The Harrison Township Historical Society presents a lecture and book signing with Dr. Tom Kinsella on Sunday, October 18 at 3 p.m. at the Richwood Academy Cultural Center, 836 Lambs Road in Richwood. Admission is free.
In 1882, families fleeing the pogroms of czarist Russia arrived in the South Jersey countryside to take up a trade most of them had never practiced. They became farmers. Where many such settlements failed, this one endured. The Alliance Colony became the first successful Jewish farming community in America and grew into the villages of Norma, Alliance and Brotmanville, outside Vineland, which
remain today.
Kinsella is Distinguished Professor of Literature at Stockton University, director of its South Jersey Culture and History Center, and the Elizabeth and Samuel Levin Director of the Alliance Heritage Center. He has spent years gathering the photographs, documents and family memories that keep the colony’s story in the record. In February the New Jersey Historical Commission recognized the Alliance Heritage Center’s work with an Award of Recognition.
His book, Growing American: The Alliance Agricultural Colony in South Jersey, was published in 2021 by Stockton’s own South Jersey Culture and History Center. Copies will be available for purchase and signing after the lecture.
The lecture is Sunday, October 18 at 3 PM at the Richwood Academy Cultural Center, 836 Lambs Road, Richwood. Admission is free and on-site parking is available. The program will be live-streamed and archived on the Society’s Facebook page and posted to YouTube. Information is at harrisonhistorical.com, hthsmhnj@gmail.com and 856-478-4949.
