Pearl River is a

hamlet ''The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark'', often shortened to ''Hamlet'' (), is a Shakespearean tragedy, tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play. Set in Denmark, the play (the ...

and

census-designated place A census-designated place (CDP) is a Place (United States Census Bureau), concentration of population defined by the United States Census Bureau for statistical purposes only. CDPs have been used in each decennial census since 1980 as the counte ...

in the town of Orangetown,

Rockland County Rockland County is the southernmost county on the west side of the Hudson River in the U.S. state of New York. It is part of the New York metropolitan area. As of the 2020 U.S. census, the county's population is 338,329, making it the state's ...

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York New York may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * ...

, United States. It is east of Chestnut Ridge, south of

Nanuet Nanuet is a hamlet and census-designated place in the town of Clarkstown, New York, United States. The third largest hamlet in Clarkstown, it is located north of Pearl River, south of New City, east of Spring Valley, and west of West Nyack. It ...

, west of

Blauvelt, New York Blauvelt is a Hamlet (New York), hamlet, about 20 miles northwest of New York City. It is a census-designated place, formerly known as Greenbush and then Blauveltville, in Orangetown, New York, Orangetown, Rockland County, New York, Rockland Coun ...

, and north of Montvale and

Old Tappan, New Jersey Old Tappan ( ) is a borough in northern Bergen County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. As of the 2020 United States census, the borough's population was 5,888, an increase of 138 (+2.4%) from the 2010 census count of 5,750, which in turn refl ...

. The population was 15,876 at the 2010 census. Pearl River is north of

midtown Manhattan Midtown Manhattan is the central portion of the New York City borough of Manhattan, serving as the city's primary central business district. Midtown is home to some of the city's most prominent buildings, including the Empire State Building, the ...

and just north of the

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border. It is the first (traveling north) of three New York stops on

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History

In 1696, Pearl River was part of a larger piece of land known as the Kakiat Patent that was granted to Daniel Honan and Michael Hawdon. In 1713, the land was split into north and south plots. After the Revolutionary War, the land was further divided and sold. Pearl River was a piece of land made up of woods and swamps originally called Muddy Creek. In the early 1870s, the town was divided into five different parts: Middletown, Sickletown, Pascack, Muddy Brook, and Naurashaun. There are conflicting accounts on how Muddy Creek came to be named Pearl River. According to some historians, a town resident named Ves Bogert found small pearls in mussels that thrived in Muddy Brook and, upon hearing this, the wife of John Demarest, the president of the

New Jersey and New York Railroad The New Jersey and New York Railroad (NJ&NY) was a railroad company that operated north from Rutherford, New Jersey, to Haverstraw, New York beginning in the mid-to-late 19th century.Please see the 1891 maps of West Haverstraw and Haverstra ...

, suggested the name "Pearl River" to him. Another account is that the name change was made to make the station sound more appealing on railroad schedules. A third account is that Julius E. Braunsdorf wanted to enhance the hamlet's business image by renaming it Pearl River. In any event, there is no body of water near the hamlet called Pearl River; the most significant stream is Muddy Brook. Braunsdorf, an industrialist and German immigrant, purchased Muddy Creek in 1870. He donated a long strip of land through the center of his property to the New Jersey and New York Railroad to enable it to bring an extension of the line from

Hillsdale, New Jersey Hillsdale is a Borough (New Jersey), borough in the northern portion of Bergen County, New Jersey, Bergen County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey, within the New York City metropolitan area. As of the 2020 United States census, the borough's po ...

north to

. Braunsdorf was the "Father of Pearl River" and established Aetna Sewing Machine Company to produce his patented home sewing machine in 1872. Later that year the first post office was established in the hamlet and from then on it was known as Pearl River. Braunsdorf invented and manufactured the carbon-arc light bulb in 1873, six years before

Thomas Edison Thomas Alva Edison (February11, 1847October18, 1931) was an American inventor and businessman. He developed many devices in fields such as electric power generation, mass communication, sound recording, and motion pictures. These inventions, ...

