# Montclair, Essex County, New Jersey in the 1910s

> A wealthy New York suburb on the Orange Mountain slope, with rail commuters, sharp class divisions, and ambitious public health reform.

- Place: Montclair, Essex County, New Jersey (40.826, -74.209)
- Years: 1910 to 1919
- Page: https://yorehistory.com/place/montclair-essex-county-new-jersey/1910s
- Step into it (interactive): https://yorehistory.com/?step=Montclair%2C%20Essex%20County%2C%20New%20Jersey%2C%20United%20States&at=40.8259,-74.2090&year=1915

## Looking around

You stand in a town at the base and on the slopes of the Orange Mountains[2], where the ground rises from the lower streets toward Upper Montclair. The place is a residential suburb of New York and neighboring cities[2], not a factory town, though work is still everywhere in houses, shops, schools, hospitals, and rail yards. Turn toward the tracks and the new Lackawanna terminal shows Doric columns, green-tile roof, brickwork, and marble-concrete trim[3]. Beyond it are autos and parking facilities for commuters[3], a sign of local wealth. Along many streets stand two-story-and-attic frame cottages for one family, with good-sized yards[7]. In the poorer fourth ward, the view tightens into tenement houses, crowded rooms, basement tenements, dirty yards, and houses in bad repair[7]. Milk wagons must carry licensed, inspected milk, because the Board of Health tests the town milk supply[9].

## Work: Commuters and service work

Montclair is explicitly a residential suburb of New York and other neighboring cities[2], and the railroad made it practical for business and professional men to live here while working elsewhere. Local labor also sits behind the houses, hospital, schools, dairies, shops, and health inspections, though no opened source gives a full occupational breakdown.

## Who lived here: Black and Italian Montclair

In 1910, after native-born whites, the largest named groups were Black residents at 11.5 percent and Italians at 7 percent[4]. The infant-mortality study shows these communities were not spread evenly: foreign-born and Black mothers’ births were concentrated heavily in the fourth ward[7].

## Home & table: Cottages and tenements

The admired suburban image rested on two-story-and-attic frame cottages for one family, with good-sized yards[7]. But the same town contained 133 tenement houses in 1912[7], and the fourth ward was marked by overcrowding, basement tenements, dirty yards, and bad repair[7].

## Money: A rich town, unequal rents

Montclair’s 1912 assessed property valuation was $40,319,062[4], exceptionally high for a place of its size. Yet among babies in the federal study, 135 lived in homes renting for under $15 a month[8], while 119 were in owned homes.

## What people feared: Babies, milk, sanitation

The town’s great local danger was not wilderness but infant disease and bad housing: the fourth ward’s infant mortality rate was 130.4 per 1,000 births[7]. Reform meant inspection, registration, and clean supply lines, including 307 milk samples tested from 11 supplies in 1912[9].

## Law & power: Health officers watched homes

The Board of Health had real everyday reach: it tested milk[9], inspected dairies, and supervised birth records. Its records mattered because a birth certificate could prove school admission, working age, voting age, marriage, inheritance, and public-office eligibility[9].

## In the air: Civic improvement and art

Montclair’s elites invested in culture and uplift: the Montclair Art Museum opened in 1914[6] with American and Native American collections. The older annual Bach festival[2] points to a town where cultivated music and public respectability were civic projects.

## Roads & news: Railways brought the outside

News, commuters, shoppers, and strangers came by Erie, Lackawanna, and electric lines to Caldwell and Newark[2]. The new terminal of 1913 made the railway a civic monument, with Doric columns, green-tile roof, brickwork, and marble-concrete trim[3].

## Year by year

- **1910** (here): The federal census counted 21,550 people in Montclair.[1][2]
- **1912** (here): A federal infant-mortality study found Montclair wealthy overall but sharply divided by ward, housing, race, and nativity.[7]
- **1913** (here): The Delaware, Lackawanna & Western completed the new Montclair railroad terminal.[3]
- **1914** (here): The Montclair Art Museum opened as a public art institution with American and Native American collections.[6]
- **1914** (the world): World War I began in Europe, becoming daily news in a commuter town tied to New York newspapers and rail travel.
- **1917** (the country): The United States entered World War I, making enlistment, draft registration, bonds, and war work national concerns heard in Montclair.
- **1918** (the country): Influenza struck New Jersey and the nation, making Montclair’s existing concern with sanitation and infant health newly urgent.[9]
- **1919** (the country): The Eighteenth Amendment was ratified, beginning national Prohibition arguments that would have reached Montclair’s churches, clubs, and newspapers.

