As many in town know the Elizabteh V. Edwards school has been in the news and there has been much activity regarding it lately. Sadly that has not been the case for sometime.
What many, including me, didn't know was some of the facts regarding the person the school was named after. As it turns out she was never the principal of the school named after her. She was a teacher in Barnegat around the turn of the 20th century (sometime bet 1900-1930). She started in the one room school house that had been located on Birdsall Street. That area is not a vacant lot across from the Engine 11 Barnegat Fire House. She later taught and was the principal of the Barnegat Elementary school that once also stood on Birdsall street where Engine 11 stands today. That school was demolished in the late 1950's after the old Barnegat High School was turned into an elementary school. A panel was formed and it was decided that the school should bear the name of Elizabeth V. Edwards. That would have happened sometime after 1958.
In her honor a painting was done by a local artist named C. Schulz. It was done from a very early photograph of Lizzie taken around the turn of the century. After the school was no longer used in the early 2000's it was feared that the painting may have been lost in transition. I am glad to report it is not and was being safely kept by the town historian Mary Kathrine Kennedy. We revealed it at the 10/12 even at Barnegat High and it is going to be placed on display in the district.
It appears that Elizabeth V. Edwards lived to the ripe old age of 91 and she passed in 1965. After researching a bit I learned that she is at rest in the Barnegat Masonic Cemetery located between Burr Street and West Bay Ave.
It is always good to have a little history to go along with the legend.
