Swartswood State Park is a

protected area Protected areas or conservation areas are locations which receive protection because of their recognized natural, ecological or cultural values. There are several kinds of protected areas, which vary by level of protection depending on the ena ...

located in the Swartswood section of Stillwater and

Hampton Hampton may refer to: Places Australia *Hampton bioregion, an IBRA biogeographic region in Western Australia *Hampton, New South Wales *Hampton, Queensland, a town in the Toowoomba Region * Hampton, Victoria Canada * Hampton, New Brunswick *Ha ...

townships in Sussex County,

New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...

, in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

. Established in 1915 by the state's Forest Park Reservation Commission, it was the first

state park State parks are parks or other protected areas managed at the sub-national level within those nations which use "state" as a political subdivision. State parks are typically established by a state to preserve a location on account of its natural ...

established by the state of

for the purposes of recreation at the state's third-largest

freshwater lake A lake is an area filled with water, localized in a basin, surrounded by land, and distinct from any river or other outlet that serves to feed or drain the lake. Lakes lie on land and are not part of the ocean, although, like the much larger ...

. Today, Swartswood State Park is operated and maintained by the

New Jersey Division of Parks and Forestry In the state of New Jersey, the New Jersey Division of Parks and Forestry is an administrative division of the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection. In its most visible role, the Division is directly responsible for the management and ...

. The park's main feature is Swartswood Lake, a

glacial lake A glacial lake is a body of water with origins from glacier activity. They are formed when a glacier erodes the land and then melts, filling the depression created by the glacier. Formation Near the end of the last glacial period, roughly 10,0 ...

located in northwestern New Jersey's

Kittatinny Valley The Kittatinny Valley is a section of the Great Appalachian Valley in Sussex and Warren counties in northwestern New Jersey that is bounded on the northwest by Kittatinny Mountain, and in the southeast by the New Jersey Highlands region. The val ...

—part of New Jersey's

Ridge and Valley The Ridge-and-Valley Appalachians, also called the Ridge and Valley Province or the Valley and Ridge Appalachians, are a physiographic province of the larger Appalachian division and are also a belt within the Appalachian Mountains extending ...

physiographic province physiographic province is a geographic region with a characteristic geomorphology, and often specific subsurface rock type or structural elements. The continents are subdivided into various physiographic provinces, each having a specific characte ...

. Both Swartswood Lake and the smaller Little Swartswood Lake are remnants of the retreat glaciers from the

Wisconsin glaciation The Wisconsin Glacial Episode, also called the Wisconsin glaciation, was the most recent glacial period of the North American ice sheet complex. This advance included the Cordilleran Ice Sheet, which nucleated in the northern North American Cor ...

which began roughly 20,000 years ago. Both lakes have been the focus of water-quality improvement efforts by the state, including invasive aquatic-weed control and watershed protection in association with a local non-profit organization. The park is open all year, with many recreational activities available, including hiking, birdwatching, cross-country skiing, swimming, boating, and camping. Fishing and hunting are also permitted within the park.

History

In 1905, Governor

Edward C. Stokes Edward Casper Stokes (December 22, 1860November 4, 1942) was an American Republican Party politician, who served as the 32nd governor of New Jersey, from 1905 to 1908. Biography Stokes was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1860. He attende ...

established the Forest Park Reservation Commission to begin acquiring and setting aside lands within the state of New Jersey as parks and forest reserves. The first acquisitions were forest lands with an aim toward protecting their commercial value. According to the commission's first annual report, "the forests are 'the great savings banks of nature' from which we have been taking the interest and reducing the capital". However, in 1908, the state forester, Alfred Gaskill (1861–1950), proposed the creation of parks for recreation, writing that "the aesthetic part of forestry must be dominant here because a large proportion of the people live in towns and cities and consider the forests as their playgrounds". From his acquisition of the lake in 1888 until his death in 1905, Newark-based rubber and harness manufacturer Andrew Albright, Sr. (1830–1905), sought to prevent free public access to the lake for fishing and strenuously fought state efforts to exercise its legislative and

eminent domain Eminent domain (United States, Philippines), land acquisition (India, Malaysia, Singapore), compulsory purchase/acquisition (Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, United Kingdom), resumption (Hong Kong, Uganda), resumption/compulsory acquisition (Austr ...