## What the sources say

- Montclair had 21,550 people in the 1910 federal census. (from the sources)[1][2]
- In 1911, Montclair was described as lying at the base and on the slopes of the Orange Mountains, from about 217 to 665 feet above sea level. (from the sources)[2]
- The 1911 Encyclopaedia Britannica called Montclair a residential suburb of New York and other neighboring cities. (from the sources)[2]
- Montclair was served in the early 1910s by the Erie Railroad, the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western Railway, and electric lines to Caldwell and Newark. (from the sources)[2]
- The Delaware, Lackawanna & Western completed its Montclair terminal in 1913. (from the sources)[3]
- The 1913 railroad station had Doric columns, a green-tile roof, tapestry-bond brickwork, and marble-concrete trim. (from the sources)[3]
- A National Register nomination says the 1913 Lackawanna terminal provided for automobiles and that its parking facilities were usually filled. (from the sources)[3]
- Montclair’s institutions listed in 1911 included Mountainside Hospital, the State Normal School opened in 1908, Montclair Academy, a public library, and two orphan asylums. (from the sources)[2]
- The State Normal School at Montclair was operating in the 1910–1911 school year as a teacher-training institution. (from the sources)[5]
- The Montclair Art Museum opened in 1914 with American and Native American art collections given by local patrons including William T. Evans and Florence Rand Lang. (inferred)[6]
- In 1910, after native-born whites, Montclair’s largest population groups were Black residents at 11.5 percent and Italians at 7 percent, with another 2.8 percent native-born of Italian parentage. (from the sources)[4]
- A 1912 federal infant-mortality study estimated Montclair’s population at about 24,000 and its assessed property valuation at $40,319,062. (from the sources)[4]
- The same study said Montclair’s most common house type was a two-story-and-attic frame cottage for one family, with a good-sized yard. (from the sources)[7]
- The fourth ward had Montclair’s main housing problem in 1912: congestion, overcrowding, houses in bad repair, occasional basement tenements, and dirty yards. (from the sources)[7]
- Montclair had 133 tenement houses on December 31, 1912, including 20 ordinarily classed as apartment houses. (from the sources)[7]
- Among babies visited in the 1912 infant-mortality study, 135 lived in homes renting for under $15 a month, 76 in homes renting for $15 to $30, 32 in homes renting for $30 or more, and 119 in owned homes. (from the sources)[8]
- Montclair’s Board of Health supervised milk by laboratory analysis and dairy inspection, testing 307 samples from 11 town supplies in 1912. (from the sources)[9]
- In 1913, among U.S. cities of 20,000 to 30,000 population, Montclair ranked fourth in per-capita spending on health and sanitation and first among New Jersey cities of that size. (from the sources)[9]
- The fourth ward’s 1912 infant mortality rate was 130.4 per 1,000 births, compared with 84.6 for Montclair as a whole. (from the sources)[7]
- In 1912, Montclair’s Board of Health reported 76 privies on unsewered streets and 26 privies on streets that already had sewers. (from the sources)[8]
- Montclair had an annual Bach festival first held in June 1905, showing an organized local musical culture before and during the 1910s. (from the sources)[2]
- The town’s Board of Health used birth registration for school admission, proof of working age, voting age, marriage, inheritance, and eligibility for some public offices. (from the sources)[9]
- No digitized source opened here gives a full occupational breakdown for ordinary Montclair workers in the 1910s. (not known)
- No source opened here identifies every church or synagogue active in Montclair during the 1910s. (not known)

## Sources

1. Abstract of the Thirteenth Census of the United States, 1910: Supplement for New Jersey. U.S. Census Bureau, 1913. https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/decennial/1910/abstract/supplement-new-jersey.pdf
2. 1911 Encyclopaedia Britannica: Montclair. Encyclopaedia Britannica / Wikisource, 1911. https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/1911_Encyclop%C3%A6dia_Britannica/Montclair
3. National Register of Historic Places Inventory: Montclair Railroad Station. National Park Service, 1972. https://npgallery.nps.gov/NRHP/GetAsset/NRHP/73001092_text
4. Infant Mortality: Montclair, N.J., A Study of Infant Mortality in a Suburban Community. U.S. Children’s Bureau / FRASER, 1915. https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/title/infant-mortality-8305/fulltext
5. Catalogue and Circular of Information of the New Jersey State Normal School at Montclair, 1910–1911. New Jersey State Normal School at Montclair, 1910. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/af/Catalogue_and_circular_of_information_of_the_New_Jersey_State_Normal_School_at_Montclair_%28IA_cataloguecircula191011191516newj%29.pdf
6. MAM’s History. Montclair Art Museum. https://www.montclairartmuseum.org/mams-history
7. Infant Mortality: Montclair, N.J., Housing and Ward Conditions. U.S. Children’s Bureau / FRASER, 1915. https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/title/infant-mortality-8305/fulltext#p_13
8. Infant Mortality: Montclair, N.J., Housing Conditions Table. U.S. Children’s Bureau / FRASER, 1915. https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/title/infant-mortality-8305/fulltext#p_15
9. Infant Mortality: Montclair, N.J., Civic Factors and Milk Supervision. U.S. Children’s Bureau / FRASER, 1915. https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/title/infant-mortality-8305/fulltext#p_24

## The same place in other decades

- [Montclair in the 1920s](https://yorehistory.com/place/montclair-essex-county-new-jersey/1920s/md)

## Nearby, about the same time

- [New York in the 1930s](https://yorehistory.com/place/new-york-new-york-county-new-york/1930s/md) (21 km)
- [New York in the 1900s](https://yorehistory.com/place/new-york-new-york/1900s/md) (21 km)
- [Princeton, New Jersey in the 1930s](https://yorehistory.com/place/princeton-new-jersey/1930s/md) (65 km)
- [Doylestown, Bucks County, Pennsylvania in the 1890s](https://yorehistory.com/place/doylestown-bucks-county-pennsylvania/1890s/md) (97 km)
- [Scranton, Lackawanna, Pennsylvania in the 1940s](https://yorehistory.com/place/scranton-lackawanna-pennsylvania/1940s/md) (138 km)
- [Pittston, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania in the 1880s](https://yorehistory.com/place/pittston-luzerne-county-pennsylvania/1880s/md) (144 km)
- [Wilkes-Barre, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania in the 1900s](https://yorehistory.com/place/wilkes-barre-luzerne-county-pennsylvania/1900s/md) (148 km)

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Researched by Yore's AI historian (gpt-5.5) on 2026-10-12 from the sources listed. It is about the place and the time, not about any person. Statements marked "inferred" are conclusions, not records. Cite as: Yore, "Montclair, Essex County, New Jersey in the 1910s", https://yorehistory.com/place/montclair-essex-county-new-jersey/1910s