The man who built Exchange Place Former banker helped begin the creation of modern Jersey City

Banker Thomas J. Stanton refused to give up on Jersey City, even during the times when the city seemed to be falling apart.

Those who knew him best said he had a vision of Hudson County as a thriving business and residential community. And largely because of this vision, the Gold Coast, as people know it today, became a reality.

In 1999, a few years after he finally retired from First National Bank of Jersey City, the City Council unanimously passed an ordinance that would have named the area around Exchange Place the Thomas J. Stanton Plaza, a fitting tribute to a man who perhaps did more to start the revitalization of Jersey City’s waterfront than any other single individual.

Unfortunately, according to his son Charles Stanton, “Nothing was ever done to implement it.”

“First Jersey was basically responsible for the development of three of the four corners of Exchange Place and Montgomery,” Charles Stanton said. “One Exchange, 2 Montgomery built as bank headquarters in 1969, and its final headquarters in 1988 at 10 Exchange (the green glass tower).”

Stanton said he would love for the current City Council to honor the original ordinance and name the Exchange Place Plaza after his father.

The city did post a commemorative street sign at the corner of Montgomery and Exchange, but Charles Stanton has talked with Ward E Councilwoman Candice Osborne and other city officials, hoping to get a more substantial plaque installed in the area.

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