The Deserted Village: In the heart of Watchung Reservation

Patti Slobogin drove slowly so that her mother could take in all the changes to the neighborhood she hadnt seen in more than 75 years.

Some things had changed--others hadnt. But to just be there againto see the porches where she would sleep on warm summer nights--was enough for 88-year-old Becky Slobogin, who grew up in The Deserted Village, in the heart of Union Countys 2,000-acre Watchung Reservation.

Slobogin is the oldest person known to have lived in the small enclave, once known as Feltville, a small mill community founded by David Felt in 1845. So when County parks officials learned that she wanted to visit, they were thrilled.

"It was wonderful to hear Mrs. Slobogin's recollections of her childhood in the Deserted Village," said Union County Freeholder Bette Jane Kowalski, who met Slobogin and her family at the Deserted Village's restored church/general store.

"She came a long way -- in distance and in time -- to share her memories with us," Kowalski said, noting that Slobogin, her daughter, and granddaughter, Cassie Spodak, drove all the way from Ossining, N.Y.

"She is a living link to a past that few people remember, and we are very grateful to her for taking the trouble to come and visit us," Kowalski said.

Slobogin, who was five years-old when her family moved to The Deserted Village in 1928, was interviewed by Daniel Bernier, who oversees historic settlement as part of his responsibilities with the Union County Parks department. The interview was videotaped and will become part of the growing online archive about The Deserted Village on the Countys website, ucnj.org/desertedvillage.

(Anyone wishing to participate in the oral history project can send an email to dv@ucnj.org or call 908-789-3682.)

After the interview, Bernier led a tour of the village. While Slobogins home was destroyed in a fire in the 1950s, just to finally return and see her childhood neighborhood brought her close to tears.

While she would later live all over the world because her husband was with the CIA, Slobogins greatest wish in recent years, her daughter said, was to see the Deserted Village again.

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The Deserted Village: In the heart of Watchung Reservation