High Point State Park, New Jersey

I’ve been in New Jersey a long time, but had never made it to High Point State Point. Up in the northwest corner and very close to both New York and Pennsylvania, the park surrounds, not surprisingly, the highest point in New Jersey. The obelisk was built in 1930 and is 220 feet high.

The land was donated to the state by Anthony and Susie Kuser in 1923. The Kusers, were, among many other things, ardent birders. In the early twentieth century, Anthony Kuser encouraged the (futile) search for surviving passenger pigeons by offering a reward for proof of their existence in the wild. The reward was never paid.

View from the base of the High Point memorial. Source: TCM
Cedar Swamp Trail at High Point State Park. Despite the name, the trail loops around a bog, not a swamp. Source: TCM

The Dryden Kuser Natural Area is within High Point State Park The Atlantic White Cedar Bog here is, at an elevation of 1,500 feet, thought to be highest bog of its kind in the world.

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