Bedminster Has A Tavern Serving Over 200 years of History

Bedminster, New Jersey is situated just 45 miles west of New York City but you are right int the middle of one of the most populated equine areas in the United States. The United States Equestrian Team Foundation headquarters is the next town over along with the famed Essex Hunt Club, providing a legacy from the late 1800s. Basked in history the area was also home to America’s first military academy in Pluckemin which was the precursor to the Academy in West Point, New York. Mr. Local History now takes you back to an iconic hotel and tavern that has lasted the test of time dating back to 1786.

With many names and even more owners, what is now known as Delicious Heights on Main Street in Bedminster has at least eight names we’ve found in our research. So if you drop into the current watering hole and restaurant, you’ll see historic memories of the area and the tavern over the past two centuries. MLH digs into another historic Jersey icon.

Timeline

The first hotel established in what was known as the Lesser Crossroads section of Bedminster was erected in 1786 by Bedminster’s farmer and tanner Aaron Melick for his son, John, who was returning home after serving in the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War. Since 1786 the location has served as a hotel, tavern, polling place, a cock fighting establishment, pool room, package store, political forum, speakeasy, and restaurant.

There have been numerous proprietors over the years. Still, we will honor its most colorful owner, Mr. William “Willie” Howard, who 1893 came to Gladstone with Charles Pfizer who employed Howard as huntsman for what is now the Essex Hunt Club. After settling first in Bernardsville the Hunt Club moved to Gladstone and in 1898, Willie and his wife, Bertha, purchased the Bedminster Hotel, as it was called at the time, for $5,000. The hotel was renamed the “Howard Hotel” and in 1912 the first indoor plumbing was installed.

• Bedminster Hotel – 1786 by Aaron Melick for his son, John (Malick), who was returning home from the Revolutionary War. It was the first tavern in Lesser Crossroads (Bedminster). The name Mellick acquired three different spellings. In those days the people in charge of registering land titles and other legal documents spelled names as they sounded. The Bedminster branch became Mellick, the Tewksbury branch Melick, and a few spelled it Malick. There was a standing joke in the Melick family that the Mellicks had enough money to afford 2 ‘l’s’ in their name. The original Dutch name was Moelich and John would have been Johannes.
• April 11, 1800 – Continental Army Captain William Fulkerson purchases the tavern.
• 1825 – Peter Blair of Lesser Cross Roads takes ownership. Documents state Blair then sells the tavern to Agatha and Duwick Jeffkin and they call it Bedminster House. (No relation to C. Ledyard Blair who later settled in nearby Peapack, New Jersey with his Blairsden Estate,)
• 1889 – The establishment was renamed the “Inn at Bedminster” or “The Bedminster House.”

The Howard Family – 65 years of Ownership

Since 1786 the establishment has served as a pub, a polling place, a pool room, a cock fighting hub, a package store, a political forum, a speakeasy, a hotel and a restaurant. There have been numerous proprietors over the years and we honor its most colorful owner, Mr. Willie Howard who’s family has owned the hotel//tavern longer than any other family.

In 1893 William “Willie” Howard came to Gladstone with Charles Pfizer and served as huntsman for Essex Hunt Club. In 1898 Willie and his wife, Bertha, purchased the Bedminster Hotel, as it was called, for $5,000. The hotel was renamed the “Howard Hotel.” The name William Howard also might tie back to the original “William Howard Taft” who later became the 27th President of the United States from 1909-1913. Probably not, but thought it interesting.

• 1898 – Howard Hotel – Willie Howard and the Howard  Hotel- 1930s – Howard was also known for raising and engaging in fighting cocks at the inn until it was made illegal.

• October 20, 1911—New Jersey Governor Woodrow Wilson visited Somerset County on Saturday, October 20, 1911, for 11 campaign stops in the county, alongside the mud and rain. Speaking from the old steps, Governor Wilson thrilled audiences with an address that was said to be one of the classics of his political career. Wilson became the 28th President of the United States in 1913 (Woodrow Wilson Papers).
• There is a mention of the visit dated 1916 as President, but we’re still looking for verification.

• 1912 – First of its kind, indoor plumbing added to the Bedminster Inn.
• 1916 – Bedminster Inn – Woodrow Wilson speaks on the porch making the inn a stop on his 1916 re-election campaign tour. (Still looking for affirmation on this event).

• Prohibition – The Howards made their own applejack in a 1,000 gallon still in nearby Chester, Beer and ale were made in the cellar. Bought apples from Hildebrandt’s farm in Oldwick. 115 proof and smooth so they said. There is still a Hildebrant Farm today between two Melick orchards.
• 1929 – Federal Agents raid the Inn during prohibition. The hotel was padlocked for a year, according to Charlie Howard (Willie Howard’s son).