's carbonized filament version. It was installed and used on ships in New York harbor for loading and unloading operations. He also designed generators, one of which powered the first

incandescent Thermal radiation is electromagnetic radiation emitted by the thermal motion of particles in matter. All matter with a temperature greater than absolute zero emits thermal radiation. The emission of energy arises from a combination of electro ...

electric lights, which he also invented,Peckman, Herbert Pearl River Then and Now. Brief Narrative of one man's love for a community, 125 Anniversary in the nation's capital. When Braunsdorf designed the street layout, the only existing streets were Pearl Street and Washington Avenue. He drew a wide main street through the middle of town and called it Central Avenue. Parallel to Central Avenue he drew Franklin, after his hero,

Benjamin Franklin Benjamin Franklin (April 17, 1790) was an American polymath: a writer, scientist, inventor, statesman, diplomat, printer, publisher and Political philosophy, political philosopher.#britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Wood, 2021 Among the m ...

. To connect Washington, Central, and Franklin he drew three streets and named them William, John and Henry, after his sons. Braunsdorf built: * 1872 – The Aetna Sewing Machine Company, the largest factory in Pearl River, and ceded land to the railroad company so workers from New York City could get to his factory. * 1872 – The Pearl River Post Office and became the first

Postmaster A postmaster is the head of an individual post office, responsible for all postal activities in a specific post office. When a postmaster is responsible for an entire mail distribution organization (usually sponsored by a national government), ...

. * 1873 – Two brick train stations (passenger/freight) still in use today. * The Pearl River Hotel * Low-cost housing for the factory employees he attracted from Germany and Scandinavia. In 1894, Talbot C. Dexter moved his Dexter Folder Company to Pearl River. On August 25, 1885, Dexter filed a patent for an automatic folding machine that changed the way newspapers, books, and magazines were folded and assembled. Between 1885 and 1913, Dexter filed many patents, some still in use today. In 1907, Ernst J. Lederle, former New York City Health Commissioner, established the Lederle Antitoxin Laboratories in Pearl River. In 1930, it became Lederle Laboratories, a division of

American Cyanamid American Cyanamid Company was an American manufacturing conglomerate. It began as a fertilizer company and added many additional lines of business before merging with American Home Products in 1994. The combined company sold off most of its di ...

. During World War II, Lederle was a major supplier of vaccines and blood plasma to the U.S. armed forces. In 1931, Gottfried (Fred) Schmidt invented the automatic

pinsetter In bowling, a pinsetter or pinspotter is an automated mechanical device that sets bowling pins back in their original positions, returns bowling balls to the front of the alley, and clears fallen pins on the pin deck. Prior to the machine's in ...

. Brunswick was not interested in an automatic machine at the time. In 1937, AMF acquired the patent rights to this early machine—The “Sch-Bec-Roy”, which stood for Schmidt (inventor), Beckerle (bowling alley proprietor) and McElroy (blueprint designer). In 1955, Pearl River was the setting for ''

Norby Norby is a fictional robot created by Janet Asimov and Isaac Asimov who stars in his own series of children's science fiction books, ''The Norby Chronicles''. His first appearance was in the 1983 book '' Norby, the Mixed-Up Robot'', in total he a ...

'', an

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of Comcast. It is one of NBCUniversal's ...

situation comedy A sitcom (short for situation comedy or situational comedy) is a genre of comedy produced for radio and television, that centers on a recurring cast of character (arts), characters as they navigate humorous situations within a consistent settin ...

that aired from January to April of that year and was one of the first regular television series filmed in color.Classic TV Archive ''Norby''
/ref>Brooks, Tim, and Earl Marsh, ''The Complete Directory to Prime time Network and Cable TV Shows, 1946–Present, Ninth Edition''
New York: Ballantine Books, 2007, , p. 996. It starred

David Wayne David Wayne (born Wayne James McMeekan; January 30, 1914 – February 9, 1995) was an American stage and screen actor with a career spanning over 50 years. Early life and career Wayne was born in Traverse City, Michigan, the son of Helen M ...

as a small-town banker who lived and worked in Pearl River, where the 13 episodes of the series were filmed. In 2011, CNNMoney.com ranked Pearl River 78th on its annual "100 Best Places to Live" list. Pearl River Station

Geography

Pearl River is located at (41.0591,-74.02025). According to the

United States Census Bureau The United States Census Bureau, officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the Federal statistical system, U.S. federal statistical system, responsible for producing data about the American people and American economy, econ ...

