The museum of the Warren County Historical and Genealogical Society, also located at
313 Mansfield Street, stands within the historic district in the county seat of Belvidere,
New Jersey.
Yesterday's home to the working middle class family of Warren County, the Federal brick
townhouse looks very much as it did when it was built circa 1848, long before most of the elegant
Victorian manses lined the Garret D. Wall county square.
Initially purchased by George R. King, a real estate speculator, the museum has had a long list of
absentee owners. It was occupied mainly by tenants until Charles and Adella Smith purchased
the house in 1910. The Historical Society bought the house from daughter Clara Smith in 1980.
Today the museum holds an eclectic collection of Warren County memorabilia and antiques.
The front parlor is furnished with an ornate red plush Eastlake seating arrangement. The add-on
kitchen with its original tin ceiling houses a turn of the century wood/coal burning cook
stove.
All through the house museum are reminders of Warren County's fascinating past. An 1824 weathervane
and dark dungeon door are from the first courthouse. Cornish music makers from Washington,
N.J., the organ capitol of the world can be seen, along with many artifacts of the Victorian era.
There is an exceptional collection of made-in Warren County textiles and folk art from wreaths
and coverlets to pieced quilts and hand-spun, and hand-woven
linen made from county grown flax.
From antiquity come the relics, survivors of a time when our world was still new. On
display are hundreds of artifacts from the Lenape Indians as well as from the Paleo and Archaic
peoples who long ago called what is now Warren County home.
