See the "The Thing" at Raritan Landing, celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month with salsa dancing and a New Brunswick City Hall Halloween party:

NEW BRUNSWICK, NJ — As we dive right into October and all the spooky fun it brings — plus October is Hispanic Heritage Month — here are all the free family events this month in New Brunswick, presented by the Middlesex County Arts Institute:

First Fridays: 3-5 p.m. Oct. 6 in Monument Square Park in New Brunswick. DJ George will be present to play Latin favorites, and Amy Garcia Phillips from Contento Dance will host a dance party and teach salsa lessons throughout the event.

"The Thing" at Raritan Landing: From Thursday-Sunday, October 19-22 and 26-29 at 7-8:30 p.m., come to the historic East Jersey Old Town Village in Piscataway for an unforgettable live theater performance. Become a part of the cast in this immersive theatrical adventure as audiences join forces with Puritan villagers as they track a murderous outer space invader before it kills again. Tickets are free but limited, reserve them here!

New Brunswick Domestic Violence Awareness Coalition March and Rally: Join the New Brunswick Domestic Violence Awareness Coalition for a March and Rally on Saturday, October 21 from 10 a.m. - 2 p.m. Please check @nbdvac on Instagram for more updates.

National First Responders Day: On Friday, October 27 from 2-5 p.m., come and give thanks to all first responders from across Middlesex County at the New Brunswick Fire Department at 93 Joyce Kilmer Avenue in New Brunswick. Residents can show their appreciation for first responders, and get involved in interactive art-making activities, mural painting, live music and dance performances.

Find out what's happening in New Brunswickwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Hub City Sounds: Corazon Latino Festival and “Trick or Treat Around Town”: On Sunday, October 29 from 1-3 p.m. enjoy traditional music and dances celebrating the culmination of Latinx Heritage Month at the New Brunswick Cultural Center at 2 Livingston Avenue in New Brunswick.

City Hall-Oween: Join the City of New Brunswick in celebrating Halloween on Sunday, October 29, from 1-3 p.m. at New Brunswick City Hall. Enjoy pictures with the Batmobile and Ghostbusters vehicles, creative DIY activities, pumpkin decorating contests, free giveaways and more.

Throughout the month of October, visit middlesexcountynj.gov/artsandculture for full details on all the events listed above and many more. Registration details and links to live stream events are available.

NEW BRUNSWICK – Blanquita B. Valenti Community School, like its namesake, embodies what’s best about the city it calls home.

"She was about community, about purpose, about advocacy," said Superintendent of Schools Aubrey A. Johnson. "And this was a real community effort."

Some 800 city students will have an extra-special first day of classes Thursday when they walk into the brand-new $55 million school on Jersey Avenue for the first time.

Two years in the making, the three-story, 127,400-square-foot facility replaces Lincoln Annex School, formerly St. Peter's High School and Elementary School, which was demolished for construction of the state's first free-standing cancer hospital. It can house up to 1,000 K-8 students.

The excitement is palpable, said Valenti School Principal Ellen Treadway and the superintendent. A ribbon-cutting is scheduled for the afternoon of Sept. 6.

"It's very exciting," Treadway said. "It's a beautiful building, absolutely gorgeous. It already has a ton of vitality to it. You can feel it. When you walk in you get that energy of teachers who are excited to set up their classrooms, seeing their new furniture, seeing all the materials that they have, the technology that they have. Everything is vibrant here and you can feel that with all the teachers and staff members who have come in."

Johnson called it a "true community school." He praised Treadway, who has been with the district for about a decade, with being able to connect the Valenti school community and "bring a lot of vision to what the mindset of what Blanquita Valenti was about."

"Everyone's worked together to create the opportunity for us," Johnson said. "From the mayor (Jim Cahill) and his vision to DEVCO (New Brunswick Development Corporation) and their vision to the Board of Education and their vision. And the hospital. The vision was set forward and then everybody pulled together to make it work. I want to say now we are at the micro stage where our administrators and our teachers and our principals and everyone is now filling in those buildings. Before there were just walls. But I feel now there are promises that have come inside. And that makes a school. I'm extremely excited for what's going to happen."

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The school broke ground in spring 2021, just a few months after Blanquita B. Valenti died at age 87. A strong role model for her community, Valenti was a longtime educator, public servant and held numerous elected local and county positions while raising her family in the city. She taught Spanish at John F. Kennedy High School in Woodbridge for 32 years before her retirement.

Valenti's political and community achievements included serving as Middlesex County freeholder from 2004-2019, New Brunswick councilmember from 1990-2010 and as a member of the New Brunswick Board of Education and New Brunswick Planning Board. She also served on the board of directors for St. Peter's University Hospital and Middlesex College, was a founding and charter member of the Puerto Rican Action Board and a founding member of ASPIRA, Inc. of New Jersey.