powers to compel such access. In August 1914, his children and heirs Andrew Albright, Jr. (1874–1930), and Elizabeth Spurr (1869–1934) sold which included the waters of Swartswood Lake, to the commission for $30,000. The transaction was finalized with deeds filed on June 30, 1915. This included the lake and approximately of land to provide nine boat launching and landing sites as well as picnic and recreation grounds. The commissioners reported that they "intended to make Swartswood a public playground. Boat liveries and picnic shelters to be maintained under proper control will make it available to a large number of people" and to stock the lake with fish. Because of its focus on recreational activities, Swartswood is considered New Jersey's first

. The park was expanded from two tracts obtained from the farm of Newton resident George Emmans, in 1916 and in 1941 from his widow, Hannah Struble Emmans. A June 1962 park pamphlet described the park as "704 acres including the entire water body of Swartswood Lake. The land area consists of 185 acres with about one mile of lake frontage". Since 1961, open space preservation and acquisition funds from the state's Green Acres Program have aided the expansion of state's protected areas, including Swartswood State Park. Recent purchases have connected the park with the Trout Brook Wildlife Management Area and provided protected habitat for wildlife including the

bobcat The bobcat (''Lynx rufus''), also known as the red lynx, is a medium-sized cat native to North America. It ranges from southern Canada through most of the contiguous United States to Oaxaca in Mexico. It is listed as Least Concern on the IUC ...

and

black bear Black bear or Blackbear may refer to: Animals * American black bear (''Ursus americanus''), a North American bear species * Asian black bear (''Ursus thibetanus''), an Asian bear species Music * Black Bear (band), a Canadian First Nations group ...

. In 1992, the Swartswood Lakes and Watershed Association was established by local residents to "protect the water quality of Swartswood and Little Swartswood Lakes and preserve the lakes for recreational use".New Jersey Division of Parks and Forestry, State Park Service
Parks: Swartswood State Park
Retrieved October 16, 2015. The association has partnered with the State Park Service,

Rutgers University Rutgers University (; RU), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a Public university, public land-grant research university consisting of four campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's ...

, and the

United States Geological Survey The United States Geological Survey (USGS), formerly simply known as the Geological Survey, is a scientific agency of the United States government. The scientists of the USGS study the landscape of the United States, its natural resources, ...

in watershed management and conservation efforts. However, association members have criticized the New Jersey Division of Environmental Protection for failing to address the identification or harvesting of

invasive species An invasive species otherwise known as an alien is an introduced organism that becomes overpopulated and harms its new environment. Although most introduced species are neutral or beneficial with respect to other species, invasive species ad ...

from the lake.Bruce Scruton
"Group wants state to help clean up Swartswood Lake"
''The New Jersey Herald'', August 23, 2015. Retrieved October 20, 2015.

Geology and geography

Swartswood Lake Stillwater Township New Jersey

Swartswood State Park is a protected area located in Stillwater and Hampton townships, New Jersey. Located at above mean sea level, the park is located along County Route 619 (East Shore Drive in Stillwater, Swartswood East Side Drive in Hampton) southeast of the hamlet of Swartswood.New Jersey Division of Parks and Forestry
Swartswood State Park Area Map
(February 2015). Retrieved October 13, 2015. The focus of park is Swartswood Lake, glacial lake that is the third-largest freshwater lake in New Jersey. The lake stretches 3 miles (north-to-south) and 1 mile wide (east to west); it has an average depth of with a maximum depth of . The park's area also comprises several mountain streams, including Neldon's Brook, and other lakes, including Little Swartswood Lake—an glacial lake—as well as Duck Pond, Spring Lake, Willow Crest Lake, and Frog Pond. The park, and its bodies of water, are located within the watershed of the Paulins Kill, a tributary of the

Delaware River The Delaware River is a major river in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. From the meeting of its branches in Hancock (village), New York, Hancock, New York, the river flows for along the borders of N ...

