The community was previously known as 'Raritan Township', not to be confused with the current-day Raritan Township in Hunterdon County. The Laing House of Plainfield Plantation (listed on the National Register in 1988), the Benjamin Shotwell House (listed 1987) and the Homestead Farm at Oak Ridge (liste 1995), are buildings from the colonial era included in National Register of Historic Places listings in Middlesex County. James Church and the Piscatawaytown Common, near the intersection of Plainfield and Woodbridge Avenues in South Edison. The earliest village was Piscatawaytown, which is centered around St. Įdison Township, comprising former sections of Piscataway and Woodbridge townships, was settled (by Europeans) in the 17th century. In 1646, Chief Matouchin led a group of 1,200 warriors. The earliest residents of the area were the Raritan people of the Lenape Native Americans, who lived in the area and travelled through it to the shore.

History Early history Stelton Baptist Church and Cemetery, the second oldest Baptist Church in New Jersey and the tenth oldest in the United States. The name was officially changed to Edison Township on November 10, 1954, in honor of inventor Thomas Edison, who had his main laboratory in the Menlo Park section of the township.

Portions of the township were taken to form Metuchen on March 20, 1900, and Highland Park on March 15, 1905. The township got its original name from the Raritan indigenous people. What is now Edison Township was originally incorporated as Raritan Township by an act of the New Jersey Legislature on March 17, 1870, from portions of both Piscataway Township and Woodbridge Township. As of the 2020 United States census, the township was the state's sixth-most-populous municipality, with a population of 107,588, an increase of 7,621 (+7.6%) from the 2010 census count of 99,967, which in turn reflected an increase of 2,280 (+2.3%) from the 97,687 counted in the 2000 census. Situated in Central New Jersey within the core of the state's Raritan Valley region, Edison is a commercial hub (home to Menlo Park Mall and Little India) and is a bedroom community of New York City within the New York metropolitan area.

Edison township municipal