The year was 2007.

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American Gangster and Bee Movie were neck and neck in the box office although No Country for Old Men would go on to win Best Picture (personally, Michael Clayton was a favorite).

George W. Bush was in the White House but we were in the thick of a presidential campaign, with an election a year away. Locally, James Kennedy was mayor, a tenure that began in 1991 and got the ball rolling on redevelopment efforts. Putting things into perspective, members of the high school Class of 2007 are now roughly a decade out of college!

And if you know RahwayRising’s origin story, you know that this experiment started as an idea of what one guy could do with a laptop, or now, a smartphone. The very first blog post was published on November 2, 2007.

Platforms like Blogger and WordPress were making things simple to publish, changing the media landscape dramatically and yet still different from what it looks like today, with even less coverage of local issues thanks to the decimation of local news. Social media networks were in their infancy, not nearly as ubiquitous as they are now.

I have dozens of notes that I’ve jotted down in the past few weeks thinking about an “anniversary” post. I could go on and on about some of the important posts over the last 15 years but sometimes it’s the simple stuff that’s a good reminder, like a few recent posts. I remember being at Planning Board meetings more than a decade ago regarding a new hotel on Routes 1&9, and remember they also got approval to eventually build a restaurant. Last month, I wrote about plans to come back to build that restaurant. And you can read all about its history on this site. That’s a good example because at that recent meeting, there were questions about what exactly was approved 10 or 11 years ago, and there weren’t very many people present who were there at the time.

RahwayRising.com has evolved quite a bit and maybe there are other, more important issues that I’ve written about but it’s always focused on redevelopment – mainly because there’s only so much time in the day. I’m as surprised as anyone that the site has continued, thanks to being fortunate enough to have the time and resources to devote to it. Part of it I consider community service because much of what you read on this site is stuff that you won’t find anywhere else, unless you want to watch or attend City Council meetings or read the minutes of Planning and Zoning Board meetings. I’m not sure how long the site will remain but there are some new Patrons recently plus advertising commitments for 2023, so it looks like I’ll keep it up for another year.

Remember, you can support the site by becoming a monthly patron on Patreon, or you can make a one-time contribution ($15 seems appropriate, doesn’t it?!) via PayPal or Buy Me a Coffee. And, of course, there’s advertising, remember to support those who support our site, like Lehrer-Gibilisco Funeral Home and Mr. B Printing, and the Rahway Special Improvement District.

Become a Patron!
For RahwayRising.com’s 15th anniversary, consider a $15 contribution via PayPal or Buy Me a Coffee – or support local news all year round by  becoming a monthly Patron.