Columbia Triumphant marks return to boro

FREEHOLD — The 100-year journey of an important symbol of freedom will end on June 27 when the original Columbia Triumphant statue, also known as Liberty Triumphant, is unveiled in its new home on East Main Street.

The ceremonies in a just-completed pocket park that sits between the Monmouth County Hall of Records Annex and a commercial building is scheduled for 4 p.m. at the end of the Battle of Monmouth Parade that will march from Englishtown to the borough.

Through the efforts of Carl N. Steinberg, a local businessman and former borough councilman, the Freehold Center Partnership and Monmouth County officials, the statue has been resurrected and restored.

According to Steinberg, the cost of building the park is about $70,000. To defray the costs of the acquisition, preparation and installation of the statue, personalized brick pavers were sold at $100 each. More than $27,000 has been raised in this manner, Steinberg said. The county is picking up the remainder of the cost of constructing the small park.

County Freeholder Ted Narozanick will serve as master of ceremonies at Friday’s unveiling, while members of the Cpl. Philip A. Reynolds Detachment, Marine Corps League, will serve as the color guard.

Mayor Michael Wilson will give the welcoming address and Gen. George Washington will present the history of Columbia Triumphant.

Other dignitaries scheduled to participate in the ceremonies are the Hon. Ray Raymond, British Consulate, New Jersey Secretary of State Regena Thomas and Brooks Von Arx, chairman of the Monmouth County Historical Commission.

The statue that will make its new home on Main Street is the original piece that was on top of the Battle of Monmouth Monument when the monument was completed in 1894 on Court Street near the site of the present Monmouth County Courthouse. A rededication of the monument was staged in November 1984.

The saga of Columbia Triumphant began on Aug. 15, 1894, when a bolt of lightning struck it during a violent storm. The lightning did considerable damage to the lower half of the statue. The damaged statue was removed and a new version of the statue was placed on the monument in 1896.

There were plans to repair the original statue and place it in a prominent spot, presumably close to where it will now be located.

That did not happen, however, and little was heard of the statue for the next 50 years until the late 1940s, when it was found buried in mud in what is now the McGackin Triangle parking lot, bordered by West Main, Throckmorton and South streets.

At that time a Freehold junk dealer who was an Ocean County resident rescued the statue and moved it to his property. He discovered it near the railroad tracks which border the triangle parking lot.

That was the last anybody heard about the statue until Steinberg, a local history buff, entered the picture.

"I heard what happened to the statue from an old-time borough resident," Steinberg said in a December 1999 interview. "I was able to locate the person who had found it and contacted him, but he said he had no intention of letting it go, so I forgot about it."

Steinberg’s interest in the statue was renewed in 1999 when the Freehold Center Partnership and county officials began planning for the new pocket park on East Main Street. The Ocean County resident who had the statue was contacted and eventually agreed to sell it to the county for $15,000.

The rest is history in the making.

— Dick Metzgar