Maria Pratt Hopper

Montvale Maria Pratt Hopper

Montvale is a small borough of approximately 4.5 square miles in the picturesque Pascack Valley in northeastern Bergen County, New Jersey. How the borough grew from a small farming community to a population of nearly 9,000 in 2019 is told through the use of vintage photographs. Pictures of 18th-century Dutch Colonial sandstone houses, a 19th-century octagon house, a cider mill that made "Jersey applejack," horses and buggies, and antique cars all have stories to tell, as do advertisements and posters. In one for an 1896 social and basket picnic, folks were invited to "bring your team, wife and children," but there would be "no swearing or fighting.'' Turn-of-the-century postcards tell of the hundreds of summer visitors escaping the city heat. After Montvale became the last stop in New Jersey on the Garden State Parkway, the western section of the borough changed from farmland to the headquarters of some of the most prestigious national and international corporations, including Benjamin Moore, KPMG, Sharp Electronics, and Western Union, as well as home to the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.