. Camp Lou Henry Hoover, a camp affiliated with the Girl Scouts, and the Trout Brook Wildlife Management Area administered by the

New Jersey Division of Fish and Wildlife The New Jersey Division of Fish and Wildlife is a government agency in the U.S. state of New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the stat ...

are located nearby the state park. Swartswood State Park is located in the

which is a segment of the

Great Appalachian Valley The Great Appalachian Valley, also called The Great Valley or Great Valley Region, is one of the major landform features of eastern North America. It is a gigantic trough—a chain of valley lowlands—and the central feature of the Appalachian M ...

that stretches from Quebec to Alabama. The valley and surrounding area is part of New Jersey's Ridge and Valley physiographic province. The surficial geology of the valley, namely its soils and parent materials, were created from materials left behind by the retreat of the

after the

last glacial maximum The Last Glacial Maximum (LGM), also referred to as the Late Glacial Maximum, was the most recent time during the Last Glacial Period that ice sheets were at their greatest extent. Ice sheets covered much of Northern North America, Northern Eur ...

. The topography of the valley, and the lake itself, were formed by the damming or obstruction of a river valley with extra-morainic stratified drift and

till image:Geschiebemergel.JPG, Closeup of glacial till. Note that the larger grains (pebbles and gravel) in the till are completely surrounded by the matrix of finer material (silt and sand), and this characteristic, known as ''matrix support'', is d ...

deposits.Barbara Heskins Davis, Land Conservancy of New Jersey
Environmental Resource Inventory Update 2014 for Township of Stillwater, County of Sussex
Stillwater Township Environmental Commission (May 2014). Retrieved October 13, 2015. As a glacial lake, Swartswood Lake eventually will atrophy into a bog, a natural progression that is estimated to occur in 100,000 years.Mary Jasch
"A Day at Swartswood Lake"
''Skylands Visitor'' (magazine). Retrieved October 13, 2015. The lake and valley is underlain by a two-mile-thick (3.2 km) layer called the Martinsburg Formation, a

turbidite A turbidite is the geologic deposit of a turbidity current, which is a type of amalgamation of fluidal and sediment gravity flow responsible for distributing vast amounts of clastic sediment into the deep ocean. Sequencing Turbidites were ...

sequence of weaker sedimentary materials, mostly slate,

greywacke Greywacke or graywacke (German ''grauwacke'', signifying a grey, earthy rock) is a variety of sandstone generally characterized by its hardness, dark color, and poorly sorted angular grains of quartz, feldspar, and small rock fragments or lit ...

sandstone, shale, and limestone derived from

Ordovician The Ordovician ( ) is a geologic period and System (geology), system, the second of six periods of the Paleozoic Era (geology), Era. The Ordovician spans 41.6 million years from the end of the Cambrian Period million years ago (Mya) to the start ...

-period deep ocean floor deposits from 540 to 400 million years ago.A.A. Drake, Jr., R.A. Volkert, D.H. Monteverde, G.C. Herman, H.F Houghton, R.A. Parker, and R.F. Dalton
Miscellaneous Geologic Investigations Map I-2540-A: Bedrock geologic map of northern New Jersey
(Washington, DC: United States Geological Survey, 1996).Ron W. Witte and Don H. Monteverde
New Jersey Geological and Water Survey Information Circular: Geologic History of New Jersey's Valley and Ridge Physiographic Province
(2012). Retrieved June 30, 2015.Avery Ala Drake Jr. and Jack B. Epstein,
USGS Bulletin 1244-H: The Martinsburg Formation (Middle and Upper Ordovician) in the Delaware Valley, Pennsylvania-New Jersey
' (USGS Numbered Series. (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1967. 16 pages. To the east of the lake and the park is a ridge of bedrock composed of Kittatinny Formation (a

supergroup Supergroup or super group may refer to: * Supergroup (music), a music group formed by artists who are already notable or respected in their fields * Supergroup (physics), a generalization of groups, used in the study of supersymmetry * Supergroup ...

) materials that rests on the Martinsburg Formation, which includes Bushkill Member, Allentown Dolomite,

Beekmantown Group The Beekmantown Group is a late Cambrian to lower–middle Ordovician Group (geology), geologic group that occurs in the eastern Canada (Québec) and northeastern United States, datable from its conodont fauna. It contains Dolomite (mineral), do ...

, and

Jacksonburg Limestone Jacksonburg may refer to: * Jacksonburg, Indiana * Jacksonburg, New Jersey * Jacksonburg, New York * Jacksonburg, Ohio