A mountain saved not by a law, but by neighbors who would not let it go.
WOMEN WHO SHAPED KINNELON
Engineer, historian, environmental commissioner, breast-cancer survivor, and the woman who saved the mountain. Lucy Meyer has her own place in the Women of Kinnelon encyclopedia.
The threat
When Interstate 287 was completed through Morris County, it set off a building boom across the highlands. By the mid-1980s the privately held land around Tripod Rock was slated for single-family homes, and the most famous boulder in the county was about to sit in someone's back yard. The mountain that had survived the glacier, the colonial axe, and the power company was, finally, for sale.
The trailblazer
DocumentedLucy Meyer was not an obvious revolutionary. Trained as an engineer, she had been the first woman engineer at Sperry Gyroscope; in Kinnelon she became the borough's local historian — author of the 1976 town history written after she was told Kinnelon "had no history" — and served on its Historical and Environmental Commissions. After surviving breast cancer in the early 1980s, she turned her attention to the mountain.
She began the way an engineer would: with data. She compiled a thorough Resource Inventory of the area's plants, wetlands, Ice-Age features, and its Native American site, then used it to build a preservation coalition out of neighbors, naturalists, and officials. She founded and chaired the Committee to Save Pyramid Mountain (also called the Friends of Pyramid Mountain). She died in December 2019, at 89.
Her partner in it
Local historyLucy's husband Karl was her partner in the campaign. A pilot and engineer who had moved the family to Kinnelon in the 1950s for his work at the Aircraft Radio Corporation in Boonton, he served as president of the North Jersey Highlands Historical Society and supplied much of the natural-history and Native-site expertise — and the open-space economic arguments — behind the committee's case. He died in late 2010, at 87.
How it was bought
There was no single rescue. Lucy Meyer "knitted together" municipal, county, and state money and private gifts into a series of purchases that assembled the park piece by piece. A Lenni-Lenape tribal representative took part in the preservation effort — a fitting return to land used by the Lenape for ten thousand years.
| Partner | Role in the save |
|---|---|
| NJ Green Acres / Garden State Preservation Fund | State open-space purchase funding |
| NJ Department of Environmental Protection | Owns part of the park's land |
| Morris County Park Commission | Acquired and now manages the park |
| Borough of Kinnelon + NJ State Legislature | Municipal and state support and funding |
| New Jersey Conservation Foundation | Bought 11 acres in 1988 and donated them to the county |
| Committee / Friends of Pyramid Mountain | The grassroots campaign that drove it all |
| The Mennen Company | Funded the first parcel in 1989 |
| A Lenni-Lenape tribal representative | Took part in the preservation effort |
Sources: Borough of Kinnelon Open Space & Recreation Plan (2005); NJ Conservation Foundation; Morris County Park Commission.
Becoming a park
The rescue came in stages. The area was designated and preserved as the Pyramid Mountain Natural Historic Area in 1987; the park was formally established in 1989, the year the Mennen Company funded its first parcel; and in 1993 the visitor center on Boonton Avenue was dedicated, marking the shift from threatened land to permanently protected natural and historical resource. The overlook south of Tripod Rock — Lucy's Overlook, at about 841 feet — now carries her name.
President Reagan honored the committee with a national "Take Pride in America" award on the White House lawn. The NJ Conservation Foundation dates this to July 1988; the Kinnelon Museum gives 1987 — we follow the 1988 date and note the discrepancy rather than pick silently.
The timeline
~18,000 years ago
The Wisconsin Glacier retreats, stranding Tripod Rock, Bear Rock, and Whale Head Rock.
10,000+ years
The Lenape hunt, fish, and gather across the mountain; a Native American site is later recorded here.
~300 years ago
European (largely Dutch) settlers clear homestead farms and woodlots; stone walls and surveyor stones still mark the boundaries.
1920s
Electrification strings high-tension towers across the mountain's northwest corner.
Early 1980s
The Tripod Rock area is surveyed; a solstice sightline is noted during a gypsy-moth defoliation.
Mid-1980s
I-287's completion fuels a building boom; homes are proposed around Tripod Rock. The Committee to Save Pyramid Mountain forms.
1987
The area is designated and preserved as the Pyramid Mountain Natural Historic Area.
1988
The NJ Conservation Foundation buys 11 acres and donates them to the county; Reagan presents the committee a "Take Pride in America" award.
1989
The park is formally established; the Mennen Company funds the first parcel.
1993
The Boonton Avenue visitor center is dedicated.
2008–2009
New trails are added, extending the network toward Bear Rock.
March 17, 2021
A park-wide re-blazing is completed; some trail colors change.
September 2024
The current official Morris County trail map is published.
“A mountain saved not by a law, but by neighbors who would not let it go.”
Visit this place
Pyramid Mountain Natural Historic Area
Lucy's Overlook and the visitor center carry the preservation story forward; the park is open sunrise to sunset.
Sources
Compiled from publicly available sources; where accounts differ, the most widely documented version is used. Community corrections welcome.
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