New Jersey - Paterson Great Falls National Historic Park
I visited this park after landing at LaGuardia in the morning, and visiting a site in Harlem. My road trip of the northeast states was just beginning! As usual, I look at the NPS website to find nearby properties, and I went to the Paterson Great Falls National Historic Park without knowing ANYTHING of what I was going to see.
I was surprised to see such a HUGE waterfall so close to Manhattan!! The falls is in the city of Paterson New Jersey, and the site has only recently become a National Historic Park. There wasn't much at the visitor center, but I spent a bit of time touring the grounds and looking at the waterfall. The town was founded by Alexander Hamilton, and there is a statue of him overlooking the falls. He started the town in 1792 with the intention of making it a hub of manufacturing. He created the " Society for Establishing Usefull Manufacturers" (SUM), and there are some SUM insignias around the site. The falls themselves are amazing, and there is a power plant adjacent to them, there is a large old water mill. It appears that it is at least somewhat still operational.
