Five little-known historical facts about New Jersey

New Jersey has a boardwalk-lined shore made even more famous by an ineffable reality show.

It has a toll-charging turnpike with a short concrete wall for a median. It’s the home of Ellis Island, Bruce Springsteen and "The Sopranos."

But those things are common knowledge. Here are five historical facts many people may not know about the 8,723-square-mile slice of paradise known as the Garden State.

First Navy submarine

The first submarine acquired by the U.S. Navy, the Holland, was built in Elizabeth. Launched at the city’s Lewis Nixon Crescent Shipyards on May 18, 1897, the 53-foot Holland was purchased by the Navy in April 1900 and commissioned six months later, naval records show.

The Holland served for 10 years as an experimental vessel before its name was struck from the Navy Register of Ships, records show. It was created by Irish immigrant John P. Holland, who had previous designs rejected by the Navy.

The Holland used a gasoline engine on the surface and an electric motor when submerged. While a remarkable achievement, the submarine wasn’t the first.

A Dutch inventor, Cornelis Drebbel, tested a submarine in the early 17th century. Moreover, the first American combat submersible, the single-seat Turtle, dates to the American Revolution.

Napoleon’s brother called it home

Joseph Bonaparte sat on thrones as the king of Naples and later Spain. Then he moved to Bordentown, crown jewels and all.

The older brother of French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte, Joseph Bonaparte fled Europe for New York in a disguise after his brother’s surrender in 1815, according to Evan Morrison Woodward’s 1879 book “Bonaparte's Park and the Murats.”

He initially settled in Philadelphia. However, within two years, he would relocate to an 1,800-acre estate called Point Breeze near the convergence of Crosswicks Creek and the Delaware River. There, the Comte de Survilliers constructed lavish mansions and outbuildings, including one connected to the manor by underground tunnel, Woodward wrote.

He adorned his home with art, entertained guests and designed gardens, which he often opened to the public. He left for England in 1832, according to Woodward, but returned five years later before leaving New Jersey for good in 1839.

A tale of two capital cities

In the 1780s, Princeton and Trenton temporarily served as the U.S. capital. The Congress of Confederation first adopted Princeton due to anti-government protests by Continental Army soldiers demanding back pay at its home base of Philadelphia.

Government officials selected Princeton and Nassau Hall on the campus of the College of New Jersey from June 30, 1783, to Nov. 4, 1783, federal records show.

The oldest building on what is now known as Princeton University, Nassau Hall was the largest academic building in the nation at the time. It also bore scars from the Battle of Princeton in 1777, when the Continental Army took back the building seized in 1776 by British forces.

After spending roughly one year outside of New Jersey, meeting at the Maryland Statehouse, the Congress returned. This time, it set up shop at the French Arms Tavern — once Trenton’s largest building. From Nov. 1 to Dec. 24, 1784, delegates met at the tavern, which was demolished in 1837.

Home of the first drive-in movie

Before anyone ever heard of a drive-in, there was Camden’s Park-In Theaters. Opened on June 6, 1933, the outdoor venue on Crescent Boulevard in Camden was the first-ever open-air automobile theater — later called a drive-in.

Little lie:Häagen-Dazs, rooted in Bergen County, built an ice cream empire on a little white lie

All about booze:A century ago, NJ governor's 'applejack campaign' was all about the booze

NJ history:Bergen's Camp Merritt, closed 100 years ago, was WWI's largest embarkation camp

Built at an initial cost of $60,000, according to the Camden Courier-Post’s next-day report, the theater was the brainchild of Richard Hollingshead. Using a 1938 Kodak projector, the theater initially showed three abridged features nightly. Admission was $1 per car or 25 cents per person.

Within 25 years of their invention, drive-in theaters in the United States would peak at more than 4,000. There are now 321, according to the National Association of Theater Owners.

Hollingshead’s son told the Courier-Post in 1983 that his father had smokers, the handicapped and the obese in mind when developing the concept.

Host to the first inning ever

The riverside city of Hoboken staged the first organized baseball game on June 19, 1846. Played on the Elysian Fields, a resort area frequented by New Yorkers who flocked there by ferry on holidays and weekends, the game was won by the New York Nine.

The away team annihilated the “home” club, the New York Knickerbockers, 23-1, according to NJ.gov. Though baseball in other forms may have been played competitively before 1846, the Hoboken game was recorded as the first to use the rules developed in 1845 by Knickerbocker founding member Alexander Cartwright Jr. and tested on the Elysian Fields.

Those rules set the foundation for modern baseball. Cartwright, who would go on to become chief of the Honolulu Fire Department, entered baseball’s Hall of Fame in 1938. Among his lasting contributions: 90 feet between bases, nine players and nine innings.

David Zimmer is a local reporter for NorthJersey.com. For unlimited access to the most important news from your local community, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.

Email: zimmer@northjersey.com Twitter: @dzimmernews