After 23 years of living on year-to-year leases in a building attached to the Hoboken Public Library, the 190 students of the private Hudson School finally have a new, historically-significant home.
“We are so happy to have our first home,”said the Hudson School’s founder and founder Suellen Newman Monday at the official ribbon cutting. “We are absolutely thrilled that this moment has finally arrived after so many years of planning. We are grateful to everyone who has supported the project and helped us achieve our dream.”
The $4 million four-story building at the corner of Park Avenue and Sixth Street, is a modern interpretation of the Martha Institute, which was built in the 1860s as the first high school in Hoboken. The Hudson School’s new building is on the exact footprint of that storied school.
The ribbon was cut by 12-year-old Samantha Stevens Reckford, the daughter of board president Samuel Reckford and the great-great-great-great granddaughter of Martha Stevens, the namesake of the Martha Institute and the wife of inventor and Stevens Institute of Technology Founder Edwin Stevens.
As the ribbon was cut, Newman rang the 50-year-old bell that had last hung on the walls of the Martha Institute, signaling that classes are now in session.
“I can’t believe that we are finally here,”said Reckford just before his daughter was about to cut the ceremonial ribbon. Reckford has volunteered hundreds of hours over more than 15 years to see that this project did get completed.
He later said that the opening of the new school building a monumental step forward for the Hoboken institution, which serves grades 5-12.
“It really gives the school a true identity,”said Reckford. “We now have a dramatic looking building that has our name over the door.”
For the last two decades, the school’s students have bounded between several different locations in Hoboken.
Most recently, the school’s 115 fifth through eighth graders have been taught in rented space at Our Lady of Grace School and the 75 high school students learned in rooms in the Hoboken Public Library. “We lived year to year never knowing if our space would be taken away from us,”he said.
At the ribbon cutting, there was a gathering of local and area community leaders and politicians. Among them was U.S. Rep. Robert Menendez (D-Union City), whose son is a senior at the school.
“Only though Ms. Newman’s dedication and her dogged persistence were they able to make this vision and dream become a reality,”said Menendez. “This is a great day for the students that are currently enrolled, and for the thousands of students that will one day walk through these doors in the future.”
Mayor David Roberts, who was also at the event, praised the school’s staff and its board. “This has been a long time coming,”said Roberts. “Suellen Newman deserves a lot of credit for her determination in seeing this project to its completion. The Hudson School has been an important part of Hoboken and will continue to provide the highest possible quality of education.”
The new school’s construction was funded by donations and fundraising from parents and members of the community as well as a $1.25 million loan from the New Jersey Economic Development Authority.
Bought 10 years ago
The school purchased the Martha Institute building over 10 years ago for $300,000 with the intention of renovating the building. But according to Reckford, it quickly became apparent that the historic building would have to be torn down because its structural integrity was too fragile to attempt a renovation. Some in the community objected to the razing of the old building, but in the end, because of the old building’s poor condition, they decided it would be more economically feasible to construct a new building the interpreted and took on the look of the old Martha Institute.
Newman added that another significance of the school’s opening is that the building will provide all-purpose space for community performing arts groups and represents an enormous upgrade in the on-site performing and visual arts facilities.
“We look forward to serving the community as a cultural center,”said Newman.
The students of the Hudson School come from 35 municipalities in the area and, according Reckford, the school assists one third of the students with tuition scholarships.
Hoboken residents can find out more about the Hudson School by visiting www.thehudsonschool.org or by calling (201) 659-8335.