Known for its pristine beaches and small town charm, Stone Harbor is a coastal New
Jersey town that is exceptionally dedicated to preserving its unique history. The Stone Harbor Museum of New Jersey, a collection of archival material committed to bringing the past into the present, is especially devoted to this goal of preserving history. According to the President of the Board of Trustees for the Stone Harbor Museum, Teri Fischer, the mission of the museum is to “acquire, preserve, display, celebrate, and promote archival and artifact items relevant to the development of our unique cultural heritage and to delight, inspire, and educate the present and future generations about the story of Stone Harbor, NJ.” One way in which the museum is currently committed to its mission is its 2024 Taylor Swift collection that is being displayed in the museum from June 13 to the end of September.
As a South Jersey native who is a self proclaimed Swiftie and loves taking day trips to Stone Harbor, this Taylor Swift collection has most certainly piqued my interest and has convinced me to take a trip to the Stone Harbor Museum before the end of the summer.
Taylor Allison Swift, a global sensation and inspiration to millions of people around the world, is a local of West Reading, Pennsylvania. A little known fact about Swift is that she and her family spent their summers in Stone Harbor until they moved Taylor to Nashville, Tennessee at the age of fourteen to pursue her music career. With Swift spending her childhood summers in Stone Harbor, performing at local favorites such as Coffee Talk and the now closed down Henny’s, and her father Scott working for the Stone Harbor Volunteer Fire Company as an EMT during that time, the entire Swift family have very fond memories of the coastal South Jersey town. It is no surprise then, that the Swift family reached out to the Stone Harbor museum to offer some of Taylor’s archival material. Taylor’s museum exhibit consists of four music videos from her Midnights album, four Midnights vinyls displayed as a clock, a Midnights-themed guitar autographed by Taylor herself, a poster of Swift created by an artist named Peter Max, an Eras Tour concert film poster, and of course, photos of Taylor as a child spending her summers in Stone Harbor. The Swift family donated these items to the Stone Harbor Museum in order to contribute to the museum’s goal of making history fun and preserving the unique heritage of Stone Harbor.
Another way in which the museum is committed to their goal of preservation is a
program called “Vintage Houses of Stone Harbor,” in which the museum formally recognizes
and celebrates certified houses within the town. There is an entire section on the Stone Harbor Museum’s official website displaying pictures of these houses, their addresses, and their nicknames. According to the museum’s website, a house can be certified if it was built in 1965 or earlier. Owners of a vintage house of Stone Harbor receive an official Vintage House plaque with the date the house was constructed, membership in the Vintage House Plaque Society, and a Certificate of Authenticity from the museum. The Stone Harbor Museum acknowledges these vintage houses for the same reason they have set up their 2024 Taylor Swift collection: to encourage locals to take pride in the history of Stone Harbor and to celebrate the town’s unique past.
The Stone Harbor Museum is currently trying to encourage local historical pride by
appealing to the younger generations. According to Rebecca Carlsson, writing for MuseumNext, research shows "that museums must make extra effort in order to encourage millennial [and Gen Z] visitors...the digital revolution that has so consumed the millennial generation has eroded the desire to gain information from a museum." The article notes that "millennials are far less likely to visit a museum in their downtime than they are to eat out or go to the cinema." Here, we have a local history museum making an effort to reach out to younger visitors like myself. As a college student, I can’t say I would have any major interest in visiting a museum in my down time, but because the Stone Harbor Museum has made the effort to appeal to younger audiences, through their Taylor Swift collection for example, it makes me want to drive down to Stone Harbor as soon as possible and pay a visit to the museum.
Ava Costello is an undergraduate at Monmouth University majoring in Early Childhood and Elementary Education. She is currently a student worker at the campus's Bruce Springsteen Archives & Center for American Music.
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