{{Use American English|date=July 2025}} {{Use mdy dates|date=August 2023}} {{Infobox NRHP | name = Isaac Van Campen Inn | partof = [[Old Mine Road Historic District]] | nrhp_type = cp | nocat = yes | image = Isaac Van Campen House, 1750 (3707827199).jpg | caption = Van Campen Inn in 2009 | location = [[Old Mine Road]]<br >[[Walpack Township, New Jersey|Walpack Township]] | coordinates = {{coord|41|9|52.5|N|74|53|31|W|region:US_type:landmark|name=Van Campen Inn|display=inline,title}} | locmapin = USA New Jersey Sussex County#New Jersey#USA | architect = | designated_nrhp_type = December 3, 1980 | partof_refnum = 80000410<ref name="nris">{{NRISref|version=2013a|refnum=80000410|name=Old Mine Road Historic District}}</ref> | designated_other1_name = New Jersey Register of Historic Places | designated_other1_abbr = NJRHP | designated_other1_link = New Jersey Register of Historic Places | designated_other1_date = October 24, 1975 | designated_other1_number = 2644<ref name=NJRHP>{{cite web | title=New Jersey and National Registers of Historic Places – Sussex County | url=https://www.nj.gov/dep/hpo/1identify/nrsr_lists/SUSSEX.pdf#page=9 | publisher=[[New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection]] - Historic Preservation Office | page=9 | date=March 23, 2022 }}</ref> | designated_other1_num_position = bottom | designated_other1_color = #ffc94b }}
'''Van Campen's Inn''' or '''Isaac Van Campen Inn''' is a fieldstone residence that was used as a [[yaugh house]] during the American colonial era. Located in [[Walpack Township, New Jersey|Walpack Township]], [[Sussex County, New Jersey]] along the [[Delaware River]], it is a historic site located along the [[Old Mine Road]] in the [[Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area]]. It is operated under a memorandum of understanding between the [[National Park Service]] and the Walpack Historical Society, a local non-profit corporation.
==History== [[File:INTERIOR - PANEL DETAIL - LIVING ROOM - Isaac Van Campen House, Old Mine Road, Wallpack Center, Sussex County, NJ HABS NJ,19-SHAP.V,1-2.tif|thumb|left|HABS photo from 1937]] The Rosenkrans family, a Dutch family from the Hudson Valley in New York, settled in the [[Minisink]] circa 1730.<ref name="IVCNJSkylands">Koppenhaver, Robert. [http://www.njskylands.com/hsoldmine072.htm "Old Mine Road: Roadside Attractions"] ''Skylands Visitor''. Retrieved 2 January 2013.</ref><ref name="DWGNRANewsletterIVC">Solon, Tom. [https://web.archive.org/web/20080210044310/http://www.nps.gov/dewa/historyculture/upload/cmsstgVCITS.pdf "Isaac Van Campen Inn"] in ''Spanning the Gap: The newsletter of Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area'' Volume 6, Number 2 (Summer 1983). Retrieved 2 January 2013.</ref> It acquired a large tract of land along the Shapanack Flats section of the Delaware River in 1742.<ref name="IVCNJSkylands" /> Harmon Rosenkrans is believed to have built the first section of the house shortly after (most sources stated 1746).<ref name="IVCNJSkylands" /> This section, the "kitchen wing" was located on the north end of the house.
In 1754, Rosenkrans sold the property and the small house to his brother-in-law Isaac Van Campen who had married Magdalena Rosenkrans. Van Campen built the larger, main section of the house.<ref name="IVCNJSkylands" /> Today this later wing is the extant structure. The older "kitchen wing" was torn down in 1917.<ref name="IVCNJSkylands" />
The house was added to the [[National Register of Historic Places]] in 1980 as a contributing property to the [[Old Mine Road Historic District]].<ref name="nrhpdoc">{{cite web|url={{NRHP url|id=80000410}}|title=National Register of Historic Places Inventory/Nomination: Old Mine Road Historic District / Old Mine Road |publisher=[[National Park Service]]|first1=Wayne K. |last1=Bodle |first2=Clifford |last2=Tobias |date=July 1980 }} With {{NRHP url|id=80000410|photos=y|title=accompanying 29 photos from 1977}}</ref> The National Park Service authorized a substantial restoration and reconstruction of the Van Campen Inn beginning in 1981. This restoration involved dismantling two-thirds of the front and side walls of the house, constructing new foundations, stabilizing the rear walls, and replacing interior wood structural beams.<ref name="IVCNJSkylands" /> It was completed in 1984 by local stonemason Clarence Sharp (1923–2002).