, the CDP has an area of , of which is land and , or 4.87%, is water.

Demographics

As of the census of 2000, there were 21,042 people, 5,539 households, and 4,209 families residing in the CDP. The population density was . There were 5,636 housing units at an average density of . The racial makeup of the CDP was 72.37%

White White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no chroma). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully (or almost fully) reflect and scatter all the visible wa ...

, 6.39%

African American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from an ...

, 0.05% Native American, 7.16% Asian, 0.02%

Pacific Islander Pacific Islanders, Pasifika, Pasefika, Pacificans, or rarely Pacificers are the peoples of the list of islands in the Pacific Ocean, Pacific Islands. As an ethnic group, ethnic/race (human categorization), racial term, it is used to describe th ...

, 0.57% from other races, and 0.68% from two or more races.

Hispanic The term Hispanic () are people, Spanish culture, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or broadly. In some contexts, Hispanic and Latino Americans, especially within the United States, "Hispanic" is used as an Ethnici ...

or Latino of any race were 6.44% of the population. There were 5,539 households, out of which 33.6% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 64.4% were married couples living together, 8.4% had a female householder with no husband present, and 24.0% were non-families. 20.7% of all households were made up of individuals, and 8.3% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.79 and the average family size was 3.26. In the CDP, the population was spread out, with 25.3% under the age of 18, 6.0% from 18 to 24, 29.3% from 25 to 44, 24.7% from 45 to 64, and 14.6% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 39 years. For every 100 females, there were 93.6 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 91.3 males. The median income for a household in the CDP was $76,692, and the median income for a family was $91,618. Males had a median income of $58,966 versus $39,452 for females. The per capita income for the CDP was $31,417. About 2.2% of families and 3.4% of the population were below the

poverty line The poverty threshold, poverty limit, poverty line, or breadline is the minimum level of income deemed adequate in a particular country. The poverty line is usually calculated by estimating the total cost of one year's worth of necessities for ...

, including 3.1% of those under age 18 and 4.7% of those age 65 or over. Pearl River has a large Irish community and, under the auspices of the

Ancient Order of Hibernians The Ancient Order of Hibernians (AOH; ) is an Irish Catholic fraternal organization. Members must be male, Catholic, and either born in Ireland or of Irish descent. Its largest membership is in the United States, where it was founded in New Yo ...

, hosts New York State's second-largest

Saint Patrick's Day Saint Patrick's Day, or the Feast of Saint Patrick (), is a religious and cultural holiday held on 17 March, the traditional death date of Saint Patrick (), the foremost patron saint of Ireland. Saint Patrick's Day was made an official Chris ...

parade, typically on the Sunday after St. Patrick's Day. This large Irish-American population also supports the nation's largest youth Gaelic Athletic Football team.

Commerce

Lederle Laboratories (which became

Wyeth Wyeth Pharmaceuticals Inc. was a pharmaceutical company until it was purchased by Pfizer in 2009. The company was founded in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1860 as John Wyeth and Brother. Its headquarters moved to Collegeville, Pennsylvania, a ...

) was founded in 1907 on a Pearl River farm by Ernst J. Lederle. The site grew to encompass and 40 buildings, and employ 4,000 workers. After

Pfizer Pfizer Inc. ( ) is an American Multinational corporation, multinational Pharmaceutical industry, pharmaceutical and biotechnology corporation headquartered at The Spiral (New York City), The Spiral in Manhattan, New York City. Founded in 184 ...

acquired Wyeth in 2009, the number of employees at the site was greatly reduced, and most of the campus was sold in the mid-2010s. Streets and a pond on the campus are named after scientists and inventors: Pearl River is the site of Blue Hill Plaza, an office complex that includes Rockland County's first commercial skyscraper, completed in 1972.

