Book ‘Down Neck’ native chronicles Newark’s Ironbound history in new book

FRENCHTOWN, NJ – One neighborhood that has been getting a lot of respect these days is the Ironbound, that Newark locale notable for some pretty tasty food and drink in the Spanish-Portuguese mode, among others.

That’s not exactly the way things used to be, as a new published history informs us about this place – otherwise known as “Down Neck” – that was long regarded as being on the wrong side of the tracks.

The book is entitled “The Ironbound: An Illustrated History of Newark’s Down Neck” ($21.99, Stone Creek Publications), the work of a veteran newspaperman whose roots in the neighborhood go all the way back to the 1930s.

The author, Edward A. Jardim, traces the path by which this section on Newark’s eastern edge developed as the city grew in leaps and bounds starting early in the 19th century, giving rise to factories, schools, churches, and various social organizations. Amid burgeoning industrial activity that shaped Newark’s destiny as an urban powerhouse, the Ironbound and its labor force were poised to make a mark as a stronghold of “ethnic” identity and loyalties.

Down Neck

Even those familiar with the neighborhood may be surprised to learn that the area tucked into the “Big Bend” of the Passaic River was once considered so wild and remote that local folks referred to it as “Texas;” or that a young Thomas Edison launched his inventing career at several Ironbound locations; or that, in the decades before Prohibition, the Ironbound was a major producer (and consumer) of beer, with some 18 breweries and 140 saloons, “not to mention the dance halls of dubious propriety.” A social worker reporting on the Ironbound in 1912 suggested that it might have been more correctly named “Beer Island.”

Jardim was raised in the Ironbound and later settled with his family in Long Hill Township, N.J. His father, Vasco de Sousa Jardim, was a printer and publisher whose own ethnic identity was Portuguese, one of the many nationalities that gives the neighborhood a multicultural ambience to this day. The senior Jardim was publisher of the Portuguese-language Luso-Americano newspaper for over four decades starting in 1939. The paper is still owned by the family and operates out of offices on Ferry and Union streets in Newark.

The Ironbound: An Illustrated History of Newark’s ‘Down Neck’ is available for sale at amazon.com, ironboundbook.com, and the Luso-Americano Bookstore at 88 Ferry Street, Newark, NJ 07105.

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