While it is called an "inn", it is more accurately a "yaugh house"—a rural residence in a remote area that was licensed under colonial law to provide food and shelter to travellers.<ref name="IVCNJSkylands" /> During the [[French & Indian War]] (1754–1763), the Van Campen's Inn "provided a safe haven when settlers fled for protection from Indian attack."<ref name="DWGNRANewsletterIVC" /> According to the National Park Service, in November 1763, 150 settlers sought shelter in the "stout walls" of the house against the threat of Indian attack.<ref name="NPSMilitaryTrailBroch">[https://web.archive.org/web/20141006125426/http://www.nps.gov/dewa/planyourvisit/loader.cfm?csModule=security/getfile&pageid=153843 "Guide to Military Trail"]. National Park Service brochure. Retrieved 2 January 2013.</ref> During the American Revolution, [[John Adams]] is said to have rested the night at Van Campen's Inn while travelling from Massachusetts to Philadelphia for the [[Continental Congress]].<ref name="DWGNRANewsletterIVC" /> According to the National Park Service, "In a December snowstorm in 1776, several regiments under General [[Horatio Gates]] marched south via Old Mine Road past this point and camped overnight on Shapanack Flats in front of Van Campen Inn. They then continued south to join General Washington in the Battle of Trenton."<ref name="NPSMilitaryTrailBroch" /> Brigadier General [[Casimir Pulaski|Pulaski]], a Polish count, and his command of 250 cavalry soldiers wintered here in 1778.<ref name="NPSMilitaryTrailBroch" /> Van Campen served in the state legislature from 1782–1785.<ref>Hine, Charles G. ''The Old Mine Road''. (New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 1908, 1985), 150.</ref>
The Van Campen's Inn site had a Dutch colonial-style barn with characteristic large, "steep roofed" inward-swinging double doors, gable ends, smaller animal doors (one for horses, another for dairy cows). It was built across the road from the inn circa 1811 by Henry DeWitt and John H. DeWitt of [[Rochester, Ulster County, New York|Rochester, Ulster County NY]], who purchased the property from Abraham Van Campen in 1811.<ref name="IVCNJSkylands" /> This structure was destroyed by [[arson]] in the 1971.<ref name="IVCNJSkylands" />
The ruins of Fort Johns, a fortification built during the [[French & Indian War]], is located on the nearby hillside overlooking the property. Fort Johns was the headquarters of the [[New Jersey Frontier Guard]], and the largest of a series of a dozen forts built to defend frontier settlers along the Delaware River by New Jersey's colonial government during that war, which lasted 1754 to 1763. It was located at the terminus of [[Jonathan Hampton]]'s [[Military Road (New Jersey)|Military Road]] built in 1755–1756 from the colony's capital Elizabethtown (now [[Elizabeth, New Jersey]]) to [[Morristown, New Jersey|Morristown]] to supply the colony's fortifications in the Minisink. Today, the 1.6-mile long section of the Military Road traversing [[Walpack Ridge]] has been restored by the National Park Service as the "Military Trail" from Walpack Centre; it ends at the Old Mine Road a half-mile north of Van Campen's Inn. Driving between these two points on public roads requires a journey of ten miles.
==See also== * [[Tocks Island Dam Controversy]] * [[List of the oldest buildings in New Jersey]]
==References== {{reflist}}
==External links== *{{commons category-inline|Isaac Van Campen House}} * {{HABS |survey=NJ-436 |id=nj0155 |title=Isaac Van Campen House, Old Mine Road, Wallpack Center, Sussex County, NJ |photos=15 |dwgs=14 |data=7 |cap=2 }} *[https://www.nps.gov/dewa/index.htm National Park Service: Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area] *[http://www.walpackhistory.org/index.php/landmarks/6-van-campen-inn Van Campen's Inn - Walpack Historical Society]
{{Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area}} {{authority control}}
[[Category:Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area]] [[Category:Buildings and structures in Sussex County, New Jersey]] [[Category:Museums in Sussex County, New Jersey]] [[Category:Tourist attractions in Sussex County, New Jersey]] [[Category:Historical societies in New Jersey]] [[Category:History of New Jersey]] [[Category:Walpack Township, New Jersey]] [[Category:Stone houses in New Jersey]] [[Category:National Register of Historic Places in Sussex County, New Jersey]] [[Category:Historic district contributing properties in New Jersey]] [[Category:New Jersey Register of Historic Places]] [[Category:Historic American Buildings Survey in New Jersey]]