Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
Photo: Daniellek0512 · CC BY-SA 3.0More historic than 50% of U.S. towns · #310 of 468 in New Jersey. What drives it
Most of Mahwah Township was built recently: 8% of its homes predate 1940 and the median home dates from 1984. Below: 1 old photo or paper, maps from 1910 on, and the census since 1850.
The Mahwah Township post office opened in 1870, the earliest record of the town by name. Two smaller post offices, Oweno (1884) and Harrington (1890), opened inside today’s town and later closed.
More historic than 50% of U.S. towns, on its age, its old homes and the National Register.
On its age, its old homes and the National Register, Mahwah Township is more historic than 50% of U.S. towns, #310 of 468 in New Jersey. Its National Register listings hold the grade up; its age pulls it down.
New Jersey towns list more on the Register than most of the country (a typical New Jersey town has 3.7 per 10,000 residents, the U.S. 2.4), so Mahwah Township’s 6.7 sits near the middle of its state (63% of New Jersey towns have fewer) while its 17 historic buildings outnumber those of 79% of U.S. towns.
Founding year: the first post office (other dates in Quick answers). Homes: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register: National Park Service, May 2026 list; each listing counted once (boundary changes and added documentation belong to their listing), and a historic district counts its contributing buildings. How TownRatings grades history →
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Mahwah Township’s history is told.
Lost a third of its people between 1880 and 1910, then grew more than tenfold.
18 censuses, 1850–2020.
U.S. Census Bureau decennial counts, from the census table on Mahwah Township’s Wikipedia page.
Two other post offices opened and closed inside today’s town.
US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock, CC0). Places and cemeteries from the USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
From Wikipedia’s history of Mahwah Township.
The Lenape and ancestral Indigenous peoples were the original inhabitants of Mahwah (the meeting place) and surrounding area.
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
In the archiveMahwah station - Bailey
On the mapFirst mapped by the U.S. Geological Survey
Born herePatrick Murray is born hereOne decade in the archive so far: the 1900s. Scroll each row; tap a photo for its story.
2018Sam Braen Field
2018Lechi
2018Lechi Mahwah 2
2018Eruv recall the mayor
2015JOHN SMITH HOUSE
2015JOHN BARTHOLF HOUSE
2015ISAAC BOGERT HOUSE
2015GARRET GARRISON HOUSE
2015CROCKER-McMILLIN MANSION - IMMACULATE CONCEPTION SEMI…
2013Mahwah Public Library-Digital Bookmobile
2013Kilmer Home
2012Vanderbeck House
2012DarlingtonSchoolhouse
2012Abraham Gelder House
2005Sheraton Crossroads
2005Scarlet Oak Pond
2005Njmap-0233Every edition of the U.S. Geological Survey’s map of Mahwah Township. Tap a year, or press play to watch the town change.
U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (public domain), via Esri’s collection of the scans. The red ring marks the center of Mahwah Township.
No then-and-now pairs yet. Take a photo from the same spot as an old one and they appear here side by side.
Find the spot, match the angle, and add your photo. It becomes the first then-and-now pair on Mahwah Township’s page.
Retake this view · +15The country’s official list of buildings and places worth saving.
National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places. Photos from Wikimedia Commons, credited on each place’s page.
Writers, athletes, leaders and more, ranked by how widely they’re known.
Each neighbor’s History grade, on the same three inputs.
The Mahwah Township post office opened in 1870, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
Mahwah Township is more historic than 50% of U.S. towns, #310 of 468 in New Jersey. The History grade combines the town’s founding era, the share of homes built before 1940 and its National Register listings. It’s a character grade, so it isn’t part of the overall grade. How it works.
10 listings: 10 buildings, among them the Hopper-Van Horn House (listed 1973, the first). 17 historic buildings in all.
8% of Mahwah Township’s homes were built before 1940 (Census estimate, ±2.1 points), against a typical 15% for a New Jersey town; the median home was built in 1984.
What the archives can’t tell you, neighbors can.
Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
From Wikimedia Commons (18), the National Register of Historic Places (10), Wikipedia, Wikidata and Wikipedia for famous people, U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, U.S. Census counts (via Wikipedia), the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock) and the USGS Geographic Names Information System. Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
