Through the courtesy and co-operation of Mr. Charles Grant Schaeffer, Principal of the Elliott Street School, the school children entered into a competition for a cover design for this book which resulted in the selection of the design submitted by Miss Edna Eckert, a pupil in the Eighth B Grade. PART I. [Illustration: Woodside in 1849. Enlarged from Sidney’s map of “Twelve Miles Around New York”, published in 1849.] GENERAL HISTORY. Woodside was originally included in the Newark grant, which extended north “to the Third River above the towne, ye River is called Yauntakah”. For a long time those of this region in common with those of Belleville, were known as the “Inhabitants of the Second River”. But Newark on March 11, 1743, having become tired of supporting the poor of so large a district, narrowed its borders, drawing a line on the north just below the eastern end of the Gully road to the “Boiling Spring”. THE FIRST BOUNDARIES OF WOODSIDE. The description given in the Town Meeting of March 11, 1743, reads as follows: “Beginning at Passaick River, at the Gulley near the House of Doct’r Pigot, thence North West (Northeast?) to Second River, thence up the same to the Saw Mill belonging to George Harrison, thence a direct Line to the North East Corner of the Plantation of Stephen Morris, thence to the Notch in the Mountain leaving William Crane’s House to the Southward, thence on a direct line to Stephen Van siles, thence Westwardly (Eastwardly?) to Passaick River leaving said Van siles Bars and Abraham Francisco’s to the Northward of s’d Line: and it was agreed, that all on the Northward of s’d Lines should be esteemed Inhabitants of Second River, and all on the Southward of the Body of Newark, excepting Levi Vincent, Johanes Kiper and his Son Thomas Cadmus. John Low desired that himself and his Father might be reconed or esteemed Inhabitants of Second River, since they belonged to that Society.” This is a verbatim copy taken from the “Newark Town Records”, but I do not know just what it means unless some previous copyist stood on his head when putting down the points of the compass. AN INDEPENDENT COMMUNITY. For nearly one hundred years this region was a portion of Bloomfield, or Wardesson, as it was formerly known, and when in 1839 Belleville was set off from eastern Bloomfield, Woodside became a part of the newer township, and so remained until March 24, 1869, when it became independent of all outside control.