November 2023: Hardyston’s Creamery

Sussex County and Hardyston Township have grown from a rural setting. Two hundred years ago most people were farmers. They were subsistence farmers—that is, they would need to provide all that life required for they and their families. Thus they had to have poultry and cattle for meat, vegetables and corn and carrots for the family to survive. They were a hardy bunch that’s for sure.

Around 1870 railroads came to the area. They brought goods, and people, from the city. They also created a good trade in lumber, in ice in the winter, and milk all year for the citizens in the city region. 

Farmers realized that they could make a living supplying milk, cream, and cheese to the city. Most farms in our area became such, with large herds of Holstein cattle which were good producers of milk. 

The milk was collected in an area that would be the short distance for daily horse and wagon delivery of raw milk from the farms. 

Before the milk collected left for the city there was the creamery. One was in Stockholm and the attached photo shows it in later years. It is located right beside the track as you can see. It was near the Stockholm station. Both were behind where Jorgensen’s Restaurant was, the older Lewis place before that. It was located just to the west side of the Pequannock River near the old Hamburg Turnpike bridge close beside the Stockholm Methodist Church. As you can see, this was a busy area at one time.