The World's Tallest Water Sphere

As many readers of this site are aware, the World’s Tallest Water Sphere connects us through time and space.

We are all connected to its past, evidenced in our relationships to the histories of the WTWS shared earlier on this site. We are also connected to its future, envisioning what will be, and molding and shaping what is to come under the influence of this mighty tower.

Similarly in place we are all connected. Those of us lucky enough to see the WTWS in person, have stood on its site, and become connected with each other and our ancestors through its presence. Those of us who have not yet visited the WTWS may do so one day, and become connected with those who have gone before.

Those of us browsing this site through the internet too are connected in a seemingly boring existence, rescued through the excitement and hopeful potential of the life under the World’s Tallest Water Sphere.

We have covered Life Before the Water Sphere – 1951, and now it is time to go way back to life in Union Township, circa 1880, before the Union Flagship, before Springfield’s Playland Park, before the World’s Tallest Water Sphere.

From the map, circa 1880, courtesy of the New Jersey Division of Public Records, you can see many of the same streets and features that exist in Union Township today.

The east-west line of Morris Avenue bisects the town. Stuyvesant Avenue and Vauxhall Road stretch out from the center and to the north. Chestnut Street and Salem Road cross at Five Points in the south.

Hard to believe, but Route 22 does not exist in 1880. How did they ever purchase their cell phones and flat panel digital TVs back then? Rather, Chestnut Avenue curves westward and merges with what eventually becomes Route 22. A D.W. Sayer lives near the Best Buy near Springfield Avenue. And K.F. Hantes sold his Route 22/Michigan Avenue spread to make way for the McDonald’s.

Serendipitously, some of the Union landmarks that exist today link us to the past. The Connecticut Farms Church is clearly marked, as is the Connecticut Farms Elementary School labeled “School No. 27.” The loop of Spruce Street junctions with Liberty Avenue and heads towards Springfield and the Rahway River. Caldwell Avenue shows the old Parsonage. Elmwood Avenue appears to be the home of J. Burnett, a relative of David G. Burnet (first governor of Texas)?

In the center of the map is the Union Branch of the Elizabeth River. This is the current home of the World’s Tallest Water Sphere. Curiously, the stream is labeled in pencil “Hammock Brook.” Nearby the current site of the WTWS is a Cider Mill, and downstream lies an Ice House. Follow the Hammock Brook upstream, and you see the it snakes through Kenilworth, under Chestnut Street and back toward Rahway and Morris Avenue, to its source under the current Jaeger Lumber store.

Reader Nina Dennis submits this beautiful view of Union’s wonder of the world from her neighborhood.

Nina says, “I thought I would send you photos of the World’s Tallest Watersphere as seen from my house. I can see it clearly from my sunporch in the winter when the leaves are off the trees.”

It’s a gorgeous view, lovely houses, and a comforting thought to live on a street over watched by the World’s Tallest Water Sphere.

The Star Ledger has another fine newspaper article on the World’s Tallest Water Sphere by Kelly Heyboer in her Jersey Blogs column. She interviews site owner and museum curator Dan Becker on the philosophical meaning of the WTWS, it’s role in society, and the incredible tallness of being. Click on the blog header to read the article.

There is also a wonderful photo by Jennifer Brown of The Star Ledger of the WTWS circa 2003. It has a great view of the now-defunct “World’s Tallest Watersphere” billboard from now-defunct Elizabethtown Water Company.

Where were you before the World’s Tallest Water Sphere existed? Since Union’s water tower was built in 1964, you would have to be at least 45 years old in the year 2009 to qualify.

The map circa 1951 shown above (courtesy the New Jersey Division of Public Records) reveals all sorts of interesting facts about Union township. (Click on the image for more details.)

First of all, the World’s Tallest Water Sphere did not exist. In fact the land that hosts the WTWS today, shows up on the map as “Sayre Park.” If you visually cross Morris Avenue, there is also park land. Today it hosts a Lowe’s home improvement store. Older readers might remember this as the site of “Two Guys” department store.

Route 22 with its islands and multiple U-turns is quite visible crossing the middle of the map. A dotted line through Kenilworth, Union, and northward through Irvington suggests the future site of the Garden State Parkway. Interstate Route 78 does not exist.

The familiar arteries of Chestnut Street, Stuyvesant Avenue, Morris Avenue, Vauxhall Road, and Salem Road are present. Five Points down south looks to be the ever present mess it is today. Notice Burnett spelled with two Ts. Vaux Hall spelled as two words.

The western most part of Union is filled with interesting historical bits. The Rahway River and the familiar bend of Liberty Avenue/Springfield Avenue lead to Route 22, but there is no Battle Hill School, no Rahway Avenue, no Hickory Road, no Pinewood Road. The many houses are preceded by the Battle Hill Golf Club. Imagine that, golf in west Union!

