Palisades has the rides... Palisades has the fun… Come On Over. Shows and dancing are free... so's the parking, so gee... Come On Over. Palisades from coast to coast, where a dime buys the most. Palisades Amusement Park. Swings all day and after dark. (bumm, baa, dumm, bumm, bummmm) Ride the coaster...Get cool...In the waves in the pool. You’ll have fun... so...Come On Over..(dumm de dum da dum... dum) So goes the song Come on Over that was heard over all the New York metropolitan area radio stations and seen on TV commericials in the 1960s. This song, lodged in the recesses of millions of …

Early January is a time to look back as well as ahead - back to the previous year's successes and shortfalls and ahead to what we all hope will be a good year for all.  This being an archives piece, I have the great good fortune of revving up the old Fort Lee way back machine and heading to a January distant in time but, as Einstein said, relatively not so distant in scope. The time, my friends, is January of 1916, some 97 years ago.  Imagine Fort Lee without the George Washington Bridge, a small rural town with a vibrant Main Street, trolley tracks and movie studios. This was near the apex …

As these short December days melt into memory, we here in Fort Lee should take time to bid farewell to our Police Chief, Tom Ripoli, who will retire with the ringing in of the New Year.  The Chief has received many accolades over the past few weeks and will likely see many more in the coming days. All are well deserved. However these accolades center on his time as Chief of the Fort Lee Police Department and for his 41-year career in the department. The Chief is not only from Fort Lee, he is Fort Lee, and I will tell you why from my own personal perspective. Decades ago in the fall of 1972 …

'Tis the season for many holiday remembrances, and here in our little perch atop the Palisades in Fort Lee, one rarely heard tale comes to mind. As you go about your holiday shopping these last few days before Christmas, I hope you can take the time to relax for a moment or two in front of your fireplace if you have one, and if not, then position yourself near your TV as WPIX brings back its yearly ratings hit, “The Yule Log.”  As you relax in this cozy atmosphere, you might be compelled to think of the holiday classic A Christmas Carol. Charles Dickens’ acclaimed novella was first published …

Last week’s piece centered on the Old English Neighborhood of Fort Lee that hugs lower Main Street and River Road just below Kaufer Lane. I left out a discussion of Old Palisade Road because I felt that lonely little road deserved a moment in the sun on its own merits.   Just north of the Fort Lee Pump Station on lower Main Street as Main meanders into River Road, there is a lonely, forgotten and somewhat desolate reminder of a time when this section of Fort Lee was noted for its artists and bohemians from the late 19th to the mid-20th century.   Old Palisade Road climbed the cliffs to Kaufer…

This time of the year always brings me back to thoughts of the fall of 1776 and General Washington’s retreat from Fort Lee, or as we refer to it, "Washington’s Retreat to Victory."  As mentioned in previous pieces, General Washington led more than 2,000 of his troops west on Fort Lee's present day Main Street on Nov. 20, 1776 as they abandoned Fort Lee when they received warning that the British had crossed the Hudson River and were heading to capture Fort Lee. This archives piece will deal with the area of Fort Lee where the main fortification of Fort Constitution, later named Fort Lee, was …

The Palisades cliffs of Fort Lee are referenced in many of these archive pieces.  Often I use as a point of reference the fact that we denizens of Fort Lee reside perched atop these very cliffs. These ancient cliffs define us as a borough. Carol Ortlip, a Fort Lee native and a member of the famed Ortlip family of artists of Fort Lee, wrote a book some years ago titled We Became Like A Hand: A Story of Five Sisters.  Carol brought a new meaning to growing up on these cliffs, as she wrote about her family life atop the cliffs near Old Palisades Road, the present day site of several high-rises, …

The Ortlip family of artists are among many artists who called Fort Lee their home from the 19th through the 20th century. As hard as it may seem to believe today, back in the post-Civil War era through the early part of the 20th century, Fort Lee was a resort community with lavish hotels atop the Palisades.  Here many artists ventured to capture on canvas the wonderful views of the Hudson River atop the bluffs of Fort Lee’s Palisades. Many artists associated with the famous Ashcan School of the early 20th century created their art in Fort Lee. It was a realist artistic movement made up of …

As Thanksgiving approaches next week, this is a time to reflect on many things in our lives as Americans, from the most recent visit of a superstorm named Sandy and the ensuing havoc, to those things we all have to be grateful for in our Fort Lee of 2012.  Each November, our borough takes on the look of the town depicted in the Ray Bradbury story, Something Wicked This Way Comes. The book and the film based on this story evoke all the darkness and mystery of autumn, and, in a way, if you look from our perch on the Palisades, Fort Lee too takes on a very Gothic look, as the grayness of the …

Fort Lee for those of us who live here is sometimes just home, and it is hard to fathom the interest the outside world shows in our little borough perched atop the bluffs of the Palisades. This column has covered much of Fort Lee’s history, including our role as the birthplace of the American film industry, but this week we add an international flavor via the year 1912. This year, 2012, as noted in previous archive pieces, we celebrate some of the most important centennials in American and world cinema history, all of which occurred on the streets of Fort Lee.  Madame Alice Guy Blache built …

