Excellent Show Prospect

Charles K. Landis purchased 30,000 acres (121 km 2) of land in 1861 and another 23,000 acres (93 km 2) in 1874, near Millville, New Jersey, and along the West Jersey railroad line with service between Camden and Cape May, to create his own alcohol-free utopian society based on agriculture and progressive thinking. The first houses were built in 1862, and train service was established to Philadelphia and New York City, with the population reaching 5,500 by 1865 and 11,000 by 1875. Established as a Temperance Town, where the sale of alcohol was prohibited, Landis required that purchasers of land in Vineland build a house on the purchased property within a year of purchase, that 2 1⁄ 2 acres (10,000 m 2) of the often heavily wooded land be cleared and farmed each year, and that adequate space be placed between houses and roads to allow for planting of flowers and shade trees along the routes through town. Landis Avenue was constructed as a 100-foot (30 m) wide and about 1-mile (2 km) long road running east-west through the center of the community, with other, narrower roads connecting at right angles to each other.