If you lived in Union before 1964, why not write this web site and tell us what life in old Union was like.

Today the Star Ledger Live reporter Brian Donohue covers the World’s Tallest Water Sphere, this web site, and the WTWS Museum:

Ledger Live: The World’s Tallest Water Sphere

Click to  watch Ledger Live episode on YouTube

The attached photo of the World’s Tallest Water Sphere was submitted by Gina (Signorella) Arlen, self-described WTWS groupie, formerly of Roselle Park. This is a very recent photo because the World’s Tallest Water Sphere now sports a flashing red beacon which makes it taller than last year’s World’s Tallest Water Sphere.

I like the angle of the WTWS in this photo. Obviously the tower has had a bit too much to drink there. The sunglasses must hide some other secrets. The new beacon is very becoming of the inebriated tower. Also I like the sun halo effect. It is the halo effect you see when you have a near death experience, and you wake up, and this is the first thing you see.

If you have photos or other artistic journeys involving the World’s Tallest Water Sphere, please send them in, and we will publish them as soon as possible. Also please let us know a little bit about the author and any experiences or connecting experiences you have to the WTWS. Thanks Gina!

Happy New Year for 2009! Featured at right is another wiggles animation of the World’s Tallest Water Sphere. (To see animation, your browser must support GIF file format and allow images to animate. For some browsers this is a configuration option.) The photo was taken on 2008-12-25 from the park near Kawameeh Lane. You can see it was a bright sunny day with clear blue skies.

You can also see the new construction on the top of the WTWS – a bright red beacon light. Not only does the new beacon signal and warn off airplanes and other air craft, but it broadcast subliminal signals for all to obey.

Look up during winter’s short days, and you might be lucky enough to see the World’s Tallest Water Sphere. Of course you must be somewhere near Union, New Jersey, and you must be looking sometime during the shortened daylight hours. The current “ghost gray” paint scheme of the tower goes particularly well with the gray skies and foggy winter mists.

Look again at this unusual photo. It is not the actual WTWS, but an incredible simulation. This is the latest model of the WTWS to enter the World’s Tallest Water Sphere Museum. The model is an HO scale (1/87th) plastic styrene model and stands over two feet tall. Notice the ghost gray paint scheme circa 2008. Note the array of five rings of cell phone antennas. Note the halo collars up near the sphere. The array of support hardware and antennas were particularly unique and required many feet of brass wire, styrene strip plastic, and epoxy to complete. Enjoy.

This exciting video is frightening to watch. Here automobile driver Paulo Ordoveza traveling through Union has videoed the World’s Tallest Water Sphere chasing a car. It is tough to see, but through the rain and the trees you see the WTWS moving along the road side and matching the speed of the traveling automobile. Several other automobiles with headlights on are seen fleeing the water sphere tower and exceeding the speed limit in order to escape. Beads of rain streak across the automobile glass as the driver evades under several overpasses, but the WTWS tower still keeps up with the car.

This video is being analyzed by the WTWS forensic team to try to detect signs of forgery. However, the forensic team has established that there is no evidence of photoshop or video tampering, and there is also no evidence that the WTWS is portrayed by an actor in a suit or other motion picture trickery.

Here is a wonderful prototypical view of the World’s Tallest Water Sphere as many people see it speeding by on the highway. The sky is blue, the clouds are floating on high, the window is down, the sun is shining, and our view if dominated by a ghostly gray monster looming overhead, towering over us, and ready to smash us out of our meager existence.

This photo taken by Steven F. Scharff, of Henderson Nevada, on 2008-11-01.

Steven F. Scharff, former Union resident, now of Henderson, Nevada, shares this portrait of self with illuminated tower taken by John R. Scharff on 2008/11/01.

The World’s Tallest Water Sphere is gleaming white and certainly is the center of attention of this photograph. Your eyes cannot but help but be drawn to the giant spike of whiteness slashing down the center of the photo. Steven looks a little bit like my older brother, and his face shows a bit of seriousness of the task at hand, while at the same time being proud to see the WTWS in person.

If you have a photo, artistic, portrait, or historic, please share it with the site, and it will be awed by the world.

Brian Donohue reports (2008-11-10): “Through the fog, I noticed something new protruding from the top of the WTWS. Right out of the sphere. I think they may be putting antennae right on the top of the thing now. Tough to see through the fog. I will be back there this weekend and will try to shoot a photo.”

