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“The State House
Through The Years” The New
Jersey State House was originally built in
1792 by Jonathan Doane. The site was
approximately 3.75 acres and cost 250
English pounds, which is about $400 today.
The building was two and one-half stories
high and consisted of seven bays radiating
off a center hall. A bell-tower was
situated in the center of the roof. The
legislative chambers were located on the
first floor - Senate (then the Legislative
Council) in the west and the General
Assembly in the east. The Governor's and
judicial offices occupied the second
floor. State
government grew steadily for
many The
New Jersey State House, 1792.
Portions of the original
structure are incorporated into
the present building. North
Facade, c. 1845. The addition was
linked to the original structure
by the new dome. In 1865,
the river-side portico was extended 68
feet. Another major building campaign
began in 1871, when Samuel Sloan, also a
Philadelphia architect, was commissioned
to modify the northern State Street wing
and design new wings for both legislative
houses. These two wings flanked the 1865
southern extension. While little is known
for certain about the final structure, it
is believed that the new wings contained a
two and one-half story chamber surrounded
by a gallery, offices and caucus rooms.
The old Senate chamber was modified to
accommodate thee Governor's office, while
additional offices were created in the
former Assembly chamber. Early in the
morning of March 21, 1885, a fire broke out and
raced through the empty building, totally
destroying the State Street wing, Lewis Broome of
Jersey City was selected to plan the
reconstruction. He designed the building in a
simplified Second Empire style with three stories
and limestone facing. He also added a new rotunda
and dome that were more proportional to the scale
of the building. Twenty
years after Sloan's new Assembly wind was
erected, it was replaced by a larger wing
of late Victorian style. James Moylan, an
Assemblyman, was the architect. Due to
space limitations, Moylan decided to
rotate the wing so that it paralleled the
building's center wing. Accompanying his
work was the addition to the west end of
the original 1792 structure, which created
private offices for the Governor and
judges. A third floor was also added to
the south end of the center wing. In 1900,
the wing was extended 95 feet, ending at
the edge of a water power canal, known as
the Sanhican Creek. The addition
was North
and Northeast Facades, c. 1905.
Major reconstruction took place
after a devastating fire in
1885. In 1903, under the
direction of Merchantsville architect Arnold Moses,
the Senate wing was reconstructed in American
Renaissance style to mirror the Assembly quarters.
The wing was enlarged using classical forms and
rich materials, particularly in the decorative
interior and exterior treatments. South
and East Facades, c. 1912-17. The
building remained nearly
unchanged until current
renovations began in
1986. The
original 1792 east wing was replaced with
a four-story office section in 1906. The
front area was extended on the east side
in 1911. Similar work was done on the
front west side the next year. In the
decades following, no major structural
changes occurred aside from the
modernization of the main corridor in the
late 1950's. The effort
of all these years was nearly lost in the
1960's when a master plan called for the
demolition of almost the entire building.
Luckily, the plan was never executed. With
today's new respect for historic
buildings, the |
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