(The following story by Donna Weaver appeared on the Press of Atlantic City website on May 6.)
STAFFORD TOWNSHIP — The township Historical Society received a piece of history last week.
Thanks in part to historian Al Stokley, of Toms River, a railroad track diamond has found a home at Heritage Park on East Bay Avenue, said Paul Hart, the society’s collections manager.
“The tracks are called a diamond, and it’s where the central New Jersey tracks that ran north to south crossed the Pennsylvania tracks that ran east to west, in Whiting,” Hart said.
The Tuckerton Railroad, which operated until 1936, also crossed at the diamond, Stokley said. The Pennsylvania Railroad was ripped up from its original location in 1967.
The first diamond at that spot was laid in 1882, although it can’t be verified that it is the diamond now here in Manahawkin, according to Stokley.
When the road was recently resurfaced, Stokley rediscovered the diamond, which was lying nearby in the woods.
“I’ve known about it being there for about 12 years because I belong to railroad historical groups. They put in a new road last fall and even named it Diamond Road,” Stokley said.
The township Historical Society is also preserving the last train station from the Tuckerton railroad, three tracks and a 1922 railroad car that was used on the Central Jersey Railroad, Hart said. The society is restoring the railroad car.
“This is no little thing, and it’s significant because this marks where these major railroads changed New Jersey in the central and south (areas). It brought people to the area and brought city merchandise and the natural resources of the bay,” Hart said.
Jay Thompson of Atlantic Structure Movers in Barnegat donated the work needed to move the rails to the park Wednesday.