Trenton Highway Projects, Alternative Mitigation
Trenton Potteries Database and Teacups to Toilets Booklet
City of Trenton, Mercer County, New Jersey
In the course of improving ramps giving access onto the Route 1 Freeway in Trenton, the New Jersey Department of Transportation removed portions of the site of the Enterprise Pottery, one of the country’s first purpose-built sanitary earthenware factories. Lying within the National Register of Historic Places-listed Delaware and Raritan Canal Historic District (Enterprise made use of the canal and its basins for shipping raw materials and products), kiln and building foundations were destroyed by the highway construction. Soils at the site were moderately radioactive, precluding large-scale archaeological excavation and documentation. Mitigation of the project’s adverse effects saw Hunter Research undertake a research-based project resulting in the creation of the Trenton Potteries Database, soon to be launched as an interactive website, as well as produce an introductory booklet “From Teacups to Toilets,” written for 4th through 8th grade local schoolchildren. These two mitigation outcomes have done much to inform and connect the greater Trenton community to its rich past as one of the nation’s two leading pottery-making centers.