Rail Carts going to get filled.	Excavator	Filling carts with clay.
Machine forms clay into bricks.	Workers moving bricks.	Worker passes a kiln oven.
Kilns are large & domed shaped.	Truck tilts to pick up bricks.	All photos are of Graham Brickyard.

Below is some Deed Histories of the Brickyard lands. Most town's people, even if they are too young of age to remember the Graham Brickyard which operated until 1956 when the clay supply was exhausted, know of the "Clay Pits" along the rail road tracks East of North Pine Ave.

The brick home that you see on the North side of Main Street as you come up "Brick Yard Hill" as some have called it in a past generation into Maple Shade Township from Moorestown is another historic reminder. This was a once a double house where John and son Robert Muffett lived. This yard was sold to Augustus Reeve and known as the Maple Shade Brickworks. Another product beside bricks was terra cotta sewer pipes and other terra cotta products.

Theodore Sauselein Sr. purchased land on both sides of the railroad east of Pine Ave. He built a home and a slaughter house near the railroad. He later established the Sauselein Brick Yard, which was north of the rail road tracks. (Information is from "Maple Shade A Story of 300 Years.") His sons also built brick houses at 31 and 39 North Pine Ave. (Then Sauselein Lane). The photo to the top left is of one of the son's houses. Theodore Cash Sauselein finished his. George Sauselein never finished his front porch or steps so that the Tax Assessor could not assess it a completed house. (Thats what is written on the back of the photo.) Thats either a joke or a shortlived truth because in the bottom photo are the two brother's houses with the front porches completed on both. These brick homes are no longer there. You can see Holly Ave. homes in the background.

The Depression ended the front brickyard land but the northern back brickyard land under Graham operated until 1956.
We will first list the back, and then list the front brickyard chain of titles.

Over the period of time the brickyards of Maple Shade were used, technology changed from primitive methods of stirring the water and clay mixture probably by horses walking in a circle turning the stirrer, and hand digging of the clay and hand packing it into wooden forms to later using a excavator to dig the earth and mechanical formers to cut the clay into bricks, etc... Today, technology has changed to where much of the Graham Brickyard's operations would prove outdated.

The brickyard land North of the railroad is today an industrial complex. Some of the brickyards land was taken away for the making of S-41, now Route 73. I seen an old tax map that showed an old branch of the Pennsauken creek that had been filled in or changed to straighten it. A portion of the "Clay Pits" remain undeveloped today, as upland marsh land, East of N. Pine Ave. and the Railroad tracks.

During the digging of deep clay pits various small fossils were uncovered and the Philadelphia Natural Academy of Science made field trips to the site.

Church Brick Co.-

Thomas J. Church, LeRoy Church, Sr., and a few minor investors founded the Church Brick Company in 1916 and incorporated in the State of New Jersey in 1918. The first two brick plants were located in Fieldsboro, NJ and in the 1920's a third brick plant was purchased in Maple Shade, NJ. With the onset of the depression and having over three hundred employees on payroll, the company was forced to close one plant in Fieldsboro and the Maple Shade plant.

Church Brick Company's Short Time Leasing from John S.E. pardee

The Back Brickyard, Lasted Until 1956-

The Sauselein/ William Graham Brickyard was north of the railroad.
In this 1944 Sanborn map it has round drying kilns made of brick.

?

William Graham Brick Manufacturing Co.

Sauselein Brick Yard

From a 1877 GM Hopkins map-

The above mentioned 47 acres would be the tract on map owned by Joseph Walton.

A County Plan Map showing the Proposed S-41 Highway going under the R.R.-


Besides the Depression, S-41, now Rt. 73, didn't help the brickyards!

The Front Brickyard, The Depression Ended It-

Ausustus Reeve/ John Pardee Brickyard in 1923 The Moorestown Pub was a Public Service bus station.

John Pardee's Maple Shade Brick Co. yard in 1929. North Boulevard Ave. with subdivision.

John S.E. Pardee Brick Company

(Take notice that the Maple Heights housing development begins with Boulevard Ave. BECAUSE the land to the east was once brickyard clay pits. The Maple Heights Land Co. took title on March 25, 1908, under deed book 430 page 266, sold by John R. Mason and Margaret his wife, who took title on March 25, 1867, under deed book P7 page 36, sold by Joseph W. Lippincott.)

The below photo and quoted information is from the book- The Clays and Clay Industry of New Jersey by Heinrich Ries and Henry B. Kummel, 1904 (Note the horse or mule pulling the clay cart on small gauge r.r. tracks)

Maple Shade- The same Clay Marl formation is worked by T. Sauselein, at Maple Shade (Loc. 150), on the north side of the railroad tracks. Here the beds are mostly weathered, but burn to a hard, red brick, and make a good product on stiff-mud machines. On the south side of the railroad, and just south of the trolley road from Merchantville to Moorestown is A. Reeve's brick-clay pit (Loc. 149 Pl. XLI, Fig.1), but here the clay dug is at the line of contact between Clay Marl 1, and Clay Marl 2, both being used. The section exposed in 1902 was about thirty feet high and showed the following layers at the top: Section in A. Reeve's clay pit, Maple Shade. No. 1 Loamy gravel 2 ft. (Start of Clay Marl 2-) No. 2 Weathered clay, 8 ft. No. 3 Black clay, 6 ft. (Start of Clay Marl 1-) No. 4 Greensand and clay, 6 ft. No. 5 Black clay, 5 ft.

