(upbeat music) - Hi, I am Jacqui Tricarico, Senior Correspondent for "One-on-One."

And joining us now to talk about what's happening here in New Jersey to celebrate America's 250th anniversary is Mark Texel.

He is the historic sites administrator at the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protections.

So great to have you with us, Mark.

- Great to be here.

Thanks for having me, Jacqui.

- Thank you.

I wanna talk about New Jersey being known as the crossroads of the American Revolution because we're uniquely situated between New York and Philadelphia and the historical sites here in the state really go across the whole state.

Why has it been so important for the state of New Jersey to invest in these historical sites, particularly this year as we celebrate the country's semi-quincentennial?

- Excellent question, Jacqui.

The crossroads of the American Revolution is what New Jersey is known for.

We want that message to be broadcast loud and clear across our state and across the world this year.

Why is it the crossroads?

Because more Revolutionary War engagements happen within New Jersey.

It was involved in all eight years of the conflict, from 1775 to 1783.

And we think this is the perfect opportunity to position New Jersey in a way that wasn't positioned 50 years ago in the bicentennial to let the world know just how important this state was to winning independence for the New Republic.

- Let's talk about some of those locations.

I live in Lawrenceville, so I'm pretty centrally located by some of those historical sites like the Princeton Battlegrounds, which I've brought my kids to and Trenton, but there's so many people here in New Jersey and around the area that don't even know about these sites.

Why has it been important for you and the folks in your department to boost tourism right now around those sites, and how are you doing that?

- Yeah, especially given the fact that we have events happening in New Jersey.

We're already doing living history events, things that took place 250 years ago.

We're bringing those stories to life in South Jersey and throughout the summertime.

And as we get closer to when the British Army invaded New Jersey, we started having things happen in Bergen County in November, and the retreat across New Jersey leading to the evacuation of Trenton, and, of course, the epic crossing of Washington's army on December 25th and 26th, 1776.

And the turn of the entire war that happened with winning the battles of Trenton, one and two and the battles of Princeton on January 3rd, 1777, which was part of what we call the day of the 10 crucial days, really took what was a failing revolt, you might say, against British monarchy, and gave this colonist hope that we could probably win our independence.

And within six months of those events, the British Army retreated almost entirely from New Jersey back into New York state.

So we wanna tell people why the state of New Jersey has a lot to be proud of in winning independence and in coming together in ways that we didn't know about and really didn't celebrate 50 years ago.

We have stories that tell a much more inclusive, diverse narrative of the people living in the state.

Not just the military leaders, but the civilians, the women, people of color, Indigenous peoples.

It was a very complicated and rich story that we're gonna bring to life this year and next year.

And our state historic sites really tell a broad spectrum of these stories.

And we're so excited because we've had the chance to use funding from the federal government, from state taxpayers, from our nonprofit partners to make the stories come to life and to make our sites more accessible than they've really ever been.

So for us, it's a once in a generation opportunity for New Jersey State historic sites, as well as all of New Jersey's state historic sites at the county level, city level, nonprofits, and there's hundreds of these sites to join together in a great commemoration and celebration of our founding as a country.

- Let's talk about ways that people can get that information, absorb that information.

It's definitely located centrally at a lot of these sites that you're talking about, but we know everybody's grabbing their phones to get information.

And if they stumble upon one of these really historical sites or they're going to visit it, I know there's something called Celebrate 250 Challenge and that's paired up with the Liberty Trail New Jersey app.

Talk about those two things, how they're coming together and how it's a really unique and important way people can get the information they're looking for.

- Yeah.

Celebrate 250, the Challenge app on our website, you can sign up to take that challenge.

And it's partly to give awareness to health and fitness and connecting to the history and the 250th.

You can take a challenge for 25 miles a week, 25 miles a month, 150 miles a year.

Great way to learn about our state parks and our state historic sites.

And that's one of several things that we're doing this year to bring not just the history to life, but also our parks role.

And we have a wonderful coloring book with all of our state historic sites in them that will be free and available to people visiting our parks.

We also have later this summer a passport, really cool passport that'll be available at all of our state parks and historic sites that the public can get as well.

And those are just a couple examples of things that we are doing in addition to these history-based events.

And we also are strong partners of Revolution New Jersey, which is the public private-partnership as well, so.

- Yeah, a lot of ways for people to get involved, get that information at their fingertips and like you said, a little exercise along the way while you're learning really important things about the state and these historical sites.

Finally, Mark, tell us a little bit about the Washington Crossing Museum and Visitor Center.

It's brand new and Washington Crossing, for people who don't know, it's partially in New Jersey, partially in Pennsylvania.

What can people expect to do and see when they go to that new museum and Visitor Center?

- This is an incredibly new experience center that we have been designing for almost 10 years.

And it replaces the Visitor Center that was built for the bicentennial in 1976, and this new museum and experience of Visitor Center is a one of a kind attraction for, it's really the gift to New Jersey, and to the world, looking to open it, possibly a sneak peek around the July 4th period when there'll be fireworks and programming happening at our park, Washington Crossing State Park, as well as Pennsylvania's State Park.

As you mentioned, Jacqui, this is a national historic landmark that spans one river in two states, making it very unique.

But this building is beautiful.

It blends into the landscape.

It has things like the first green roof of any of our Visitor Centers in New Jersey, a multipurpose theater that can accommodate over 100 people, immersive exhibits and kind of a four dimensional experience where you go into a room and it's a simulated crossing on a ferry boat as if you're taking back the evening of December 25th.

And one of the things in this new Visitor Center Museum is a recently rediscovered and restored 10-by-15 foot oil painting of Washington Crossing that was painted by a famous New Jersey artist in 1921 named George Harding, which once hung in the Taylor Opera House in Trenton.

And when that building was demolished, painting was saved and put away, and then we rediscovered it.

And it's an incredible work that will be hanging right in the changing gallery space when you come into the new building.

We can't wait.

- It sounds incredible.

Yeah.

I can't wait to visit it with my kids and check it out soon.

Thank you so much, Mark, for coming on and letting us know a little bit more about what we can expect in the next coming months while we celebrate America's 250.

Thank you so much.

- You're very welcome, Jacqui.

Can't wait to see you all out, have a visit.

- Appreciate it, for Steve Adubato and myself, thanks for watching.

We'll see you next time.

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