MONTVALE—Around 1910, Garret Hering’s saw mill was on Grand Avenue across from where the Montvale Post Office now stands. In the autumn, beginning at the turn of the century, the building was also a cider mill.
The story of this mill is inextricably linked with that of the Octagon House that still sits a short distance away. The Octagon House was built by John Blauvelt upon land he had inherited in 1832. That land also included a saw mill and a mill pond from which ice was harvested during the winter and sold in the summer.
In 1857, Blauvelt’s daughter, Jane Amelia, married Garret Hering, 22. After Blauvelt’s death in 1882, Hering, Jane, and their three children moved into the Octagon House and Garret continued the operation of the saw mill and ice harvesting businesses.
Hering was a strong voice in petitioning for the creation of the Borough of Montvale in 1894. That same year, he was the first freeholder to represent Montvale in the County Seat at Hackensack. He was also the borough’s third mayor from 1898-1901, a station agent for the railroad, a justice of the peace, and Montvale’s postmaster.
In the 1923 “History of Bergen County,” author Frances A. Westervelt wrote that Hering’s mill was famous throughout the county for producing the purest apple cider.
Kristin Beuscher, a former editor of Pascack Press, is president of Pascack Historical Society in Park Ridge and edits its quarterly members’ newsletter, Relics.