Bergen County Courthouse

Did you know:  The Bergen County Courthouse is located at the intersection of Main and Essex Streets. What most don’t realize, is that this location is actually the SIXTH courthouse for the county of Bergen.   Bergen became a county in in 1683. – that’s right 1683 . The City of Hackensack  (means “mouth of a river”) became the county seat in around 1710. Five years later the first courthouse, which also served as a jail, was built  three blocks from its current location. The second courthouse near the current courthouse green was burned to the ground by the British Army during the Revolutionary War in 1780.

A log building temporarily served as the third  courthouse but was relocated to Oakland and then to HoHoKus at the John Hopper house. After the Revolutionary War, it was again relocated to the home of Archibald Campbell in Hackensack. In 1786, a Freeholder, John Zabriskie, donated land near his mansion in Hackensack. In 1822, a new courthouse was constructed at the current site and used for almost 90 years. Finally, in 1910, construction began on the current Courthouse  which was of “American Renaissance” design and became a National Registered Historic  Site in 1982.