The History of InfoAge Science & History Museums

Site History

Our campus has an amazingly rich history! You can study it in categories by topic and chronology.

Early History — Information is forthcoming about the farms that preceded commercial development here and about native Americans who originally occupied the area.

Marconi Station — Radio pioneer Guglielmo Marconi competed against Nikola Tesla in the early days of the radio industry. Marconi’s company acquired the farmland here in 1912. His staff built several towers to receive trans-Atlantic wireless messages.

Naval Period — The U.S. Navy was the site owner here during World War I. Their work focused on strengthening radio signals and sharpening signal reception.

Radio Corporation of America — RCA operated the campus in the first half of the 1920s. They emphasized commercial radio developments.

Monmouth Pleasure Club — Deeply unfortunate events happened at our campus from 1926-1929. A local branch of the Ku Klux Klan acquired the land and tried to use it as a summer resort. The group experienced legal disputes and failed at its goal. (U.S. Army hiring from the 1940s through 1990s included prominent technical staff of African-American and Jewish heritage. InfoAge today welcomes people from all walks of life.)

Kings College — An organization called Young People’s Association for the Propagation of the Gospel purchased the land in 1936, opened as The King’s College in 1938, and left for New Castle, Delaware in 1941.

World War II & Radar — The campus became known as “Camp Evans” and the “Evans Signal Laboratory” during this time. It was one of America’s top research laboratories for the development, testing, and production of radar. The staff here also worked on related technologies such as antennas, fuses, and sonar.

Computer Research — Our campus as part of cutting-edge computer research from about 1941-1957. Projects here helped inspire the ENIAC developers, loaned technology to the first computers that had output screens, included the design of the earliest non-prototype mobile computers, and directly led to ASCII — American Standard Code for Information Interchange — which is part of all computers and mobile devices today.

Army Research — Camp Evans’ mission changed after World War II. The new research included subjects such as airborne identifiers for friends and foes, signals jamming, nuclear systems, and much more.

Space Age — In addition to traditional military research, Camp Evans also took on space projects. These included bouncing a radar signal off the moon (Project Diana) and tracking the first weather satellite (Project TIROS).

InfoAge Develops — Coinciding with the Army’s decision in the mid-1990s to begin closing nearby Fort Monmouth and outposts including Camp Evans, local volunteers led by history advocate Fred Carl began efforts to the campus from commercial development and to preserve it as a history/science center.