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Originally published in 1939
Some of this information may no longer be current and in that case is presented for historical interest only.
Edited by GET NJ, COPYRIGHT 2003
PASSAIC (70 alt., 62,959 pop.) is a hustling textile town that, in spite of perennial complaints, has not yet rid itself of the double line of railroad tracks which run for about eight blocks through the center of the city.
Bounded on one side by Passaic River, 15 miles upstream from Newark Bay, the city is bordered on the other three sides by the semicircular area of residential Clifton.
The long scar of the Erie Railroad main line across the face of the city is Passaic's identification mark. Each day more than 70 trains pass through the center of town, congesting traffic, blackening the streets and buildings
with their smoke. At the crossings are darkened, two-story gateman's towers, each topped by a slanting roof and a stove-pipe chimney. On the curbs are silvered wooden booths for police who operate the traffic signals.
Main Avenue is the shopping center, lined by two- to four-story builds ings with offices on the upper floors, and neon signs before tightly packed
shops of modern appearance on the sidewalk level. Towering above these structures is an 11-story bank building, the local skyscraper.
Main Avenue also is Passaic's residential dividing line. From the ridge on the west, the broad, twisting streets of the residential district dip suddenly into the center of the town. One-family houses predominate; some are of modern architecture, while there are many imposing wood dwellings of the Georgian Colonial type, well spaced with deep well-kept lawns.
East of Main Avenue a progressively shabbier area stretches down to
the river. Here the streets are narrow, with frame dwellings and congested tenements crowded beside huge factories. This is the "Dundee Section," where one-half the population is crammed into one-sixth of the city's area. Living in this section are most of the foreign-born who comprise about
one-third the total population. Numerically the Poles are first, followed in turn by the Italians, Russians, Hungarians, Slovaks, Germans, Austrians, Dutch, Scotch, English, and Irish.
Through this area flows the sluggish Dundee Canal with its trash-laden bottom and oily scum. Almost everywhere are churches, some of them merely remodeled homes; others spread out over half a block or more.
Twenty years ago the "shawled woman of Passaic" symbolized the poverty of workers in the Dundee section. Today shawls are seen only on the older women; most of the others wear berets, or go hatless. The foreign-born cling to the language of their native countries, and many little stationery stores carry a full quota of foreign-language newspapers.
Many Old World customs and folkways are perpetuated in church ceremonials and lodge celebrations. The Russian bride and groom still eat from the same plate with the same fork at their wedding, and Italians still celebrate their saints' days with open-air, electrically lit pageantry, although these festivals are becoming increasingly commercialized.
Parochial schools have kept alive the mother tongues by teaching foreign languages. Lately this practice has been furthered by language schools formed by private organizations whose members are anticlerical. Cultural organizations such as the Polish National Home,. the Slovak Catholic Sokol (falcon or hero), and the Matica Slovenska (Slovak mother) foster an appreciation of the old customs and new developments in the homelands. The Sokol, for example, publishes two national newspapers and sponsors a boys' organization comparable to the Boy Scouts; the Matica Slovenska is the chief Slovak cultural institute, with headquarters in Czechoslovakia.
Passaic is one of the centers of the Nation's woolen industry. One of its mills-the Botany Worsted Mills-claims to be the world's largest complete unit for the manufacture of woolens. Other important industries include handkerchief factories, with a daily output of 1,000,000 (almost two-thirds of the Nation's total), rubber manufacturing, and garment making.
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