By Mary Ann Bourbeau
The New Jersey Hall of Fame (NJHOF) has announced its 2024 class of inductees, and Highlands native Kevin Smith couldn’t be more excited to be included in the list.
“This induction means an embarrassingly large amount to me,” said Smith, a Hollywood staple who wrote, directed and starred in his breakthrough film, the 1994 Jersey-based comedy “Clerks.”
“Ever since the Hall was created, I’ve been watching the list they put out there for who’s getting inducted and hoping to be included. This means the absolute world to me, seriously, how nakedly I’ve wanted this for years now. It’s like a joke around my friends and family. Every year when they would announce the new inductees and I wasn’t on the list, I’d get ribbed for it. So yeah, I am delighted!”
Among the other inductees are actress Meryl Streep; actor Paul Rudd; Peter Cancro, founder of Jersey Mike’s Franchise Systems; former NY Giants quarterback Phil Simms; singer Lesley Gore; journalist Gay Talese; Nobel Prize winner and mathematician John Forbes Nash and NBC Entertainment president Warren Littlefield.
Although Smith now lives in California, he still spends a lot of time in his hometown and at his businesses, Smodcastle Cinemas in Atlantic Highlands and the comic book store Jay and Silent Bob’s Secret Stash in Red Bank.
“I wear my love for New Jersey on my sleeve,” he said. “I wouldn’t be who I am without being born and raised in the Garden State. It forms artistic individuals. So many people in my line of work in front of and behind the camera started out or did time in New Jersey. It just fosters a will to succeed and create and make your mark. Considering Jay Mewes and I have our hands and footprints in the cement at the TCL Chinese Theater, formerly Grauman’s Chinese Theater, in the heart of Hollywood, you’d imagine I’d be like, ‘Oh, the New Jersey Hall of Fame, that’s nice.’ Oh no, I’m slobberingly grateful to be included! I’ve been waiting for this. It’s almost gross how much I’ve wanted it!”
Smith said he has no idea what to expect at the ceremony, but he’s fairly certain of one thing.
“I’ll be smiling from ear to ear and trying to get Meryl Streep to be in the next Jay and Silent Bob movie,” he said. “What an accomplishment that would be!”
The inductees will be honored at the 16th Annual New Jersey Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony. The event will be filmed on location at the 10,000-square-foot New Jersey Hall of Fame at American Dream Mall and other Hall of Fame satellite exhibits. It will air beginning Nov. 13 on Fox 5, My9 and social media. Dozens of inductee events will be open to the public throughout the year.
“The 2024 class of inductees of the New Jersey Hall of Fame illustrate the New Jersey ethic of hard work, determination and grit,” said Jon F. Hanson, chairman of the NJHOF. “We are thrilled to celebrate the contributions of 18 new inductees so future generations can learn about their journeys.”
Also being inducted this year is Geraldine Livingston Morgan Thompson (1872-1967), a social reform pioneer who was affectionately known as the First Lady of New Jersey. Thompson grew up in a prominent New York City family during the Gilded Age. She married Lewis Steenrod Thompson, heir to a fortune amassed by his father, William Payne Thompson, a founder of the National Lead Company and later treasurer at Standard Oil. She and her husband had tuberculosis at an early age, prompting her career as a public health advocate. While raising their children at Brookdale Farm, an 800-acre estate in Monmouth County, Thompson was involved with many women’s clubs and organizations dealing with charity and social reform. She created the Monmouth County State Charity Aid Society, established the Visiting Nurse Association and worked tirelessly on prison reform. Upon her death, she donated the land that is now Brookdale Community College, Monmouth Museum and Thompson Park.
“It truly is a wonderful honor to have my great-grandmother’s legacy honored in such a way,” said her great-grandson Ben Thompson.
Although Geraldine Thompson died a decade before he was born, Ben Thompson remembers many stories passed down by family members.
“Everything I’ve learned about Geraldine is that she was a strong, intelligent and principled person, dedicated to her family and her community,” he said. “I don’t know what initially inspired her activism, but I read a wonderful passage from former New Jersey Gov. Richard Hughes who eloquently summed up her character following her death in 1967, writing that she ‘vigorously pursued her many interests in improving this state and nation. Central to these concerns were a few basic themes: respect for the individual, faith in God and love of nature. In all her public actions, she was able to bring to bear on questions of public concern these basic themes. She used them as an incandescent flame to illuminate and reveal the outlines of the world around us.’ ”
Ben Thompson said his father spent parts of his summers at Brookdale Farm every year while growing up and looked back on those times fondly.
“One story he always told is that every morning, Geraldine would walk the horse track and find four-leaf clovers to put at every child’s breakfast setting, and how special that made him feel,” he said. “Be it prison reform, tuberculosis treatment, women’s rights, environmental conservation or political activism, it is truly an honor to have Geraldine Thompson recognized by the New Jersey Hall of Fame. I only wish my father, uncle and aunt were still alive to see this recognition of the grandmother they knew so well.”
For more information about the New Jersey Hall of Fame and 2024 induction events, visit njhalloffame.org.
The article originally appeared in the July 1 – 7, 2024 print edition of The Two River Times.
