Middletown Township, New Jersey
township in Monmouth County, New Jersey, United States
Middletown Township is a township in northern Monmouth County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. As of the 2020 United States census, the township was the state's 20th-most-populous municipality and the largest in the county, with a population of 67,106, an increase of 584 (+0.9%) from the 2010 census count of 66,522, which in turn reflected an increase of 195 residents (0.3%) from its population of 66,327 at the 2000 census, when it was the state's 17th-most-populous municipality.
Middletown is a bedroom community of New York City, located alongside of the Raritan Bay within the Raritan Valley Region in the New York area. Due to its affluence, low crime, access to cultural activities, public school system, location at the Jersey Shore and Raritan Bayshore, and central commuting location, Middletown was ranked in 2006, 2008, 2010, and 2014 in the Top 100 in CNNMoney.com's Best Places to Live. Time magazine listed Middletown on its list of "Best Places to Live 2014".
In 2016, SafeWise named Middletown Township as the fifth-safest city in America to raise a child; the township was the highest ranked of the 12 communities in New Jersey included on the list.
History
Small communities of the Lenape Navesink tribe were common throughout the area when the first known European landing in what would become Middletown Township occurred in 1609. Sea captain and explorer Henry Hudson, in search of the mythical Northwest Passage in the service of the Dutch West India Company, anchored along the shores of Sandy Hook Bay in 1609, describing the area "a very good land to fall in with and a pleasant land to see." While a patroonship was granted by the company in 1651 the land wasn't officially settled. Today's Shoal Harbor Museum and Old Spy House includes portions of a house constructed by Thomas Whitlock, one of the area's first European settlers (and a Reformed Baptist at Middletown) who arrived here as early as 1664, around the time of the English takeover of New Netherland as a prelude of the Second Anglo-Dutch War. Long-standing tradition had Penelope Stout, one of the first settlers, hiding in a tree from hostile Native Americans.
“Middletown Township, New Jersey” enters the record as township in Monmouth County, New Jersey, United States. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Middletown, Township and Jersey can confirm, complicate or overturn.
Why this record matters
“Middletown Township, New Jersey” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Middletown, Township and Jersey provides the most credible route into that argument.
Place names and jurisdictional language are key evidence: both can reveal earlier catalogue descriptions and overlooked record series. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 1, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q735215. VIAF identifies the subject as 150110798. The Library of Congress control number is n81124848. Authority coordinates are 40.407, -74.071. 3 of 5 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2020, 2010, 2000 and 2006.
Modern boundaries and familiar names can conceal earlier jurisdictions or structures that do not align with the present site. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “Middletown Township, New Jersey” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.