From the Bergen County Web page: Easton Tower is a unique historic site in Bergen County. This stone and wood frame structure was built along the Saddle River in 1900 as part of a private landscaped park in the Arcola area of Paramus. Surrounded by busy NJ roadways, it is now adjacent to the County’s Saddle River Bikeway. Once used to pump water to irrigate and provide a scenic setting for the estate of Edward Easton, it is a 20-ft rectangular, stone-masonry tower topped with a wood-frame structure and a woodshingle, gabled roof. On the side is a large wood water wheel, which is under a wood-shingle roof. The architect Henry Ihnen designed it. In the 18th century this area along the Saddle River and near the heavily used Albany post road, was the location of many mills. Jacob Zabriskie, a Bergen County Freeholder during the Revolutionary War had leased the 80-acre mill site around 1766 and in 1771 acquired the mill that had been built in the1740s. Revolutionary maps identify it as “Demarest’s and Zabriskie’s Mills.” Over time it was rebuilt or expanded and in the early 1800s painted red by its owner Albert Westervelt. It is at this time it acquired the “Red Mill” name often mistakenly applied to Easton Tower. By the late 1800s the mill had fallen into disrepair and was demolished circa 1894. 36 In 1899, Edward D. Easton (1856-1915) bought this almost 48-acre site, which included the mill pond and dam. The area was called “Arcola.” Easton’s father, a teacher, had originally brought his young family to this area and suggested the name for the new settlement after a town in Italy. Edward Easton was a notable figure in American technological history. He started out as a stenographer, reporter and then a court stenographer in Washington DC covering many famous trials in the 1880s. After the 1886 patent was granted for the method of engraving sound by incising wax cylinders, Easton went on to make his fortune in the recording industry. He was a founder and eventually president of the Columbia Phonograph Company, which became one of the three major recording companies at the turn of the twentieth century. After opening an office in New York City, Easton relocated his family from Washington DC to Arcola. He had a large house built on his property and commissioned the design of a landscaped park. The tower, to be built near the site of the old Red Mill, was a functioning structure pumping water to the several fountains. There were also rustic bridges, lakes and expansive lawns. The tower was a favorite of photographers and appears in many contemporary postcards. People came from miles around to this beautiful spot to take boat rides and walks, and, in the winter, ice-skate near the tower. Sources list the Easton house and park as having been used in early silent films. After Easton’s death in 1915, the property went through various owners. In 1931, construction of the Route 208 connection with Route 4 at “the Old Mill at Arcola” provided access to the recently opened George Washington Bridge. This destroyed sections of the landscaped park and isolated the tower. In 1940 the 1.26-acre site was sold at a sheriff’s sale to Clyde A. Bogert. The County acquired the tower from the Bogerts and the Blauvelt-Demarest Foundation in 1956. In 1967 the Bergen County Park Commission dedicated the tower. Easton Tower was placed on the State and National Register of Historic Places and in 2008 was completely restored by the County.
I also find this information on the Haunted New Jersey Houses web page: Commonly mistaken as the "Red Mill", the Easton Tower was built in the 1900s and commissioned by Manuel Rionda as a tribute to his wife. Legend has it that Rionda's wife committed suicide by climbing to the top and jumping off the tower after seeing her husband with another woman. Some visitors say that you can summon her ghost by circling the tower at night. Others have heard strange noises from the building and seen other ghastly apparitions.
To Log this cache find the dedication on the tower and send me the name of the Director! Please feel free to post a photo of your team at the tower but please to not show the answer.
Virtual Rewards 3.0 - 2022-2023
This Virtual Cache is part of a limited release of Virtuals created between March 1, 2022 and March 1, 2023. Only 4,000 cache owners were given the opportunity to hide a Virtual Cache. Learn more about Virtual Rewards 3.0 on the Geocaching Blog.