Idylease Historic Preservation Short

This Idylease Historic Preservation short includes a number of turn of the century postcards that have returned back to Idylease 118 years later. During the last quarter of the nineteenth century, West Milford township was a major resort destination in New Jersey. At its height, the area had over forty hotels and boarding houses that catered to the tourists that flocked to the area for its magnificent scenery and healthful climate. Since the turn-of-the-century, West Milford attracted visitors for its rustic beauty and natural resources. It’s approximately eighty square miles of mountains and lakes have delighted visitors for more than a century. In the mid-1800s, renowned Hudson River School painter Jasper F. Cropsey, captured many West Milford landscapes in their autumnal splendor. He married West Milford resident Maria Cooley at the WM Presbyterian Church in 1847.

In the late 1800s and early 1900s, many resorts opened in the township and railroads brought wealthy vacationers from New York City to enjoy the countryside. The transportation revolution of the mid 1920’s, caused tourism to decline in this part of New Jersey, with other, more distant locations rising in popularity.

Opened on New Years’s Day in 1903, Idylease thrived during the Ragtime Era. The inn was a short trip from the Newfoundland Train station on the way to tourist-filled Greenwood Lake. Promoted as a health retreat, it sits amid pastoral country in the foot hills of the Kittatinny Mountains in the Highlands Region of NJ.