Lakehurst Borough Hall is located at 5 Union Avenue, Lakehurst, N.J. 08733.
Phone: 732‑657‑4141.
Lakehurst was incorporated in 1921 from a portion of Manchester Township.
Lakehurst as described in 1939 [1]
Lakehurst is a quiet little village that has seen the iron furnaces prosper and fail, the charcoal industry rise and fall, the railroad shops come and go, and the lighter-than-aircraft hailed and now seriously questioned. There are tall elms along the streets, planted in the Civil War period when real estate men tried to put new life into the old settlement of Manchester after the iron and charcoal industries died. The town was almost wiped out, but in 1860 the "new railroad," the Jersey Central, places its repair shops here and Manchester again flourished. The shops were closed in 1932; there is no industrial plant in the village now and little farming around it.
Into a tavern here in September 1937, came a local blueberry picker, John Henry Titus, 91, with a kerosene-soaked rag in his shoe to ward off mosquitoes. According to Time magazine, "he sank to one knee, and, with gestures, once more recited his famous poem, The Face on the Bedroom Floor." Scholars, however, generally give H. H. D'Arcy credit for the poem.
The many small, modern houses along the highway west of Lakehurst are rented to offices of the U. S. Naval Air Station when quarters at the reservation are filled. Reduction of personnel has made this a deserted district.
The road passes a few patches of dense cedar woods, survivals of the time when large forests of pine and cedar covered much of this region. Huge white letters and arrows painted on the road are direction markers for airplane pilots. Long stretches of roadway with wide dirt shoulders edged with scattered pines present a desolate picture for miles ahead.
Nearby Towns: Jackson Twp • Manchester Twp •