A Book About Sloan Products, Matawan Dry Goods

I'm always on the lookout for books about Matawan and Aberdeen. At the Matawan-Aberdeen Public Library I discovered "A Sloan Product: A Memoir of a Lost Boy" by Neil L Selinger, published in 2011. Selinger tells of growing up in a four-generation Jewish family living on a 23-acre farm at 59 Freneau Avenue (Route 79) in Matawan.

The family owned and operated Sloan Products, a wholesale distributor of a variety of dry goods. The enterprise was closed a few years before the book was published. Once farmland in the Freneau section of the borough, the property is now the home of The Preserve at Matawan, with a street called Sloan Court running through the development. Fifteen acres of the land has been "preserved" in the true sense of the word. It is now protected wetlands.

There is a nice tribute to the author and his book in The New York Times. (See Loss of Speech Evokes the Voice of an Author, by Peter Applebome.) Mr Selinger developed Lou Gehrig's Disease shortly after finishing the book.

The 13 Sep 1951 edition of The Matawan Journal had a classified ad: "BOY WANTED as helper on truck."

The 10 Oct 1957 edition of The Matawan Journal had two graphic ads for Sloan Products, one for a rocking horse they distributed called the Blue Ribbon Wonder Horse; the other ad was for Kaiser Foil.

You can find the book under "Selinger" in the library's Biography section, which is upstairs along the back wall.