The turning of the leaves atop the Palisades here in Fort Lee connote many things to many people. Most people think of Halloween and tricks or treats as the calendar creeps closer to Oct. 31.  But since 2003 this time of the year in Fort Lee brings back memories of Alois Dettlaff. Al was an aged film collector from cosmopolitan Cudahy, Wisconsin, who visited us not so many years ago. Like the meeting of Abbott & Costello with Frankenstein, this meeting of Al Dettlaff and the Fort Lee Film Commission is legendary and worth unearthing during this ghostly season of Halloween. Jim Beckerman, …

Nothing is so missing from small town and big city America today than the corner candy store. Sure, we have our 7-11s and Starbucks abound. But when I started to work in New York City after graduating from college in the 80s, you still had the last vestiges of the local lunch counters and candy stores with soda fountains in Manhattan – places like Woolworth’s with their ubiquitous lunch counter and the waitresses in their crisp uniforms with their names sewed on the pocket’s of their blouses.  I recall one Woolworth’s on 23rd Street not far from Union Square very well.  Today, if you go to …

The Fort Lee Film Commission each year presents its Barrymore Award to an individual whose work in film best exemplifies the traditions of both the pioneer filmmakers of Fort Lee and the greatest American acting family, the Barrymores, who called Fort Lee their home in the early 1900s.  Past recipients include three-time Academy Award winning film editor Thelma Schoonmaker, Academy Award winning screenwriter Budd Schulberg and Academy Award winning actress Celeste Holm. Maurice Barrymore, the patriarch of the acting clan, made his home in a rambling grand Victorian home on Hammett Avenue in …

Fort Lee history is housed in a wonderful 1922 Palisade bluestone exterior building between Parker and Palisade Avenues and adjacent to historic Monument Park. Every season seems to bring new and different beauty to the unique architecture of this borough gem. The Fort Lee Historic Site Committee is currently at work with the Mayor & Council on getting a local landmark status for this structure. This is the first step in making sure future generations will enjoy the treasures of its exterior but also the treasure chest of history hidden and stored away in its alcoves and corridors.  This …

The year 1917 was perhaps the zenith of the filmmaking era in Fort Lee; soon thereafter the industry would center most of its activity in California. However, in 1917 it was a bit premature to shout "Hooray for Hollywood," especially since movie industry pioneer Jules Brulatour in 1916 opened his new Paragon Studio on John Street in Fort Lee. This was the last studio to be built in Fort Lee and one that produced a seminal American film that serves as a documentary of sorts on silent filmmaking. Jules Brulatour, according to Richard Koszarski in his book Fort Lee The Film Town, had a hand in …

Most people from Fort Lee, when they hear the word "ferry," think of NY Waterway based in nearby Edgewater, Weehawken, Hoboken and Jersey City. Those of us of a certain age, whose nightlife began when we tried to emulate the disco moves of John Travolta, however, recall fondly the Binghamton Ferry/Nightclub, which was the first real night spot many of us ventured to when we turned 18.  But long before the rebirth of the ferry system of transport in our area in the 1990s, there was a ferry system tied to not only transportation, but also to the birth of Fort Lee as America’s first film town …

This week’s look back into our archive might seem curious given the 3D reference. Sure, 3D movies date to the 1950s, and to such early examples as the classic 1953 Vincent Price horror film The House of Wax.  However, as is often the case, our trek to the past leads further back into a technology that was as cutting edge in the 19th century as is digital technology in the 21st century.  Sir Charles Wheatstone invented the stereoscope in 1838. Two images, side by side, were placed on this device, and when viewed through the stereoscope the image appears in a 3D form. The popularity of the …

The world famous Coney Island Sideshow Circus leaves Surf Avenue in Brooklyn and comes to the Jack Alter Fort Lee Community Center for a live free show on Saturday, Sept.8, as part of the Fort Lee Film Commission’s final Movies & Music Under the Stars program of the 2012 season. This 10-week, free program has offered wonderful live music and fantastic films to the people of Fort Lee thanks to the support of the borough and our sponsors, including Universal Studios. Our final program is one chosen carefully in that it connects in a real way to our past; that past being the colorful Palisades …

A recent Patch archive piece centered on the Coytesville section of Fort Lee, which sits in the northernmost section of the borough atop the Palisades. Not to be repetitive, but some visitors from across the pond this week make a follow-up story on Coytesville unavoidable. Call it, if you will, the third British invasion in Fort Lee’s storied history. British Invasion 1 Local history buffs are well aware that our very own Main Street served as General Washington’s retreat route, or as we call it, the "Retreat to Victory." Washington and his troops were encamped in Fort Lee in the summer and …

The Fort Lee Museum houses the Fort Lee Historical Society and Fort Lee Film Commission archives, and from these archival photos, documents and artifacts we create about four exhibits a year in our museum on Palisade Avenue. But we are always in search of additions to the collections to create new exhibits and to preserve our collective past.  Thus, we have trolled the seas of eBay, visited countless antique stores, including our friend Jim Episale’s wonderful Unshredded Nostalgia in Barnegat, NJ, and searched through the attics and basements of homes in Fort Lee when invited to do so by …