NJDAR Penny Pine Memorial Plantation
Recovered, Relocated, & Rededicated
While volunteering at the Ocean County Historical Society, Diane Barsa found a 1939 blueprint identified as a DAR planned and funded “Memorial Plantation” monument in what is now the Brendan T. Byrne State Forest. The blueprint has scale drawings of a boulder set on native stone in a concrete footing. A large wooden sign, area for parking, and gravel walkways are defined. Three plots of plantings are outlined, totaling 230 acres. The monument is in the center plot labeled “Short Leaf Pine 1939, Plot 1, 87.2 acres.”
Barsa, along with Pat Moore and Janis Gibson, were immediately interested in the unknown mystery of the NJDAR Memorial Plantation. As part of the Golden Jubilee, President General Roberts asked every DAR chapter to donate $5.00 to plant 500 pines (one acre) in their state’s Memorial Plantation or Memorial Forest dedicated to deceased members. This was part of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s reforestation Penny Pine Program run by the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) who maintained tree nurseries and planted the saplings. In addition to reforestation in areas of need, the CCC created parks and campgrounds in newly planted areas.
They learned the monument was dedicated on October 15, 1940. Newspaper articles about the event varied in the reporting of acres and facts concerning the DAR’s nationwide project. No sketch or photograph of the monument, other than on the blueprint, was located.
In early October, 2021, Moore, Gibson, her husband Jim, and Barsa went to BTB State Forest where the ranger staff reaffirmed, they had no information about the Penny Pines Project or the DAR Memorial Plantation. Armed with the knowledge of the blueprint, they separated and walked the area they thought was Plot 1. Among the 80 year old pines and low brush, after about 30 minutes, Moore found a boulder.
By the following weekend, a Captain Joshua Huddy Chapter Penny Pines Committee was formed. Aerial views of the area of the boulder were obtained from 1956, 1963, 1984, and 1995. They showed the gradual disappearance of the monument. Permission was granted by the rangers’ office, and they returned with a shovel, trowels, tape measure, and metal detector in order to excavate, measure, record, and photograph the boulder. No evidence of a metal plaque was found. [A 1946 Lebanon State Forest Commission (LSFC) document mentioned that the plaque was removed in 1942 due to suspected attempted vandalism. Its whereabouts are unknown.] The measurements of the boulder matched those of a LSFC document from 1940. They had found all that remained of the NJDAR Memorial Plantation monument.
In January, 2023, during the State Park Service review of the application to relocate the boulder, a ranger familiar with the dirt roads in BTB, remembered a sign which he believed said something about, “DAR Pine Forest” Moore and Barsa went to see the sign. Diane Argraves, who was the Haddonfield Chapter Regent in 2000, had provided the committee with photographs and a description of a rededication of a Penny Pines Memorial Plantation sign that year. Since the Park Service database had no mention of the DAR monument or sign, they were thrilled when they compared the weathered sign to the photographs Argraves had provided. Refurbishing the sign, setting it and a new bench in cement, and relocating the boulder to the site were agreed by all parties.
The project received the DAR Historic Preservation Award in October 2024, 84 years after our original Memorial Plantation was dedicated.
Barsa, along with Pat Moore and Janis Gibson, were immediately interested in the unknown mystery of the NJDAR Memorial Plantation. As part of the Golden Jubilee, President General Roberts asked every DAR chapter to donate $5.00 to plant 500 pines (one acre) in their state’s Memorial Plantation or Memorial Forest dedicated to deceased members. This was part of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s reforestation Penny Pine Program run by the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) who maintained tree nurseries and planted the saplings. In addition to reforestation in areas of need, the CCC created parks and campgrounds in newly planted areas.
They learned the monument was dedicated on October 15, 1940. Newspaper articles about the event varied in the reporting of acres and facts concerning the DAR’s nationwide project. No sketch or photograph of the monument, other than on the blueprint, was located.
In early October, 2021, Moore, Gibson, her husband Jim, and Barsa went to BTB State Forest where the ranger staff reaffirmed, they had no information about the Penny Pines Project or the DAR Memorial Plantation. Armed with the knowledge of the blueprint, they separated and walked the area they thought was Plot 1. Among the 80 year old pines and low brush, after about 30 minutes, Moore found a boulder.
By the following weekend, a Captain Joshua Huddy Chapter Penny Pines Committee was formed. Aerial views of the area of the boulder were obtained from 1956, 1963, 1984, and 1995. They showed the gradual disappearance of the monument. Permission was granted by the rangers’ office, and they returned with a shovel, trowels, tape measure, and metal detector in order to excavate, measure, record, and photograph the boulder. No evidence of a metal plaque was found. [A 1946 Lebanon State Forest Commission (LSFC) document mentioned that the plaque was removed in 1942 due to suspected attempted vandalism. Its whereabouts are unknown.] The measurements of the boulder matched those of a LSFC document from 1940. They had found all that remained of the NJDAR Memorial Plantation monument.
In January, 2023, during the State Park Service review of the application to relocate the boulder, a ranger familiar with the dirt roads in BTB, remembered a sign which he believed said something about, “DAR Pine Forest” Moore and Barsa went to see the sign. Diane Argraves, who was the Haddonfield Chapter Regent in 2000, had provided the committee with photographs and a description of a rededication of a Penny Pines Memorial Plantation sign that year. Since the Park Service database had no mention of the DAR monument or sign, they were thrilled when they compared the weathered sign to the photographs Argraves had provided. Refurbishing the sign, setting it and a new bench in cement, and relocating the boulder to the site were agreed by all parties.
The project received the DAR Historic Preservation Award in October 2024, 84 years after our original Memorial Plantation was dedicated.