An ad from a 1907 Moorestown Chronicle Directory-

Augustus Reeve Brick Yard (Maple Shade Brickworks)

John Muffett & Son Brick and Tile Yard

The John and Robert Muffett Brick and Tile Yard house in 2006.

The Muffett's house was built about 1858 and the brickyard was in operation by 1860 with John and Robert Muffett working at it. In 1863, The Muffetts bought title to it.

John and his son Robert Muffett's brick house on East Main Street is still there today. It was once a double house. The brick yard area can be found on the map of Chester in J.D. Scott's 1876 Illustrated Atlas of Burlington County and G.M. Hopkins 1877 Cinnaminson and Part of Chester area maps. The story according to the book "Maple Shade A Story of 300 Years" is that Joseph Walton made the brick house for Muffetts the foremans of his brickyard. It is probable that Thomas Lippincott might have.

The Muffett Brickyard was part of the original John Robert's land. (Some might have been Clark's which was very early purchased by the Roberts). Descendant William Roberts had a daughter, Hephzibah Roberts Lippincott, and a son John G. Roberts. The Lippincott couple bought the land from her brother lying on both sides of the Moorestown Camden Turnpike. She and husband Joseph B. Lippincott had several children. One was Joseph W. who farmed the Mason farm- Maple Heights land. One was Thomas who moved to Philadelphia and was a brickmaker. A daughter was Lydia who married Joseph Walton a cabinet maker.

Joseph and heiress Lydia L. Walton sold the land to John and Robert Muffett who it seemed lived there managing the brickyard years prior to buying it for themselves. The 1860 Chester census would indicate this as "John and Robert Moffett" are listed. Waltons are not, not even in a later Chester 1873 tax assessor's book of the Chesterford school district No. 27 tax area. There is on a GM Hopkins 1877 map two houses on Walton's land which doesn't include at the time the land of the "Moffett Tile Yard" with its house. It is unknown if Joseph Walton actually lived there.

In "Moorestown and Her Neighbors" by James C. Purdy it has a mention of the "John Muffit & Son Brick & Tile Yard." In George DeCou's 1929 book "Moorestown and Her Neighbors" we have this mention-
I regret that I cannot state definitely when the first brick yard was established near Moorestown. The present yards at Maple Shade, owned by the William Graham Brick Manufacturing Company, were conducted by John Moffit and Son in the 1880’s. They were undoubtedly established at a much earlier date. Shark’s teeth and sea fossils of various kinds are still dug up in the clay pits showing that this section was under water in pre-historic times.

Maple Shade's First Known Brickmaker was Thomas Lippincott.

Thomas Lippincott grew up on the original Roberts land and left to live in Philadelphia. He probably learned brickmaking right on the property. Several nearby homes such as the Jeremiah Matlack home and later ones from his time probably got their bricks from along the creek there. His brother, Joseph W., inherited the "Mason Farm" land, and a sister and her husband the brickyard land(s), as he moved.

Joseph Walton-

In the above deeds, Joseph Walton's trade is listed as a cabinet maker. Some other findings seem to indicate that he was the editor of "The Friend" for the Arch Street Meeting House in Philadephia.

Perhaps one would assume that the Lippincott family got Joseph Walton somehow involved into brickmaking. It is more probable that he got one of them, Joseph W. Lippincott into cabinet making!

Advertisements found in The New Jersey Mirror newspaper on microfilm.

From a Sept 9, 1897 Trenton newspaper-

In other references the below date of death of Joseph Walton aligns him with being the Editor of the Orthodox Quaker periodical "The Friend" published for the Philadelphia Arch Street Meeting House. MOORESTOWN FRIENDS CEMETERY MAIN STREET MOORESTOWN, NJ WALTON 419. Joseph Walton Born 8th Mo. 4th 1817 Died 2nd Mo. 10th 1898 420. Lydia L. Walton Born 12th Mo. 17th 1811 Died 1st Mo. 24th 1901 421. Mary A. Walton Died 2nd Mo. 10 1879 Aged 82 Years & 5 Mo's 422. William Walton Born 12 Mo. 18, 1797 Died 9 Mo. 27, 1883

Here is two good reads for you, and downloads for your "PDF Library."

Interview with Horace J. Shiplee

More information from Mrs. Shiplee on Sept. 18, 2004-

From Mrs. Shiplee- The white bricks were patio bricks and only 1/2 the thickness of the red ones. The Elite Bakery Building at Main Street and N. Pine was never connected with the brickyard. She lived on Sauselein Lane, now N. Pine Ave., as a girl in 1923. Trucks came down there alot and crossed the railroad tracks to go to the brickyard. (can't do that now). As you come down from Main Street right about at the rear of the parking lot of the present Maple Hill Restaurant were the two Sauselein brothers brick houses on the right. Past that was a double frame house where she lived until her father built a house in Pennsauken where they moved to.

In 1923 the Graham brickyard was on fire. (Wooden kilns were probably still used then.) Her mother fried an egg and put it in bread and made her a sandwich to take outside and eat and watch the fire. Years later there was a second fire at the Graham brickyard. Mr.and Mrs. Shiplee moved to Maple Shade in 1941, but as you can see both had earlier ties to the town in that Mr. Shiplee had worked at Graham Brickyard and Mrs. Shiplee lived on Sauselein Lane as a girl.