Millville, New Jersey

AT A GLANCE MILLVILLE, NEW JERSEY WHAT: A city of 28,000 WHERE: Cumberland County, in the southern part of the state WEBSITE: www.millvillenj.gov EMBRACING THE FUTURE M illville, New Jersey, a city of approximately 28,000, is located in Cumberland County, in the southern part of the state, some 45 miles south of Philadelphia. Millville, which incorporated as a township in 1801, derived its name from the numerous mills and factories built along the Maurice River, which, in turn, gave the town shipping access to the Delaware Bay. In 1806, an Irish immigrant, named James Lee, opened the area’s first glass factory, making use of the large amount of silica sand in the region. For most of the next two centuries, Millville was a major U.S. glass producing center. In fact, American poet, Carl Sandburg, immortalized the glass making prowess of Millville in a 1904 essay: “Down in southern New Jersey, they make glass. By day and by night, the fires burn on in Millville and bid the sand let in the light. Millville by night would have delighted Whistler, who loved gloom and mist and wild shadows. Great rafts of wood and big, brick hulks, dotted with a myriad of lights, glowing and twinkling every shade of red. Big, black flumes shooting out smoke and sparks; bottles, bottles, bottles, of every tint and hue, from a brilliant crimson to the dull green that marks the death of sand and the birth of glass.” One of Millville’s legendary glass manufacturers was Wheaton Industries. Founded in 1888, by Dr. Theodore Corson Wheaton, it became a mainstay of the economy of southern New Jersey. Run by