Although little is known about the first settlers of the Mendham, NJ, area, records show that there was a small community as of the 1730s. In 1740, Ebenezer Byram renovated an old farmhouse into the Black Horse Tavern, which is a historical landmark still standing today. With the new enterprise attracting new residents and travelers, the community grew into a proper town and was officially founded in 1749. Historians speculate that the name is derived from two possible sources: it may be named for a town in Suffolk, England. However, most of the residents in the 1730s and 1740s were Irish and Scotch Protestants, and in those times, they weren’t very fond of their British cousins. The other possibility is it’s an Anglicization of a Native American word, “mendom,” which means raspberries.