Normal and Model Schools "Expenses Reduced!" brochure, c. 1878

Founded in 1855 as the New Jersey State Normal School, The College of New Jersey is the oldest teacher training college in the state and the ninth oldest in the nation. Originally located in downtown Trenton, the college expanded academically and physically, and later moved to suburban Ewing Township in the 1930s.

Over the years, the name of the college has changed to reflect its expanding mission.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    New New Jersey State Normal School,  1855-1908

New Jersey Normal School in Trenton, 1908-1929

New Jersey State Teachers College and State Normal School at Trenton, 1929-1937

New Jersey State Teachers College at Trenton, 1937-1958

Trenton State College, 1958-1996

The College of New Jersey, 1996-present

Washington Hasbrouck was born on November 26, 1824, to Sally Auchmoody and Philip S. Hasbrouck, in New Paltz, New York. His early educational training is not known. He was the vice-principal of Kingston Academy and founded the Hasbrouck Institute, an all-boys private school in Jersey City, New Jersey, in 1856. He married Sabra King (1829-1894) in about 1850 and had two children: Albert Crowell (1851-1900) and Elizabeth “Lizzie” Hasbrouck (1854-1908). He received several honorary degrees including a master's from Rutgers in 1857, a doctorate from New York University in 1869, and a doctorate from Princeton in 1876. A few years after the [financial] Panic of 1873 caused declining enrollment at Hasbrouck Institute, he left to become Principal of the New Jersey State Normal School on July 1,1876, where he remained until 1889. He died on February 24, 1895, in Newburg, New York.