Editing Belleville, New Jersey (section)

==History==
[[File:Hillside Pleasure Park - Belleville, New Jersey.jpg|thumb|left|Hillside Pleasure Park in Belleville, {{circa|1905}}]]
Originally known as "Second River" or "Washington", the inhabitants renamed the settlement "Belleville" in 1797.<ref>[http://westfieldnj.com/whs/history/Counties/EssexCounty/belleville.htm "Belleville History: People And Events – A Town Gets Its Name"], WestfieldNJ.com. Accessed September 14, 2017. "On Saturday, June 24, 1797, inhabitants of the Second River settlement met at John Ryerson's house for the purpose of giving a new name to their home. The minutes of the meeting tell what happened there: 'Resolved, that the name Second River is improper and inconsistent, as it originally applied to the brook and not to the village and therefore that some name applicable be now chosen.... Resolved, that the whole district, commonly known and called by the name of Second River be hereafter known only by the name of Washington.'"</ref> Belleville was originally incorporated as a township by an act of the [[New Jersey Legislature]] on April 8, 1839, from portions of [[Bloomfield, New Jersey|Bloomfield]]. Portions of the township were taken to create [[Woodside, New Jersey|Woodside Township]] (March 24, 1869, now defunct) and Franklin Township (February 18, 1874, now known as [[Nutley, New Jersey|Nutley]]). The independent municipality of Belleville city was created within the township on March 27, 1874, and was dissolved on February 22, 1876. On November 16, 1910, Belleville was reincorporated as a [[town (New Jersey)|town]], based on the results of a referendum held eight days earlier.<ref name=Story>''The Story of New Jersey's Civil Boundaries: 1606–1968'', John P. Snyder, Bureau of Geology and Topography; Trenton, New Jersey; 1969. p. 125.</ref>

In 1870, Belleville became the first city on the [[East Coast of the United States]] with a [[Chinatown]]. While much of the country (especially the Western states) had strong anti-Chinese sentiment, the town welcomed a group of Chinese workers from the West Coast who had been workers on building the [[Central Pacific Railroad]]. This group of people eventually formed the basis for Chinatowns in Newark and New York City.<ref>Xu, April. [http://opencitymag.aaww.org/the-first-chinatown-on-the-east-coast/ "The First Chinatown on the East Coast; Several Chinese workers who helped build the Central Pacific Railroad found refuge in Belleville, NJ."], [[Asian American Writers' Workshop]], April 7, 2017. Accessed May 8, 2017. "About 100 people watched as Perrone, the president of the Belleville Historical Society, led the ceremonial digging of the monument's foundation one rainy October morning in Belleville, New Jersey. The monument was meant to honor a group of Chinese who died around 150 years ago. They were Chinese workers who were among those who built the Central Pacific Railroad and came to live and work Belleville in 1870.... This Chinese community across the Hudson River was actually responsible for giving rise to the Newark (NJ) Chinatown and eventually, the Manhattan Chinatown — which later, successively, became the largest Chinese communities in the eastern United States."</ref>

In 1981, the town was one of seven Essex County municipalities to pass a referendum to become a township, joining four municipalities that had already made the change, of what would ultimately be more than a dozen Essex County municipalities to reclassify as townships in order take advantage of federal [[revenue sharing]] policies that allocated townships a greater share of government aid to municipalities on a per capita basis.<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20150925103452/http://www.njstatelib.org/slic_files/imported/NJ_Information/Digital_Collections/MFMG/MFMGCH6.PDF#page=3 "Chapter VI: Municipal Names and Municipal Classification"], p. 73. [[New Jersey State Commission on County and Municipal Government]], 1992. Accessed September 24, 2015.</ref><ref>[http://www.gao.gov/assets/140/137109.pdf#page=54 "Removing Tiering From The Revenue Sharing Formula Would Eliminate Payment Inequities To Local Governments"], [[Government Accountability Office]], April 15, 1982. Accessed September 24, 2015. "In 1978, South Orange Village was the first municipality to change its name to the 'township' of South Orange Village effective beginning in entitlement period 10 (October 1978 to September 1979). The Borough of Fairfield in 1978 changed its designation by a majority vote of the electorate and became the 'Township of Fairfield' effective beginning entitlement period 11 (October 1979 to September 1980).... However, the Revenue Sharing Act was not changed and the actions taken by South Orange and Fairfield prompted the Town of Montclair and West Orange to change their designation by referendum in the November 4, 1980, election. The municipalities of Belleville, Verona, Bloomfield, Nutley, Essex Fells, Caldwell, and West Caldwell have since changed their classification from municipality to a township."</ref><ref>Narvaez, Alfonso A. [https://www.nytimes.com/1981/12/27/nyregion/new-jersey-journal-147786.html "New Jersey Journal"], ''[[The New York Times]]'', December 27, 1981. Accessed September 24, 2015. "Under the Federal system, New Jersey's portion of the revenue sharing funds is disbursed among the 21 counties to create three 'money pools.' One is for county governments, one for 'places' and a third for townships. By making the change, a community can use the 'township advantage' to get away from the category containing areas with low per capita incomes."</ref><ref>[[Alan Karcher|Karcher, Alan J.]] [https://books.google.com/books?id=o0BmBWloogcC#page=119 ''New Jersey's Multiple Municipal Madness''], pp. 119–120. [[Rutgers University Press]], 1998. {{ISBN|9780813525662}}. Accessed September 24, 2015.</ref>

[[Frankie Valli]] and the band [[The Four Seasons (band)|The Four Seasons]] formed in Belleville,<ref>[[Mark Rotella|Rotella, Mark]]. [https://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/02/nyregion/nyregionspecial2/02njBOYS.html "Straight Out of Newark"], ''[[The New York Times]]'', October 2, 2005. Accessed March 3, 2012. "You remember the Four Seasons, right? Their sound, the wail of Frankie Valli – "She-e-e-e-e-e-ry baby" – layered over solid three-part harmonies, was the music of the streets of urban New Jersey and New York. It was the sound of the projects of Newark and the poor Italian neighborhoods of Belleville... Sitting in the Waldorf-Astoria in a polo shirt and leather loafers, he was describing his neighborhood in Belleville in the 1950s when he, his brother Nick, and a friend named Nick Massi first formed the Variety Trio, then the Varietones."</ref> as did [[The Delicates]], the late-1950s and early-1960s girl group made up of Denise Ferri, Arleen Lanzotti and [[Peggy Santiglia]].<ref>Clemente, John. [https://books.google.com/books?id=Yd8TAQAAIAAJ&q=delicates+belleville ''Girl Groups: Fabulous Females that Rocked the world''], p. 13. [[Krause Publications]], 2000. Accessed June 28, 2022. "The belles from Belleville, The Delicates, 1959, (L-R) Arlene Lanzotti, Peggy Santiglia, Denise Ferri."</ref>

In 1994, Congress passed a resolution recognizing Belleville as the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution in the United States.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9vIXn1bkUWQC&dq=Belleville+reform+candidate+new+jersey&pg=PA373|title = Legislative Calendar|year = 1994}}</ref>