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I was born in Bayonne, New Jersey – a small metropolis situated on a peninsula adjacent to New York City – and my earliest memories are of towering smokestacks, steel drums of oil and cargo ships pumping across Newark Bay like quiet leviathans.

Located on Elizabeth’s waterfront near Newark Bay, the Singer factory was a powerhouse of the Industrial Revolution, churning out sewing machines in the days when many people made their own clothes instead of buying them in stores.

"There has been an amazing recovery in the Hackensack and even in Newark Bay," Cristini said back in 2015.

How much more of an ecological recovery could Newark Bay have made if New Jersey had gotten those billions from Exxon in reclamation funds that just evaporated?

The reported Exxon settlement came at a critical point in the history of the Newark Bay according to Dr. Angela Cristini, who taught biology at Ramapo College and studied the region for decades.