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A History of Camden, New Jersey
By Phil Cohen                                  

“Would you like to write a history of Camden in 1000 words, with emphasis on Business History (then to now), Art and Culture, and Institutional (the establishment of the hospitals and universities)?”

Cooperative soul that I am, I said yes, but once given thought as to how to describe everything that has happened in our fair city in 10,000 words, let alone 1,000 would be akin to stuffing eight great tomatoes in the little bitty can. One might get tomato paste, but there’s not much left that resembles a tomato.

That being said, the story of Camden, from its early days as the village by Mr. Cooper’s ferry, through is incorporation as a township, then as a city, then actually becoming a city, and its “golden age of industry”, and through its long and slow decline and bottoming out, to the rebirth and revitalization of today is a story where several themes constantly assert themselves, oftentimes in positive ways, and occasionally to the negative. I do not believe you can either tell the story or understand the city without  understanding what made this town, in a sense un-made it, and is rebuilding it today. These themes are Location, Transportation, Technology, Vision, and Civic Spirit.

Location gave birth to the city. The happy accident that William Penn put roots down on the other side of the Delaware made a ferry service necessary for those farmers and tradesmen who resided on the Jersey side. Camden and its environs was a fairly sleepy place until Technology and Transportation came calling, with the blessing of the steam ferry and more importantly, the railroad. Camden, then as now was the logical gateway from Philadelphia to New York City, and it was not long before rail lines were established along paths that are still utilized today. The railroad bridge over the Cooper River at Federal Street, and the right-of-way utilized by the PATCO High Speed Line were established far back into the 1800s.

With rail transport, several ferries operating simultaneously to Philadelphia, and the capacity for unloading the sea cargos of the day, Camden was in the right Location, and when men with vision embraced the new technologies of the day, Camden was THE place to be. It was by no mere accident that so many large industries, so many companies whose names are still known or are still in use today were in Camden. They were here not because their founders were natives of the city- they came here because like the Silicon Valley of our times, Camden was the place to make your vision happen. Time and again, name after name, company after company- Joseph Campbell and his chemist John Dorrance CAME here; steam heating manufacturer Warren Webster CAME here; Eldridge Johnson of the Victor Talking Machine Company CAME here; the Kinds, founders of the Kind & Knox Gelatin business CAME here- and, in the ultimate irony, the New York Shipbuilding Corporation was not in New York, but in Camden NJ. This story is repeated time and again, with large companies and small businesses, people with an idea and a vision of a better tomorrow coming to Camden to make those dreams reality.

That brings us to perhaps the greatest example of belief in the future of all, and that is the immigrant. As these United States are one Nation comprised mostly of immigrants, people have been coming to Camden since before there was a Camden to come to….. and before I go any further, in the days before the automobile, if you came to Camden from another state or part of the country, you may as well have been an immigrant; the cultural atmosphere being far less homogenous than today.

Wave after wave of new people came to this small place, our Camden, bringing new ideas, new languages, new cultures and religions, and with few exceptions, living peacefully with the neighbors who themselves had only arrived a bit earlier. From the mostly English Quakers who were here at the time of the Revolution were added Irish and German immigrants in the mid-19^th century. Italians arrived in the 1880s, joined soon by Poles, Jews, Ukrainians, and other nationalities from Eastern Europe in the 1890s and 1900s. A large group came from Newfoundland to work in the shipyards, and there were smaller Greek and Armenian communities. The relatively small Black community was greatly augmented after World War I by a migration from the Southern states, primarily from Virginia, Georgia, and the Carolinas. There were a very few Chinese families in town as well. During World War II labor shortages caused farmers and industries alike to recruit workers from Puerto Rico and Jamaica. All came, all mixed into the Camden stew to greater or lesser degrees, all contributed to the energy that filled this place. 

That was the Camden of the period of roughly 100 years, from the end of the Civil War to the very early 1950s. Location, Transportation, Technology, and People- so much happened in this small place that it would take many volumes to record it all. Let it suffice to say that whatever the endeavor, be it the arts or sports, war or diplomacy, entertainment or invention, politics or the professions, industry or espionage…. Camden or someone from Camden played a major role.

Much of what made Camden great contributed to its undoing. The automobile arrived and with it came the highway, and eventually the bridge over the Delaware, making living in the city optional for those who could afford it. When the bridge was built through Camden in the early 1920s, it destroyed an entire neighborhood full of professionals and small businessman, and placed the backyards of mansions on Cooper Street next to a noisy highway. Those people fled to the suburbs, and with it, their talents and energies for things civic in nature. When Henry Ford made the automobile affordable to many working families, even more left.

At the end of World War II technology, trade policy, and government policy combined to deal body blow after body blow to the city. Television and federal mortgage rules played a great part in making suburban life attractive. One by one industries that employed Camden workers for decades disappeared. Soon there was no more textile industry, no more leather industry, no radio factory, no furniture factory, no pen companies, no shipyards, and in time what no one ever believed could happen, no more Campbell’s Soup. All Camden was left with was its location and its people…. and for a time, those of us who lived here found it easy to believe that no one wanted either. Still, what never died, what was handed down from generation to generation, like a precious gift was the “I’m from Camden attitude”, and that is altogether a good thing.

Camden is changing once again, as a new wave of immigrants, this

time from Asia, Mexico, Central America, the Caribbean and even suburban America (often considered a foreign country) are changing the face of the city once again. New languages are heard, new music played, and new restaurants and groceries open. As before, time passes, and the prejudices and suspicions of elders are erased by schoolyard friendships. Camden continues.

You may have noticed that I had not addressed the theme of civic-minded people and of the hospitals and universities. Camden was blessed with more than its share of remarkable men and women during the growth years. These people gave of their time, their wealth, their lands and their estates to the city with little or no thought of personal gain or recompense. Try to find a local school board upon which sat the president of a nationally known shipyard today. Camden had that, and the story repeats itself endlessly.

The story of the hospitals is typical of this. The need was felt, doctors and leading citizens responded to the call, and one of the city’s founding families, the Coopers, gave land and money to build a hospital. The West Jersey Hospital had similar humble beginnings- doctors practicing homeopathic medicine starting with a small clinic which grew to the large facility that is on Mount Ephraim and Atlantic Avenues. The internationally known Coriell Institute is a direct descendant of Camden’s own Municipal Hospital, a city owned and operated facility. Camden at one time had two homes for destitute and orphaned children; these institutions were founded locally, by men and women who felt a responsibility to make things better. To a great extent the social fabric of the city was colored by that shade, as the many civic and fraternal groups that existed here would strive together for the common good. When a call came to erect a publicly owned hotel (the Walt Whitman Hotel that stood at Broadway and Cooper Streets for so many years), well over 150 businessmen took the responsibility to raise funds, and every group and corner of the city took part. The monies for the project were raised in short order. 

Higher education in Camden, with the exception of the South Jersey School of Law and the Camden campus of Rutgers University. The South Jersey School of Law, from its early graduating classes in the 1930s, trained men and women who would play major roles in Camden city and county courts over the years. Its faculty in those years was comprised of many of the greatest lawyers in the region of the time; for it was common practice for lawyers give back by teaching law. Rutgers University’s presence in Camden has grown over the years, another wonderful thing, as now New Jersey’s best and brightest can either stay home or come to Camden and see first hand what the city has to offer. In more recent times Camden County College, the Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, and Rowan University have established facilities in the city.