This photo of the World’s Tallest Water Sphere was taken in the fall of 1998 and shows a clear view of the Elizabethtown Water Company billboard, the ghost water pump logo, and the first cell antenna to gird the structure. Note that at this writing, the WTWS is still ghostly gray, but has 5 cell antennae, and the Elizabethtown logo is obliterated.

Says Brian Donohue, who writes and often stars in the excellent Star Ledger Ledger Live videos, “I had returned from a year of wandering aimlessly through South America. In my more homesick moments, I tended to think about the water sphere. And when I got back I was determined to keep my wanderlust alive by digging deeper into places closer to home. This was part of that process.”

Brian, like many Union residents, has the image of the WTWS burned into his subliminal subconscious.

As you are driving down the New Jersey highways, don’t forget to look up and see the shackled World’s Tallest Water Sphere. Good or Evil? Perhaps these cell phone antennae will save the tower. What is more important, communication or water? Would you rather have a cell phone call or a glass of municipal water? Two enter Thunderdome, one leave.

Who has the claim to living closest to the World’s Tallest Water Sphere? Would it be some residents near Morris Avenue? Would it be some of the historic homes on Ingersoll Terrace or Boyd Avenue? Or would it be these residents on Kawameeh Lane?

Here we see a photo taken on 2007-12-29 from Kawameeh Lane. These residents boast a fill frontal view of the wonderful Union lettering. In fact it is obvious the house on the right in this photo has selected a color to match the World’s Tallest Water Sphere. These residents are lucky. Whether backing out of the driveway in the morning, or returning home at night, they enjoy a full view of the tower looking east.

Not really. But here is an imagined Aurora “long box” polystrene model if it were ever produced by the now-defunct model company. This isometric view not only shows the cover with the prominent Elizabethtown Water and Gas logo, but also the side information including the Aurora company logo as well.

This artistic conceptualization is provided by World’s Tallest Water Sphere artist David Wuethrich whose works of the WTWS are featured in other articles on the site. This rendering is water color markers and colored pencils. If you have artistic representation of the WTWS, please share them with the site. We will publish any artwork and link to your web site.

Notice the dual halos around the neck of the water sphere. What are these things? A radio signaling device? Communication with the water company? Vandalism detection? Artistic embellishment? Self defense?

In case you have never seen Google Earth, or have not run it in a while, be aware that this wonderful map / visualization / virtual travel program has become populated rapidly by the user community with three-dimensional models of famous structures. In other words, not only can you zoom around the country, viewing maps from any angle and any direction and quickly pinpoint interesting places on our earth, you now can also fly around a growing database of famous monuments, buildings, structures, and sites. In the New York/New Jersey area alone, you can see fascinating detailed models of the Brooklyn Bridge, the city of Newark, and downtown Manhattan. Soon to be added to this list of global importance, Union’s World’s Tallest Water Sphere.

While waiting for the voting, you can preview the 3D model of the World’s Tallest Water Sphere. If you are a Google or SketchUp community member, please give it a good rating, so it appears in Google Earth. Note the wonderful modeling of the most recent white paint scheme, the multitude of cell phone antennas, the abandoned E-town billboard at its base, and the nearby green water tank.

This model has been painstakingly created by artist FlagFreak who has created many wonderful models in Google SketchUp. Using photos provided by this site, this Google user and WTWS has made a noteworthy contribution to virtual travellers everywhere.

We will post the Google Earth coordinates when the WTWS model goes public.

For many residents of New Jersey, this is a question that is taken for granted. Just as there are many Bobs in your classroom or Marys at your office, there are many Unions in New Jersey.

When people mentions the World’s Tallest Water Sphere, it is taken for granted that we mean Union Township, west of Liberty International Airport, near Newark, the largest city in New Jersey.

Yet, judging from the email from many international visitors, there seems to be some confusion of where to visit when making a vacation around the World’s Tallest Water Sphere.

For your consideration, here is a handy table of the five Union New Jerseys we know about. The columns show the growth of the town over the last 7 decades. The links point to the official site for the town, the Wikipedia information on the site, and a Google Map locator of the town.

Sorry for those of you looking for a famous children’s band. When I say Wiggles, I am talking about a photographic technique in which two similar photos taken a few inches apart are animated. The result is a somewhat three dimensional looking image. If you have two similar cameras you can make a rig to space them similarly to how the human eyes are spaced to provide a simultaneous three dimensional image. This technique is similar to the old stereoscopic photographic viewers that have been around for 100 years. However, the novel twist here is that they are provided in rapid time sequence.

For instance, here is a small (110 kB) and a large (360 kB) wiggle photograph of the World’s Tallest Water Sphere taken on 2007-12-29. You get the idea that the reeds are nearby and the water tower is far away.

Have fun with your viewing, and a happy wiggly new year to you all.