Perth Amboy

Industrial town and port in Middlesex County, northeastern New Jersey, USA, on the outflow of the Raritan River into Raritan Bay, at the southern end of the Arthur Kill, 26 km/16 mi south of Newark; population (1990) 42,000. It is linked to Staten Island by the Outerbridge Crossing (1928) over the Arthur Kill. A rail shipping point since 1876, it became a distribution hub for coal and remains an industrial centre. Activities include oil refining, printing, food processing, and the manufacture of steel, chemicals, electrical equipment, clothing, building materials, paints, jewelry, cosmetics, and processed foods.

Perth Amboy is situated on a tract of land purchase from American Indians in 1651, and was settled by Scottish colonists in 1683. It served as the capital of East Jersey from 1683 until the union of East and West Jersey in 1702, and then alternated as capital with Burlington until 1790. The settlement was a summer resort in the early 1800s, and then grew as an industrial port with the arrival of the Lehigh Valley railway in 1876, connecting the town with the east and west.