1929 - Camden City Hall - Camden, NJ
N 39° 56.693 W 075° 07.204
18S E 489742 N 4421646
The huge cornerstone is a large stone block, and can be found on the right corner of the building maybe eight feet from the ground. One side of the cornerstone has the date, the other bears the name "City of Camden".
Waymark Code: WM7WGD
Location: New Jersey, United States
Date Posted: 12/13/2009
Views: 6
This is the tallest building in the metro area outside the city of Philadelphia. Local residents have absolutely no excuse to not know the time as the clock tower simply looms over the entire city. Camden's City Hall opened in 1931.
The City Hall & Courthouse Annex is still the tallest building in Camden. The Camden City Hall features a slender tower rising from a massive base. At the top is a large clock. This building is the center of the universe, at least for Camden. It is also the most recognizable with its huge clock tower and gorgeous relief art on the east and west sides of the building. The bronze reliefs are amazing. The 20 ft. X 15 ft. bronze relief depicts life of long ago. There is some text at the bottom which reads "County of Camden 1844.
The building, constructed in 1929, is amazingly, not on the NRHP but in of itself is a wonderful work of art. 50 feet above this sculpture is a huge expansive engraved quotation, "No Legacy is so Rich as Honesty". The front has another long quotation, like the other in physical length (about 30 ft), "Where There is no Vision the People Perish." After eighty years, this sculpture still looks brand new. It is a wonder the locals have yet to destroy it as everything else in their path has been leveled, decimated, graffitied and defaced.
This building is so enormous and parking is so sucky about the City Hall during the afternoon, two blocks away is the best spot to take a picture of the entire complex, which is what I was forced to do. I thought the American Guide Series excerpt on this city hall was pretty neat. Here it is:
"The City Hall and Courthouse Annex, 5th St., between Market and Arch Sts., is a light gray granite structure of modified Grecian design, the work of Edwards and Green, Camden architects. Twenty-two stories high, it is the tallest building in Camden. From the main building of five stories rises a 17-story tower, narrowing at the top into open work resembling the neck of a bottle. On the tower is a huge new clock in place of those that have ornamented Camden's city halls since 1876. The building houses county and city offices, making it often half Republican and half Democratic." --- New Jersey, a Guide to Its Present and Past, 1939; page 230-231
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