House of Moore Furman

Contained within the State Street House at the northeast corner of West State Street and Chancery Lane, shown here around 1900, was an earlier 18th-century dwelling built as the primary Trenton residence of the wealthy Coxe family. Vacated during the Revolutionary War, it was acquired by Trenton merchant Moore Furman, who was living there at the time Congress met in Trenton in 1784. In 1798 Furman sold the house to the State of New Jersey for $10,000 and it served as the Governor’s residence for almost half a century. Later in the 19th century it was sold into private hands, enlarged and functioned as a hotel known first as the State Street House and then from 1904 as the Hotel Sterling. Today the site is occupied by the Mary G. Roebling state office building.

[credit: photograph courtesy Trentoniana Collection, Trenton Public Library]