Founding Families · KinnelonThe Mead Family

Land-grant farmers whose name still marks Meadtown — and the 1873 schoolhouse that is now the borough's museum.

Among the first families to take up Proprietor land grants in these highlands, the Meads left their name on the map at Meadtown — and on the two schoolhouses that taught the valley's children. One of those buildings still stands today as the Kinnelon Museum.

1600s–1700s

Documented

Meadtown and its two schoolhouses

The Meads were among the earliest families to take up Proprietor land grants in the highlands, and one of them — John Mead — was a co-investor with Arent Schuyler in the 1695 Pompton purchase that opened this country to European farming. Their name settled onto the land at Meadtown. So did their schools: a one-room schoolhouse was built in 1839 below the Mead house and served the district until a new schoolhouse replaced it in 1873 — and it is that 1873 building, not the first, that later became L'Ecole and stands today as the Kinnelon Museum. By local account the borough's earliest council meetings were held in that very schoolhouse.

Local lore

Family tradition holds that the Meads received a 17th-century “Queen Anne grant” and an 18th-century “King George III grant” of some 5,000 acres. Neither has ever been documented — the local historian who recorded the tradition flagged the gap himself — so it lives here as cherished lore, not fact.

The family record

1600s–1700s — land grantsDocumented

The Mead family

  • farmer
  • landholder

Proprietor land-grant farmers whose name still marks Meadtown — and whose two schoolhouses, the first of 1839 and its 1873 replacement (now the Kinnelon Museum), trace the town's school across the century.

The Meads were among the earliest families to take up Proprietor land grants in these highlands, and John Mead was one of Arent Schuyler's co-investors in the 1695 Pompton purchase. Their name still marks the map at Meadtown — and so do its schoolhouses. The first one-room Meadtown School was built in 1839, below Wilton Mead's house, and served the district until 1873. A new schoolhouse replaced it that year, and it is that 1873 building — not the first one — that later became L'Ecole and stands today as the Kinnelon Museum. (Several borough and popular accounts blur the two and date the museum to 1839; the 1839 date belongs to the school it succeeded.)

Homestead & site

Meadtown — the Kinnelon Museum (the 1873 L'Ecole schoolhouse, which replaced the first 1839 Meadtown School)

Approximate locationView on Google Maps

A namesake locality; the Mead homestead site itself is not separately documented.

Connections

  • Arent Schuyler — John Mead co-invested with Arent Schuyler in the 1695 Pompton purchase.

Sources

Is this your family? Help us tell it right.

This history grows with you

The Mead story still lives partly in family memory and old deeds. If you carry the name — or hold a photograph, a record, or a correction — share it. Family stories publish as local history; dated records and documents publish as documented. Nothing publishes without review.

  • Mead farm and butternut-tree photographs
  • Deeds, wills, or land records (especially on the “grant” tradition)
  • Family lineage and descendants

Your turn

Be the first to add to this history

A story, a correction, or a name we've missed — every piece helps. It takes a minute.

Sources

Compiled from publicly available sources; where accounts differ, the most widely documented version is used. Community corrections welcome.

Explore more of the Highlands

Founding Families
Kinnelon
All history