Education

Pearl River 5 public schools are served by the Pearl River Union Free School District.. The Pearl River School District covers most of the hamlet of Pearl River and portions of Orangeburg,

West Nyack West Nyack is a hamlet and census-designated place in the town of Clarkstown, Rockland County, New York, United States. It is located north of Blauvelt, east of Nanuet, southwest of Valley Cottage, southeast of Bardonia, and west of Central ...

and Tappan. U.S. News & World Report reports that 100.0% of teachers at the Pearl River Union Free School District are licensed and the student-to-teacher ratio is lower than the state average, at 12:1. The district retains 6 full-time counselors on staff. The test score Proficiency range in the district for

mathematics Mathematics is a field of study that discovers and organizes methods, Mathematical theory, theories and theorems that are developed and Mathematical proof, proved for the needs of empirical sciences and mathematics itself. There are many ar ...

are within 46%-86% and

reading Reading is the process of taking in the sense or meaning of symbols, often specifically those of a written language, by means of Visual perception, sight or Somatosensory system, touch. For educators and researchers, reading is a multifacete ...

60%-95%. In 2001, the Pearl River School District won the

Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award The Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award recognizes U.S. organizations in the business, health care, education, and nonprofit sectors for performance excellence. The Baldrige Award is the highest formal recognition of the performance excellen ...

. * Lincoln Avenue Elementary School ** Lincoln Avenue Elementary School serves children from

Kindergarten Kindergarten is a preschool educational approach based on playing, singing, practical activities such as drawing, and social interaction as part of the transition from home to school. Such institutions were originally made in the late 18th cen ...

through 4^th grade. ** In 2025 NICHE ranked Proficient level of 82% and 67% for mathematics and reading respectfully. * Evans Park Elementary School ** Evans Park Elementary School serves children from

through 4^th grade. ** In 2025 NICHE ranked Proficient level of 72% and 72% for mathematics and reading respectfully. * Franklin Avenue Elementary School ** Franklin Avenue Elementary School serves children from

through 4^th grade. ** In 2008 and 2014, Franklin Avenue Elementary School was a U.S. Department of Education Blue Ribbon School of Excellence Award winner. ** In 2025 NICHE ranked Proficient level of 67% and 57% for mathematics and reading respectfully. * Pearl River Middle School ** The Pearl River Middle School serves children from 5^th to 7^th grade. ** In 2011, the

United States Department of Education The United States Department of Education is a cabinet-level department of the United States government, originating in 1980. The department began operating on May 4, 1980, having been created after the Department of Health, Education, and ...

awarded Pearl River Middle School the National Blue Ribbon School Award for Achievement. ** In 2025 NICHE ranked Proficient level of 46% and 60% for mathematics and reading respectfully.* Pearl River High School (New York) * Pearl River High School (New York) **In 2017, '' U.S. News & World Report'' ranked Pearl River High School with a Silver award as the 76th Best High School in New York State and 727th in the nation. ** In 2019, ''U.S. News'' ranked Pearl River High School the best high school in Rockland County. ** In 2020,

Niche.com Niche.com, formerly known as College Prowler, is an American company headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, that runs a ranking and review site. The company was founded by Luke Skurman in 2002 as a publisher of print guidebooks on U.S. col ...

ranked the Pearl River School District's

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

school reopening plan as "excellent". ** In 2024 USNews ranking of Nanuet Senior High School was 131 in the state of New York with an overall scorecard of 92.97%

Catholic School

* St. Margaret of Antioch School ** Saint Margaret was founded in 1953 and is a Catholic education to students in Pre-kindergarten & 3^rd through ⁸ grade. **Every classroom is equipped with

multimedia Multimedia is a form of communication that uses a combination of different content forms, such as Text (literary theory), writing, Sound, audio, images, animations, or video, into a single presentation. T ...

technology Technology is the application of Conceptual model, conceptual knowledge to achieve practical goals, especially in a reproducible way. The word ''technology'' can also mean the products resulting from such efforts, including both tangible too ...

that allows teachers to educate their students with state-of-the art teaching tools.

Sports

The Pearl River High School Pirates have athletic programs such as baseball, basketball, football, swimming, softball, ice hockey, lacrosse, volleyball, field hockey, bowling, soccer, track, wrestling, and chess club. The 2010 Pearl River High School girls' softball team won the New York State Championship.

