The storage sheds standing in the field off Mountain Avenue, east of its intersection with Stirling Road, are all that remain of the Schmalz Dairy Farm, a once-thriving business that occupied the site of today's Woodland School and Watchung Hills Regional High School. Still identified by old-timers as Schmalz's, the sheds (used now for storage by the Board of Education) evoke a period in Warren's history when farming was the township's major - and virtually only - business. John, Frederick W. and Edward A. Schmalz, owners of Hoboken's Schmalz Baking Company, vacationed in Summit and during a tour of the area in 1914 came to Warren Township, found a large farm they liked and bought it that year. Edward Schmalz, a licensed veterinarian, considered raising horses on the farm but soon turned his thoughts to dairy farming, erecting a large barn that accommodated 40 cows. In 1916 the Schmalz family decided to go into the dairy business in a big way, forming the Schmalz Dairy Farm capitalized at $100,000. Their main barn, a large two-story structure incorporating the latest milk-processing technology, soon became a model for other dairy barns in the vicinity. Younger brother Henry joined the company later. Schmalz processed its own milk and sold it wholesale and retail. Schmalz's milkmen and milk trucks were a familiar site in the area for many decades. Dr. Schmalz, who lived in a large house on Mountain Avenue near his brother, Henry, was active in the community, serving as president of the township Board of Education in 1933 when the schools were centralized. He died in December 1950 of a heart ailment. His house is long gone but his brother Henry's Tudor-style residence is still standing and can be seen through the trees just east of the high school property. The family also owned a pasture north of Mountain Avenue where one of the high school's athletic fields is now. A tunnel under Mountain Avenue allowed cows to pass from the upper to lower pastures. The scene is barely recognizable today; in the l970s and l980s the Board of Education raised the height of the pasture some 15' to create a level field. A raging fire swept through one of the two-story dairy barns on the early evening of July 17, 1950, burning through the night. Thought to have been the result of spontaneous combustion, the blaze caused some $75,000 in damage, destroying 4,000 bales of hay, the barn and the milking equipment in it. The barn crashed to the ground in a shower of smoke and sparks around midnight. Nearly 100 firemen from Warren and surrounding towns fought the blaze, pumping water from the Passaic River. Mrs. George Pusey, wife of the farm's superintendent, joined with her husband and three employees to lead 35 Guernsey cows to safety. The farm closed in the early 1960s, soon after the fire. Woodland School was built in 1953 on the Stirling Road side of the farm, followed later in the decade by the Regional High School, which opened for classes in 1957. The old barns on Mountain Avenue, stray milk bottles and a few rusty milk boxes emblazoned with the name "Schmalz" are the only remnants of a business known to two generations of Warren residents . © Warren Township Historical Society |