fugitives and offenders.” The properties of many Monmouth County citizens were taken from those who chose to remain allied with King George III. The particular tract of the current Shrewsbury Municipal Center was appropriated from John Wardell and sold at auction in March 1779. The Commission of Forfeited Estates granted its 40 acres plus to William M. Lippincott for £4,410. 

In 1802, just a year before he died, Lippincott sold the farm to his New York City grocery business partner Benjamin Stephens and his own son William Lloyd Lippincott. The younger Lippincott saw the Quaker Meeting House go up in 1816, diagonally across from his home on land a distant relative had sold to the Society of Friends. By 1819, William L. Lippincott owned the entire estate and farm outright.

 “All that mansion house and farm” was auctioned by the Monmouth County Commissioners of the Orphans Court in April 1838. The Commissioners found that “having viewed the said real estate, they are of the opinion that the tracts of land and real estate whereof the said William L. Lippincott died seized are so circumstanced that a partition thereof cannot be made without great prejudice to the owners of the same.” Seized meant that Lippincott had died without leaving a Will in 1837.  His heirs could not agree on the distribution of his substantial estate, so the Orphans Court sold portions of his holdings to various bidders. George Corlies (1804-1892) paid $10,000 for almost 52 acres. It remained with the Corlies family for another 18 years.

George Douglas Tallman was born in New York City in 1814. By midcentury, he was living there with his parents next door to Cornelius Vanderbilt of steamboat fame. George and his wife Ann settled in Shrewsbury where they began farming the property he acquired from John Corlies in 1856. George no doubt knew about Monmouth County because his 2nd Great-grandfather James Tallman had purchased original Proprietary land in 1720 at Pootapeck, now the Port-au-Peck section of Oceanport.

George Tallman sold off almost 30 acres of the southern part of his farm to Dr. Edward Keyes in 1873. Tallman lived on the remaining 21 acres until his death. When Tallman died seized too, five of his heirs bought the family farm in 1883 from Tallman’s executors. The property was described as bounded by the “southerly side of Main Street in Shrewsbury Village (otherwise known as the main road from Shrewsbury to Tinton Falls)…and on the west side of the Red Bank and Eatontown Turnpike.”

In April of 1891 the Tallman Heirs sold a half acre to A. Holmes Borden along the Eatontown Turnpike or Broad Street. Borden was a successful local grocer who had his store on the Friends property across the highway. He was very active in civil affairs and was a charter member of the Shrewsbury Fire Company.

In 1892, the Heirs sold 1 acre just to the south of Borden to George Barlow. This left the remaining portion of George D. Tallman’s estate at 19.66 acres, still occupying a prominent part of Four Corners.

In August 1895, the Tallman heirs gave up the property that had been in their family for almost 40 years when they sold it to William Lambert Borden, older brother of A. Holmes. William had started out as a house carpenter before becoming a successful home builder.

A succession of four different owners lived on the corner tract until 1945, but Julia and Loomis White occupied it for over 38 years. Loomis was a well-to-do Wall Street stock broker. In 1945 the Whites sold 19.65 acres to Thomas and Margaret Meacham. Dr. Bradford Judd and his wife Eleanore owned it for a little over three years before selling it back to the Meacham family in 1971.

Meacham heirs, Louis and Margaret sold a 6 acre parcel to the Borough of Shrewsbury in 1974 and then a 10+ acre tract in 1983, reuniting most of the old Tallman estate. The Borough of Shrewsbury dedicated and opened the new Borough Hall in early January 2003. The Municipal Center we enjoy today is the culmination of over 330 years of land transactions at the historic Four Corners.

Anyone interested in viewing the specific deeds for this historic property can contact Don Burden of the Shrewsbury Historical Society at DonaldBurden@verizon.net

Rick Geffken is a Trustee of the Farmingdale Historical Society and on the Board of Directors for the Wainwright House in that Borough. This article is adapted from research he is doing on a book about the history of Shrewsbury. He can be contacted at rickg0817@yahoo.com