South Jersey Gas, Electric and Traction Company Office Building

Where the SJGET building now stands was once the location of Camden's City Hall, built in 1829. That building also served as the Camden County Courthouse for almost a decade, after the county was formed in 1844. A public stall market was the next building here, added in 1878; it burned to the ground in 1900. The lot was purchased by SJGET in September 1900. Thomas Stephen was the architect who planned the structure to be built for the firm on the site. Stephen trained in his native town of Philadelphia and spent two years studying architecture in Rome and Paris. Stephen also designs included the East Camden Free Library building, the Keystone Leather Company plant, and our Lady of Mount Carmel Roman Catholic Church. The contractor chosen for the SJGET project was J.S. Rogers Company from neighboring Burlington County.

SJGET was formed as a public utility in 1900 from the merger of a number of small companies that offered closed gas and electric distribution lines. After the gas lines were linked, the small individual gas generating plants were decommissioned and all gas generation was moved to the Camden plant. The company opened a new coke facility on the last day of 1902, containing 100 Otto-Hoffmann coke ovens, to supply coke to the Lowe water-gas apparatus at the gas works. The gas plant, in South Camden at 2nd and Cherry Streets, was built in 1852 when the Camden Gas Light Company first began operations.

The "traction" part of the company name refers to the trolley line that SJGET bought. The trolley line was the Camden, Gloucester, & Woodbury Railway and ran from the ferry at Kaighn's Point in Camden to National Park via Gloucester, Woodbury, and Mantua. The trolley line was a relatively recent addition to local transport and was begun in 1893. In 1903, SJGET became a subsidiary of a newly-chartered organization, the Public Service Corporation of New Jersey (PSC). Although SJGET continued to act as a separate business entity, the company leased all their lines to PSC in 1903. PSC offices were established in the SJGET building at 418 Federal St. in 1903; also in that year, an addition was supposedly made to the building's rear; however, the addition is missing from the 1906 Sanborn map so may be a later date (or was missed or still being built). In 1904, the Camden & Suburban Railway leased its equipment and 84 miles of track radiating from Camden to SJGET.

By 1929, PSC was running out of space for its corporate, sales, customer service and operational offices; it once again added onto the rear of the 418 Federal St. building. A local woman recalled attending cooking classes there in the 1940s offered to new brides to learn how to use gas stoves. She also took classes there on wiring electric lamps. Economics caused the halt of the manufacture of gas in the Camden coke plant in 1959, after cheaper sources of natural gas were found in the Gulf of Mexico. In the mid-1960s, PSC closed down the remainder of the Camden gasworks and demolished most of the buildings. White horizontal tanks were installed to hold natural gas. Eventually, PSC got out of the public transport business, selling out to New Jersey Transit in 1980. From 1982 to 1983, PSC closed down its offices at 418 Federal St.

The City of Camden bought the Federal St. building in 1983 for $100,000. The city spent one million dollars to rehabilitate the building.to become the new location of the Camden Free Library. Matching funds came from the State Library. The new main public library opened in February 1987, using recycled shelving and books from the dilapidated former library at Broadway and Line St. (an abandoned building; also a Clio entry). The library lasted in this location until 2011 when it closed; the city is now part of the county library system. The 418 Federal St. building is currently vacant, and represents one of the last Beaux Arts commercial buildings still standing in Camden. Currently available for lease are its 28,000 square feet of office/retail space.

Boyer, Charles S. The Span of a Century: A Chronological History of the City of Camden, 1828-1928. Camden, NJ. Centennial Anniversary Committee of Camden, N.J., c1928.

LoopNet. 418 Federal St, Camden, NJ 08103, Office/Retail for Lease, LoopNet. January 1st 2021. Accessed January 11th 2021. https://www.loopnet.com/Listing/418-Federal-St-Camden-NJ/18726898/.

Sanborn Map Company. Insurance Maps of Camden, Camden County, N.J. Sanborn Map and Publishing Company Limited, NY. 1885.

Sanborn Map Company. Insurance Maps of Camden, Camden County, N.J. Vol. I. Sanborn Map Company, New York, NY. 1906.

Schopp, Paul W. NRHP Nomination of South Jersey Gas, Electric, and Traction Building, Camden, N.J.. National Register. Washington, DC. National Park Service, 2004.