The Roselle Park Museum displays photographs, documents and memorabilia related to the history of Roselle Park, and offers changing exhibits of topical interest. The borough was shaped by the railroad, and by the 1860s, the station along the Central Railroad of New Jersey had become the nucleus of a small village.

In 1883, the Charles Stone Store on Westfield Avenue became the first store in the world lighted by Edison’s incandescent lamp. Industrial development along the railroad corridor included the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company of America, established in 1912, which manufactured much of the wireless equipment used in World War I. RCA’s radio station WDY, housed in Roselle Park’s Marconi facility, became one of the earliest licensed broadcasting stations in the United States.

The earliest recorded borough residents were the Williams family of Connecticut, who built a home and farm on the road to the West Fields. At that time there were three dirt roads, possibly old Indian trails, winding through the area. One was the road to the West Fields, the second Galloping Hill Road, and the third started with Union Road and ran diagonally in a northwest direction through Five Points to Springfield. During the Revolutionary War, soldiers marched up Galloping Hill Road on their way to the Battle of Springfield. The Hospital Oak, on the corner of Westfield Avenue and Colonial Road marked the location of a field hospital where wounded soldiers were treated.

Operated by the Roselle Park Historical Society

For Hours: roselleparkhistoricalsociety.org or call (908) 245-1776