Paterson Great Falls

For Mother's Day this year, my daughter came home to New Jersey and drove me to the Great Water Fall in Paterson, New Jersey.  I had wanted to go there for many years, but it is a long drive and especially now that my eyesight is beginning to fail me, I couldn't go there on my own and none of my friends was willing to take such a long drive.

It was about 80 miles and it took an hour and 45 minutes to get there.  We drove the Mill Mile and visited the Paterson Museum which featured artifacts from many of Paterson's most famous former industrial products, the silk mills Paterson was once called Silk City) and locomotives, patent medicines, aircraft engines (the one in Lindbergh's famous trans-Atlantic flight airplane), and a facsimile of the house where Lou  Costello of Abbott and Costello lived.  There were many other treasures in the museum, too, gems and minerals from the mines and some historical artifacts from the nursing and medical history of Paterson.

The Falls were magnificent and there was good parking beside the now closed stadium alongside the Falls.  

Alexander Hamilton had engineered the rise in industrial manufacture in Paterson as an antidote to dependence on British manufactured goods at the time of the Revolution.  He utilized the formidable power of the falls to power the mills.

Paterson is still a city of great ethnic diversity, featuring a section inhabited by Peruvians, for example and showcasing a lively array of eateries catering to various ethnic cuisines.  

It was an easy day's trip to the second greatest waterfall East of the Mississippi River (needless to say the Niagara Falls are the other one.)]

The Jim Jarmusch film Paterson, is a charming homage to the poetic spirit of the city.  The star of the movie is Adam Driver who plays a poet bus-driver and there is a lovely scene at the Great Falls. 

While there, we stopped in the National parks visitor's Center and met a delightful and informative  Park Guard who had a been a veteran of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.  President Obama signed the National Park designation for the Great Falls in 2013.  It is wonderful to know that this magnificent natural wonder will be protected.

If you go, be sure to walk on the bridge over the falls for the best viewing angle!

There was hardly any traffic on the turnpike going up to Paterson or back, and the day was delightful from start to finish despite the overcast cloudy skies.  We only had a slight drizzle from time to time.

Happy Trails!
Jo Ann