Tourism

Historical markers

* Cuyper-Van Houten House, 66 Sickletown Road * Johannes Perry House, 49 Elizabeth Street * Scherer House, 599 Orangeburg Road

Landmarks and places of interest

* Braunsdorf Park Pearl River, Central Avenue & South Main Street – named after Julius Braunsdorf, first industrial developer of Pearl River and inventor of various models of sewing machines, newspaper printing presses, carbon arc light bulbs, and electric generators. His sewing machine factory is now the Dexter industrial complex. Braunsdorf installed the world's first indoor lighting at the U.S. Capitol. * Edward Salyer House (NRHP) * Jacob P. Perry House, 15 Sickletown Road – Built in 1801, it is one of Rockland County's oldest Dutch Colonial Style houses and is in the historic Nauraushaun area (NRHP) * Maria's Rock, front lawn of Lederle Laboratories, North Middletown Road – An 18th- century legend tells of a little girl named Huffy who wandered from her home in nearby Tappan and died of hunger and exposure. Tradition says that villagers found her bones near the massive boulder. * Orangetown Museum & Archives – 213 Blue Hill Road * “The Spot” - The formerly wooded area along Railroad Avenue * Pearl River United States Post Office (NRHP) * Van Houten Farms, 68 Sickletown Road – on the eastern edge of Pearl River. Adjacent is the Van Houten/Kuyper Dutch Sandstone House, the main section built in 1732 and purchased by Van Houten circa 1812.

Notable people

* Lori Barbero, drummer and musician * Christopher Carley, actor *

Robert Clohessy Robert Clohessy (born June 10, 1957) is an American actor. He is best known for playing Correctional Officer Sean Murphy on the HBO prison drama '' Oz'' from seasons 3–6, in addition to playing Officer Patrick Flaherty on the NBC police proc ...

, actor * Macduff Everton, photographer * John Flaherty, television baseball broadcaster and retired

Major League Baseball Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball league composed of 30 teams, divided equally between the National League (baseball), National League (NL) and the American League (AL), with 29 in the United States and 1 in Canada. MLB i ...

player * Dan Fortmann, professional football player and physician, member of

Pro Football Hall of Fame The Pro Football Hall of Fame is the hall of fame for professional football (gridiron), professional American football, located in Canton, Ohio. Opened on September 7, 1963, the Hall of Fame enshrines exceptional figures in the sport of profes ...

* Brian Gaine,

American football American football, referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada and also known as gridiron football, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular American football field, field with goalposts at e ...

executive who was the

general manager A general manager (GM) is an executive who has overall responsibility for managing both the revenue and cost elements of a company's income statement, known as profit & loss (P&L) responsibility. A general manager usually oversees most or all of ...

of the

Houston Texans The Houston Texans are a professional American football team based in Houston. The Texans compete in the National Football League as a member of the American Football Conference (AFC) AFC South, South division. The team plays its home games at N ...

from 2018 to 2019. * Aline Griffith, socialite, spy, and writer * Mary Beth Keane, writer *

Mike Lawler Michael Vincent Lawler (born September 9, 1986) is an American politician serving as the U.S. representative for New York's 17th congressional district since 2023. From 2021 to 2022, he was a Republican member of the New York State Assembly fr ...

, Republican

U.S. representative The United States House of Representatives is a chamber of the bicameral United States Congress; it is the lower house, with the U.S. Senate being the upper house. Together, the House and Senate have the authority under Article One of th ...

for

New York's 17th congressional district New York's 17th congressional district is a congressional district for the United States House of Representatives located in Southern New York (state), New York. It includes all of Rockland County, New York, Rockland County and Putnam County, N ...

* Dan Masterson, poet * Mario Perillo, Perillo Tours owner also known as Mr. Italy *

Josephine Pucci Josephine Pucci (born December 27, 1990) is a former women's ice hockey player for the Harvard Crimson women's ice hockey program who made her debut for the United States women's national ice hockey team at the 2011 IIHF Women's World Champions ...

, ice hockey player and Olympic silver medalist * John Jurasek, YouTube personality, food critic, and radio host * Dan Hanzus, NFL analyst, co-host of the Around the NFL podcast

References

* Knight, Robert P. ''Centennial history of Pearl River, New York''. Pearl River Centennial Committee, 1973 * McDonald, Brian. ''My Father's Gun: One Family, Three Badges, One Hundred Years in the NYPD''

External links

Pearl River history

Pearl River Yahoo! Group

– slideshow by ''

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'' {{Authority control Census-designated places in New York (state) Hamlets in New York (state) Irish-American neighborhoods Census-designated places in Rockland County, New York Hamlets in Rockland County, New York