The authoritative source on
  early churches of New Jersey

click here to order
the book from Amazon.com

About this site
We've created a database and photographic inventory on more than half the 18th & 19th century churches in the state and add to it each month. We welcome and solicit all contributions and suggestions from our visitors.

How to use this site
Respond to readers' queries
Consult the database
Annotate the database
Upload a photo
Suggest a church for inclusion
Glossary
List of churches, by county
Photographic notes
Links to related sites

   Photographic Inventory

St. Joseph's Roman Catholic Church
Newton, Sussex County

The entry vestibule is newer than the rest of the church, but quite appropriate to the style and materials of the original. Snell called it a “a handsome brick building” and says it cost $19,000—a considerable sum in those days for a small parish, but “the generous non-Catholic townspeople assisted in raising the building.”
     There were occasional visits to the area by priests from Paterson, starting about 1821, but there was no settled congregation until 1854, and the first church, a wooden frame building, was erected in 1861. The tower is very similar, perhaps identical to the one on the Shrine of the Blessed Sacrament in Raritan (Somerset County) built some years later; the probability is high they shared an architect.