Welcome to the Borough of Chatham 

Chatham Borough is a quiet, carefully developed,residential community located in north-central New Jersey near Exit 7 of Route 24. Chatham was named One of the Top Ten Places to Live in the United States. by “Money Magazine" in 2005. Located 25 miles west of New York City on the eastern edge of Morris County. Chatham's neighboring communities are Chatham Township, Summit, New Providence, Berkeley Heights, Long Hill, Harding, Madison, Florham Park, Millburn and Livingston. Chatham Borough and Chatham Township share a common heritage and both are often referred to by their shared name, Chatham. 

Chatham consists of many fine homes, townhouses, garden apartments, and condominiums and offers suburban attractiveness as well as efficient railroad, bus, and highway commuting to New York City and surrounding metropolitan North Jersey.  

There are excellent shopping facilities and restaurants available along Chatham's Main Street, and nearby in downtown Madison and Summit, as well as at the Livingston and Short Hills Malls and Hickory Tree Shopping Center in Chatham Township. 

Cultural opportunities include historical, art, garden and musical groups, as well as the facilities and programs of neighboring Drew and Fairleigh Dickinson universities. The Chatham Regional school system consistently ranks highly and the Library of the Chathams is a valuable resource to the residents. 

Many municipal and Morris County outdoor recreational facilities (see Chatham Recreation and Morris County Parks websites) are accessible to residents as well as the Great Swamp National Wildlife Preserve in Chatham Township and the Jockey Hollow and Morristown National Historical Parks. 

Many major USA corporations have located their headquarters or major facilities near Chatham. For more information on local businesses please visit the Chatham Area Chamber of Commerce.  

There are also hundreds of excellent small businesses in the area serving the residents of the Chathams.

Welcome to the Chatham Township
 

Chatham Township is a quiet, carefully developed, residential community in north-central New Jersey near Exit 7 of Route 24. Located 25 miles west of New York City on the southern edge of Morris County, Chatham has many fine homes, townhouses, garden apartments, and condominiums and offers suburban attractiveness as well as efficient railroad, bus, and highway commuting to New York City and surrounding metropolitan North Jersey. There are excellent shopping facilities available locally in the Hickory Tree section and at nearby Short Hills Mall. Cultural opportunities include historical, art, garden and musical groups, as well as the facilities and programs of neighboring universities. The Chatham Regional school system consistently ranks highly and the Library of the Chathams is a valuable resource to the residents. Chatham Township is a family community whose residents take pride in their green, forested land at the edge of the Great Swamp.

History of Chatham Township
Ages ago Chatham Township was the southerly edge of a glacial field. A large, deep lake covered what is now the Great Swamp. The same glacier gave the township many of its other distinguishing features: the Passaic River along the entire southern border, the wooded ridge parallel to the river and the gentle rolling hills that offer an expansive view over and beyond the Great Swamp. 

The first white settlers arrived around 1710, attracted by the fertility of the soil and the rich iron ore deposits in the region. During the Revolutionary War, the entire area shared in the activity of the Morristown encampment. 

In 1806, the Township of Chatham was incorporated and included the areas that are now the Borough of Chatham, Madison and Florham Park. It was named Chatham in honor of Sir William Pitt, the elder Earl of Chatham, who had spoken in favor of the colonists in Parliament.  

These areas were connected by turnpikes and toll roads originally built by private corporations to transport their goods to market. Local residents later built Shunpike Road to avoid paying tolls. 

The most important transportation development was the coming of the Morris and Essex Railroad in 1837. This led to sharp increases in the population, which resulted in incorporating Chatham, Madison and Florham Park as separate boroughs.
In the late 1870s and 1880s Chatham Township became a center of the rose-growing industry. The speciality of the Louis M. Noe Greenhouses was the American Beauty rose with a stem five feet long. At Christmas, he sent them to European royalty. Queen Victoria received 50 of them on her golden anniversary. 

After a five-year construction ban during World War II, home-hungry families invaded the township, and large farms gave way to luxurious home sites. Former rose farms became two major shopping centers at the corner known as Hickory Tree, named for a hickory tree planted during President Madison's term. 

In 1959 the Port Authority zeroed in on the "Great Swamp" as the ideal location for a major metropolitan airport. Through the efforts of Chatham and neighboring municipalities, the swamp was secured by donation as a wilderness area. This part of the township is now open space where joggers, hikers and nature lovers can see the land as it was. 

The Great Swamp wilderness, together with its proximity to metropolitan New York, make Chatham an attractive place to live.