Decades ago, people would cram into caravan tours heading across the country, stopping at historic sites for a glimpse into the nation’s past.

Fast forward to 21st century Morris County — gone are the days of the caravan, but here again are the days of history lessons, with the preservation of historic sites across all 39 Morris County municipalities.

On Tuesday, June 24, the Morris County Historical Society launched its self-guided online driving tour, which highlights 18 historic sites across 13 townships in the county.

The Morris County Historical Society (MCHS), a non-profit organization, partnered with the Morris County Office of Planning and Preservation and the broader Morris County history community to create the driving tour.

The online directions will take visitors to the historic sites, and once there, listen to the history lesson, view photos, maps and other elements.

Each of the sites was awarded over $1 million in grants through the Morris County Historic Preservation Trust. In total, the 18 sites have received more than $23.5 million in preservation funding.

“This tour was designed to celebrate and bring awareness to our county's small nonprofit history organizations who steward these sites, worked tirelessly and creatively to make each dollar stretch as far as it can possibly go, and then work to get students, residents and visitors to care about our history and value the sites that can still tell the story we can have to tell,” Executive Director of MCHS, Amy Curry said. “They say that it takes a village, but when it comes to historic preservation, let the record show it actually takes an entire county.”

The Historic Preservation Tour is the first of eight theme-based, self-guided tours. The seven other themes that MCHS plans to release over time include settlement, schoolhouse, cemetery, agriculture, revolution and industry, which is broken down into sub-tours that include mills, canals and the iron industry. Each theme will have anywhere from two to three dozen sites.

“Eighty years ago, people were getting into cars and long caravans, and they were driving across the county, stopping at local historic sites, and learning more about county history that way,” Curry said. “Several years ago, the staff and I decided it would be great if we could do something that similarly engaged people, but in a 21st-century manner.”

The Morris County Historical Society held its kickoff for the driving tours at Ayres-Knuth Farm in Denville, NJ.

Residents are greeted with access to a variety of information upon arriving at a site, Curry said. Some sites have a baseline history — a three- to five-paragraph essay — while others include historic photos and contemporary pictures or excerpts from old maps that focus on the given place.

“One of the reasons why I chose historic preservation to be the first theme was because it, better than anything else, illustrates that the preservation of our history is really a community-wide endeavor,” Curry said.

This digital tour is also part of a broader preservation initiative for the 20th anniversary of the Historic Preservation Trust Fund, said Stephen Shaw, the deputy director of the Morris County Board of County Commissioners. There are 129 buildings, county-wide, that have been preserved through the Morris County Historic Preservation Trust, and a total of $52 million in taxpayer dollars that have been invested in these sites.

“Our Office of Planning and Preservation launched the historic preservation story map, and that's an interactive platform,” said Shaw. “You can go see it online. You can see every site that's been preserved. It has the history. It has pictures. It's really a phenomenal resource that we have right online.”

MCHS, which was incorporated in 1945, serves to preserve and promote the history of Morris County, New Jersey. Located at Acorn Hall since 1971, MCHS uses the former family residence of Ms. Mary Crane Hone as an exhibition of its historic collections.

The launch of MCHS' driving tour featured seven different speakers from across the county.

While the Hall itself features four generations of residents, their stories, local involvements and legacies, MCHS also showcases changing exhibits each year. The exhibits offer an in-depth look at local cultural history by highlighting nearly 15,000 items that the Society maintains.

“When you start to understand and appreciate something, that's when you start to care for it,” Curry said.

And the people who tend to these historical sites are also part of a larger community of individuals who truly care about the art of preservation.

“This morning I did a pop visit to a preservation site,” historic preservation specialist Margaret Hickey said. “I saw six men looking at a hole and they were like, ‘Oh, thank God you're here'. They needed guidance and that is preservation. It is all about the unknown. It is about opening walls and finding the true history of resources and really trying to figure out what the chronology was, who the families were, how they were connected, how the building evolved, what the landscape is, how it enriches our landscape and how history enriches our lives.”

The 18 historic preservation sites span across Booton, Denville, Kinnelon, Madison, Mendham, Morristown, Mount Olive, Netcong, Parsippany, Pequannock, Riverdale, Rockaway Township and Roxbury. The self-guided driving tour is now available at: morriscountyhistory.org/drive.