Island Heights, NJ

Van Gogh painted a fruit salad still life -so vivid and alive – that he gave spoons to his contemporaries and offered them a taste.  They instead brandished forks and devoured his ear! – Mazelblatt Von Kaiserstein -1801

This website does not paint a still life, but instead – it paints living lives.  It reveals the history of Island Heights New Jersey as experienced by my ancestors and captured in the diaries of my Grandpapa Kaiser.  Those diaries tattle on the recorded history of this unassuming little town.  They reveal a twisted, hidden history that would have remained buried if I didn’t dig up that large cast iron box from the dirt floor cellar of my Victorian estate.

 As an Historian, I’m obligated by oath to present historical findings based on fact.  That’s critical, because speculations misinform and imagination corrupts. Many of my lazy historian contemporaries use popular “Ancestry” and “Root” websites to satisfy their research agendas.  That   hodgepodge-collage of misinformation works for them, but not for me.  Instead, I rely on the writings and stories handed down from my ancestors who drifted here along with Island Heights’ first human settlers:  The Hickatuck Indians.

Strangely, there’s been no attempt by the NJ State Historical Society to accept my ancestors’ existence.  They’ve made zero efforts to consider my family’s rich history and they stand bold behind their sparse collection of “official” documents and “authentic” artifacts that they claim represent the true history of this jersey shore town.

Thus my website.

In time, I plan to add more history based on my Grandpapa Kaiser’s writings and will include exclusive audio interviews with him and other family members.  I also plan to integrate authentic artifacts that I keep in my museum in Des Plaines Illinois – where I act as honorable curator.

Explore the above links.  The News and Events page keeps up with what’s current and the Treasures By the Sea page devotes space for the modern decedents of the Hickatuck Indian Tribe to market their wares.  From time to time, I offer items of interest from my private museums – so keep an eye out for eccentric curiosities.

I’m proud of the little town where my ancestor’s lived.  They weren’t perfect people – but I aim to show that they lived, loved, joked and even murdered – with determined hearts. 

Let this website pay fine tribute to them and reflect fond sentiments upon their living lives.

– Count Von Kaiserstein – 2011

 This rare Joyce Von Kaiserstein burnt pine charcoal sketch is featured on our Treasures page.  Click photo.