Ten on Tuesday - Welcome to Historic Flemington

I hadn't planned a Ten on Tuesday post for today because I honestly couldn't think of Ten Interesting Things About My Community off the top of my head. After reading Carole's post and consulting Wikipedia, I may have some ideas. My community is Flemington, located in central New Jersey.

1.   We're a small borough (1.077 square miles) of about 4500 people, and the County Seat of Hunterdon County.

2.   As the County Seat, this means we have two courthouses, the old one that could not be made ADA-compliant, and the new Justice Center. Naming it the Justice Center means that at least two people per week stop in front of my house and ask where the courthouse is.

3.   The old courthouse was the site of the Lindbergh trial in 1935 where Bruno Richard Hauptmann was found guilty of kidnapping and murdering Charles Lindbergh's son.

4.   Flemington was settled in the 1770s, formed as a town in 1870, and incorporated in 1910. The early settling means that seemingly almost everything (65% of the borough) is on the National Register of Historic Places.

5.   Since we're rife with history, that means we have to consult the Flemington Historic Hysterical Preservation Commission before we do any external work on the house. When we wanted to replace our leaking 150-year-old slate roof, we had to have our new shingles approved.

6.   The only famous person I know of that is from Flemington is Danny Federici, keyboard player in Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band.

7.   Flemington was home to Fulper Pottery, then Stangl Pottery. The restored building now houses an indoor farmer's market, a restaurant, and our only coffee shop.

8.   We're also the site of the Flemington Egg Auction, the country’s first, and, at one time, the largest, cooperative egg auction. It operated here from 1932 until the 1970s. It's a beautiful building with lots of carved wood inside and a castle-like exterior. It now houses offices.

9.   We have the highest property taxes in the country. Lucky us!
10. We have three traffic circles in town. They may be roundabouts or rotaries in other parts of the country, but we call them circles in New Jersey. When we first moved here I used to plan ways to get around to completely avoid them. They can be quite confusing, but once you get used to them they're really not so bad. Just keep moving!

From the NJ Driver's Manual. With no set rules and a plea for common sense to prevail, what could go wrong? :-)

I'm looking forward to reading all the other interesting things that Ten on Tuesday

 participants have in their own communities!