Town of the week:
Monroe Township, NJ

Monroe Township covers about 46 square miles of Gloucester County and counted 37,117 residents in the 2020 Census. Williamstown sits inside the township and carries the 08094 zip code, and part of the township lies inside the New Jersey Pinelands. The Grand Theatre on South Main Street, pictured above, was built in 1924 and is owned by the Road Company, a theater group founded in 1976.

Schools, grade by grade

Monroe Township runs its own schools from pre-K through 12th grade. Holly Glen, Oak Knoll, Radix and Whitehall elementary schools teach pre-K through grade 4, Williamstown Middle School teaches grades 5 to 8, and Williamstown High School teaches grades 9 to 12.

A park and a bike trail

Owens Park, on North Tuckahoe Road, has ball fields, pickleball courts, a dog park, a walking track and a nature trail. The Monroe Township Bike Trail is paved and, by the township's count, runs 6.25 miles, connecting Williamstown to Glassboro.

How Williamstown got its name

The township's history says the first settlement here was called Squankum, a Native American name for "place of evil ghosts." The ghosts are thought to have been the mosquitoes. By 1842, when the settlement needed a name for its post office, Squankum was already taken by a settlement further north, so Williamstown was chosen.

Monroe Township itself was formed in March 1859 from part of Washington Township, when both were in Camden County. It has been part of Gloucester County since 1871.