Penultimate Pleasures

Penns Grove is located in Salem County, in the Delaware River Region of New Jersey. It  is surrounded by the township of Carneys Point.  Penns Grove is a pleasant community located right on the banks of the Delaware River. In times past it was famous for its production of caviar.

The are many enjoyable activities to participate in while visiting Penns Grove. The first thing that most vacationers and sightseers do is to take along the Delaware River and see the progress that is being made on the new Penns Grove Riverwalk project. Nearby is a famous avenue known as Pitman Street, home of many Italian immigrants who came from the town of Valle San Giovanni in the Abruzzo Italy.

Some visitors head straight to the house where the TV and movie actor John Forsythe, born John Freund on 29 January 1918 , was born. Others prefer to start their visit at a spot historically known as “Tarzanville”, the exact setting where Rome 1960 Olympic Gold Medalist and world record holder Don Bragg used do his pole vault training.

It is well know that the movie actor Bruce Willis used to hang out frequently in “The Grove”.   A hardware store on Penns Grove’s Main Street has for years carried the Willis name.

Penns Grove is well known for the quality of its educational instruction.  One teacher at the local high school, PGHS (Penns Grove Regional High School) by the name of  Grace Cannavo has won a good many awards over the years, both on a county and a state wide level, for her teaching prowess.  Grace’s love of Italy, especially the Region of Abruzzo, have endeared her to many hundreds of students over the years.

The gourmand will be quite happy to find himself in Pennns Grove.  The most popular eating establishment is Di Paolo’s Italian Ristorante located on South Broad Street. Here you can sample authentic food just as it is experienced in Valle San Giovanni and Valle Soprana in the beautiful Abruzzo Region of Italy. Don’t forget to schmooze with the capo, Big Mikey, and to have a cannoli. Che buono! Ask for the scrippelle or the polpettine. If you call ahead you may even be able to order the timballo, a specialty enjoyed by guests visiting Casale in the Di Paolo’s Abruzzo hometown.

Those looking for more casual fare will want to head east to the Roman Pantry, also owned and operated by a member of the dynastic Di Paolo family. Here you can see where Bruce Willis comes for his subs when he visits the Grove. The authentic food will delight your tastbuds until you finally can eat no more and shout out to the owners, “Basta…basta!” A bit further along this road and one comes across Cowtown, the oldest rodeo on the east coast located in Woodstown.

Penns Grove is a Borough in Salem County, New Jersey, United States. As of the United States 2000 Census, the borough population was 4,886.

Penns Grove was incorporated as a borough by an Act of the New Jersey Legislature on March 8, 1894, from portions of Upper Penns Neck Township (now Carneys Point Township, based on the results of a referendum held two days earlier.  According to the United States Census Bureau, the borough has a total area of a little less than one square mile, all of it land.  Penns Grove borders Carneys Point Township and the Delaware River.

In the early 1900s, many Italian immigrants from Valle San Giovanni and the surrounding province of Teramo came to work at the local E.I. DuPont de Nemours plant in Carneys Point. Many settled on Pitman Street in Penns Grove. In 1925, a copy of the statue of the Madonna and Child, found in the Chiesa della Madonna delle Grazie in Teramo, Italy, was placed in the Penns Grove RC Church, Saint James. It remains there to this day.

Penns Grove is governed under the Borough form of New Jersey municipal government. The government consists of a Mayor and a Borough Council comprising six council members, with all positions elected at large. A Mayor is elected directly by the voters to a four-year term of office. The Borough Council consists of six members elected to serve three-year terms on a staggered basis, with two seats coming up for election each year.

Students in public school for grades K through 12 attend the Penns Grove-Carneys Point Regional School District, together with students from Carneys Point Township. Students from Oldmans Township attend the district as part of a sending/receiving relationship. Schools in the district (with 2005-06 enrollment data from the National Center for Education Statistics) are Lafayette-Pershing School for grades Pre-K to 1 (333 students), Field Street School for grades 1 – 3 (528), Paul W. Carleton School for grades 4 and 5 (324), Penns Grove Middle School for grades 6 – 8 (513) and Penns Grove High School grades 9 – 12 (622).

Notable current and former residents of Penns Grove include:

* Giuseppe Bracale, alias “Joe Firpo”, welterweight boxing champion.
* Don Bragg (born 1935), Gold medal winner in the pole vault at the 1960 Summer Olympics held in Rome, Italy.
* Roy Elsh (1892-1978), professional baseball player for the Chicago White Sox 1923-25.
* John Forsythe (born 1918), television and character actor
* Bruce Willis (born 1955), actor, moved to town as child and graduated from Penns Grove High School.

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