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Fire damages historic site
Blaze destroys barn on Titus Farm propertyBy Joseph Harvie
Staff WriterA suspicious fire destroyed a nearly 100-year-old barn on the Titus Farm in Kendall Park on Jan. 18, South Brunswick Police Department spokesman Detective James Ryan said Wednesday.
The fire was reported at 8:32 p.m. when a nearby resident saw the barn ablaze from his kitchen window, Detective Ryan said. The farm is adjacent to Woodlot Park, behind the wooded area in the northwestern section of the park, and it abuts some homes on Stockton Road.
Detective Ryan said building’s charred frame is too dangerous to enter, but that the fire is suspicious because the barn has no electricity and it was unoccupied.
Township Public Affairs coordinator Ron Schmalz said the only items in the building were tiles left by an artist who worked in the building about 30 years ago and a kiln, which he said had also not been used for 30 years.
According to the township Public Library Web site, a headstone for Thomas Titus, who died July 21, 1819, when he was 65, was found on the site and is now in storage in the township Public Works shed. In December, the Middlesex County Board of Chosen Freeholders donated a grave marker to be used in place of the headstone.
Mr. Schmalz said that the township is planning to use the farm as an agricultural museum, and will move items, such as wagons and old-fashioned mowers, from other barns on the site to a more secure location. He said that there were plans to demolish some of the buildings on the site and to erect new buildings to be used as an agricultural museum. Mr. Schmalz said the township would work with its Historic Preservation Commission before any buildings are destroyed.
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