• 1929 – Willie Howard dies. Son Harry Alfred Howard (1892-1960) takes over the Inn. Willie, his wife and the majoirity of his siblings are buried in the nearby Bedminster Reformed Church cemetery.

• 1933 – Prohibition ends
• 1937 – Mrs. Bertha Howard sells the Howard’s Old Stone home in Bedminster, the same home that was built and by the Melicks (who built the original Bedminster tavern.
• 1938 – House from Plainfield added, renamed the Bedminster Inn – Bedminster Inn or The Inn until 1989 Owned for 1 year.

• 1963 – Willie Howard’s son Harry Howard dies in 1960 and three years later the establishment is sold to Duncan Pitney and Ned Burke. Willie Howard’s other son, Thomas, Harry and the rest of his family owned the inn for 65 years (1898-1963).

• 1963 – Duncan Pitney and Ned Burke take ownership of the Howard’s legacy of the Bedminster Inn
• 1964 – Pitney and Burke sell to John H. Ewing of Peapack bought the Inn and renamed it “The Cock and Bull”

• 1965 – 1968 – Run as “The Cock and Bull”
• 1968 – 1972:  Winthrop Endicott who made it look like an equestrian bistro as he was also owned the Far Hills Training Center.
• 1972 –  Endicott sells The Cock and Bull to Elias Boudinot “Bud” Fisher of Far Hills, a direct descendant of the Elias Boudinot, the President of the Continental Congress from 1782-83 from Basking Ridge during the revolutionary war. Back to being the Bedminster Inn
• 1981 – Renamed “The Inn” – October House Properties (Kissel family) and Hunt Marckwald. Run by Innkeeper John Kissel who’s family have lived in the area for over 100 years. 
• 1989 – The Kissels sold The Inn to Welch’s partnership of Basking Ridge in July 1989. Three months of extensive renovations followed, and in October 1989 The Inn was renamed Willie’s Taverne, after Willie Howard.

• Inside Willie’s, the former Legends Sports Bar, which had a separate entrance alongside Willie’s, was typically reserved for private parties.

• 2011 – Delicious Heights – Willie’s Tavern is purchased Sept. 26, 2011 by 3J Management Inc. The buyers were Dominico Acquaviva of Chestnut Court in Basking Ridge, Alex Rubinstein of Penns Way in Basking Ridge, Raffaele Acquaviva of Washington Valley Road in Martinsville and the Delicious Heights Enterprise Corporation. They purchased the facility by longtime Basking Ridge owner Jack Welsh and Mendham’s Jeff Beers of Growth Enterprises which also owned The Store Restaurant in nearby Basking Ridge. Growth Restaurants was started in 1972 by Beers and Welch. Before Welch’s death the group of restaurants included Fair Winds Catering in Basking Ridge and The Famished Frog in Morristown was owned and operated by Beers, Welch, Jim Finnegan and John Dourney.

More History Facts

• Delicious Heights will STILL host the Township Committee’s annual reorganization meeting in January, as Willie’s had since it opened its doors in 1898.
• Willie was a huntsman for the Essex Hunt Club and had a favorite horse “Ninette”. Being thrown from Ninette so many times, Willie was nicknamed the “India Rubber Man.” He named his youngest daughter after Ninette, and even buried Ninette (the horse) behind the tavern.
• Business names over the years:
  • Bedminster Hotel (1786)
  • Bedminster House (c.1889)
  • Inn at Bedminster (c.1889)
  • Howard Hotel (c.1898)
    
  • Bedminster Inn (1916,1963)
  • The Cock and Bull (1965)
  • The Inn (c.1981)
  • Willie’s Taverne (1989)
  • Delicious Heights (2011)

Just to the south, Jacob Eoff, a prominent citizen built a tavern a few years before Aaron Melick.  Jacob Eoff was a native of Holland and purchased five hundred acres of land from the heirs of John Johnstone. He built the first inn in Pluckemin in 1750 that stood near the intersection of Route 202-206 and Washington Valley Road. Sadly, the inn and tavern was destroyed by fire in 1814. A new structure was built up the street near the present day Pluckemin Inn.

Additional Local History

Remembering Willie Howard and Bedminster’s Willie’s Tavern

Before the West Point Academy, There was Pluckamin

Bedminster History – Look To the Old Mellick Farmhouses

The Tale of Two Bedminsters

Vote for Bedminster’s Most Historic Icons