It’s March 26, 2017 and Rowan’s students are more than halfway through the Spring 2017 Semester. It’s been a blast sharing Glassboro’s hidden secrets with you all. I’ve learned a lot about the town, as I’m sure you have as well.
This week’s post won’t be about Train Stations or Glass Factories. This week, I reached out to two bloggers who blog about historic and interesting places in South Jersey. I’ve given you a profile about both, so enjoy!
Deirdre Giumetti, a.k.a. Yummygal, runs a blog via WordPress called “South Jersey History & Adventures.” The mother of two hasn’t posted new content to her blog for about two years, but she’s covered places in South Jersey since 2011, which gives readers a wide-selection of content to choose from.
Giumetti, 35, of Woodstown NJ started her blog when she left her position with Enclara Pharmacia to become a stay-at-home mom. Taking on the challenge of entertaining her son, she’d take him on trips to historic and interesting places around South Jersey. She decided to document her trips online, and created South Jersey History & Adventures in 2011. It was a new experience for Giumetti, as she never managed a blog before.
Giumetti has visited various places in the area including Sea Breeze NJ, the Weymouth Furnace, and the site of Amatol NJ. She says word of mouth, internet searches, and Google Earth helped her find the places she has blogged about. She’s also been featured in different newspapers and online news sites such as Philly.com
She agrees that blogging is the future of Journalism. She says that what she finds to be appealing about blogging is that people get a type of behind-the-scenes type of reporting. It’s done independently which allows for a new type of coverage on a topic, something she refers to as “a different form of media.”
Giumetti has also taken her love for exploring South Jersey into books. She has two books available. Her first release was,“Vincentown, New Jersey: A Picture Book” which was released in Sep. 2013. The book takes images taken from Vincentown NJ, a town off of Rt. 206, a lays them out for the audience to enjoy. Her second book is, “A Guidebook To Beautiful Salem County, New Jersey,” which is an explorer’s paperback guide to finding interesting places within this New Jersey county.
Giumetti says her advice to a new blogger is to “stick with it” when it comes to managing a blog or webpage. She says that managing a blog has meet new people while exploring, and has learned the stories behind the people she’s met.
In need of finding trails to hike in South Jersey, Mike McCormick, 35, of Barrington NJ decided to give blogging about the subject a chance. He wanted other people who experienced this lack of resources to have an online resource they could use to find local hiking spots. Thus, he took it upon himself to create “South Jersey Trails.”
McCormick never had a blog before, but had experience managing a webpage on Angel Fire. Being an avid hiker, McCormick picked up a hiking book about South Jersey. Thinking about the lack of information online, McCormick took it upon himself to make one himself. Influenced by the book, he created his own documentation of trails in South Jersey online.
McCormick says he takes his family and friends exploring with him. His favorite trail he’s covered for his blog is the Batona Trail Reroute in Chatsworth NJ.
Celebrating its four-year anniversary this month, South Jersey Trails offers visitors an array of information from hiking and canoeing in South Jersey, to highlights from national parks across the country. It’s main purpose McCormick says was to lay out information on trails in South Jersey so that people would have easy access to the information they may be looking for.
McCormick says the challenging part about maintaining South Jersey Trails is keeping up with changes in South Jersey’s hiking world. He says sometimes new parks open in the area and he may not get the information out to his readers soon enough about the parks opening.
McCormick advises anyone who want create a blog to make their blog about something they’re passionate about. He believes that blogging about a topic you enjoy will allow it to “come out,” and write itself. He also says that online journalism is the way of the future because of how it allows more independent reporting rather than allowing the large media companies to control reporting information themselves.
McCormick is also a member of Rowan University’s class of 2007, where he majored in Education & History. He teaches Middle-School Social Studies when he’s not blogging.
The Glassboro History Handbook 
Reblogged this on South Jersey Trails and commented:
Eric is a student at Glassboro Coll… Rowan University who runs a blog on Glassboro history. He recently interviewed me about South Jersey Trails. More importantly, he also interviewed Yummygal of the old South Jersey Adventures blog (I miss that blog).
Go ahead and take a read! While you’re there, definitely check out Eric’s interview with some of the students who graduated Glassboro High School in 1986… the year President Reagan came to the ceremony. Fascinating little corner of history that I’d never heard about!
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