Once upon a time, before the American Revolution, there were mills in Pohatcong. Along came Chelsea Forge in 1751, and the area industrialized. And settlers saw that it was good, and the area became known as Finesville, after the Feins who owned the original mills.


It probably didn't take until 1879 to build a church, but that's how old the Finesville Methodist Episcopal Church is.


Heading south from there on Mount Joy Road, the first house on the left, #184, is sourced online as dating to 1860. I would bet it's decades older than that in front, though the back may have been redone.


The other house on the east side of the road, #182 on the south side of Musconetcong Street and north side of the Musconetcong River, has a reported date of 1800, which I'm much more in agreement with.


Over to the west side of the road, from north to south and down to the river, these are #191 (1880, clearly newer than the others), #185 (1780), and #181 (1830, though is it really 50 years newer than its neighbor?).


Here are those same houses from south to north. You can see the relatively uninteresting #187 sandwiched between them in the last photo.


Once across the Musconetcong River, Mount Joy Road enters Holland Twp. and gains a fresh set of address numbers. Dead ahead, this is #380 and dates to 1780. Finesville is just a named place, so it's not beholden to town lines.

Mount Joy Road roads photos
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