She has a huge legacy, Johnson said, one that will be included in the school's day-to-day activities.

"In each instance, she was the first person of Latin American descent to serve in these positions," he said. "We actually have a lot of artifacts that we have collected, and we have a lot of awareness of who she was. We have been talking to the family, and we have a lot of history and legacy, and we definitely plan to incorporate that into our curriculum as well."

Valenti School is walkable for the community, Treadway noted.

"That is something that we're very excited about, being able to have our students and their families walk to school and come to functions," she said. "Even though the other school wasn't far from where we were at, we had to transport them by bus. So now they're able to walk in and it just provides a little bit more opportunities for different events and functions for families to come to."

The school features a health and wellness theme, Treadway said, which is incorporated into the curriculum.

"Health and wellness is something that we will try to put into our daily routines, and we will bring in community members and partners to kind of focus on this with families and students," she said.

According to Sarah Clarke, executive vice president of DEVCO, which developed the project, there was a group of community members, parents and staff that was integral in the early planning stages that helped identify the site and some of the design features.

"I think it really does meet with all of those factors that you would call a community school," Clarke said. "Ultimately, in its operation, it'll be a community school, but certainly as part of the development phase, the design and construction, it's also should be considered a community effort."

Among the amenities are a large outdoor playground, gymnasium, cafeteria and a multi-purpose room with a stage. There is a media center, technology lab, makerspace; biology, chemistry and hydroponics lab, Johnson said.

"I know the students are excited with the playground," Treadway said. "All of our students in grades K through 8 will have that opportunity to go to the outdoor playground for recess. The media center is beautiful. It feels like a mix of a Barnes & Noble with a makerspace area and STEAM area where we will have coding and robotics to offer."

Clarke said the building has a modern, high-tech vibe, designed to give the district the most amount of flexibility, and can host community events the way it’s designed.

"You can give community access in those spaces without having to get access to the rest of the school," she said. "So after hours or for a weekend use by different community groups. I think that is a great feature."

The school was developed in collaboration with the city, Middlesex County, RWJBarnabas Health, Rutgers Cancer Center Institute of New Jersey and DEVCO, with funding provided by RWJBarnabas as part of its cancer center project.

email: cmakin@gannettnj.com

A house in New Brunswick that sold for $780,000 tops the list of the most expensive residential real estate sales in New Brunswick area between June 5 and June 12.

In total, 11 residential real estate sales were recorded in the area during the past two weeks, with an average price of $385,545, $259 per square foot.

The prices in the list below concern real estate sales where the title was recorded from the week of May 29 to the week of June 12 even if the property may have been sold earlier.

10. $260,000, single-family house at 200 Lawrence Street

The property at 200 Lawrence Street in New Brunswick has new owners. The price was $260,000. The house was built in 1940 and has a living area of 1,686 square feet. The price per square foot is $154. The deal was finalized on May. 11.

9. $265,000, single-family home at 62 Loretto Street

The 1,201 square-foot single-family home at 62 Loretto Street, New Brunswick, has been sold. The transfer of ownership was settled in May and the total purchase price was $265,000, $221 per square foot. The house was built in 1920. The deal was finalized on May. 16.

8. $265,000, single-family residence at 80 S. Ward Street

The 960 square-foot detached house at 80 S. Ward Street in New Brunswick has been sold. The transfer of ownership was settled in May and the total purchase price was $265,000, $276 per square foot. The house was built in 1920. The deal was finalized on May. 12.

7. $310,000, detached house at 152 Townsend Street

The property at 152 Townsend Street in New Brunswick has new owners. The price was $310,000. The house was built in 1900 and has a living area of 1,687 square feet. The price per square foot is $184. The deal was finalized on May. 17.

6. $351,000, single-family home at 46 S. Pennington Road

The sale of the single family residence at 46 S. Pennington Road in New Brunswick has been finalized. The price was $351,000, and the new owners took over the house in May. The house was built in 1951 and has a living area of 676 square feet. The price per square foot was $519. The deal was finalized on May. 10.

5. $400,000, detached house at 12 Longfield Road

The sale of the single-family house at 12 Longfield Road, New Brunswick, has been finalized. The price was $400,000, and the new owners took over the house in May. The house was built in 1952 and has a living area of 1,352 square feet. The price per square foot was $296. The deal was finalized on May. 15.

4. $420,000, single-family residence at 289 Seaman Street

A sale has been finalized for the single-family residence at 289 Seaman Street in New Brunswick. The price was $420,000 and the new owners took over the house in May. The house was built in 1900 and the living area totals 1,774 square feet. The price per square foot ended up at $237. The deal was finalized on May. 15.

3. $435,000, single-family house at 12 Edgeworth Place

The 1,932 square-foot single-family home at 12 Edgeworth Place in New Brunswick has been sold. The transfer of ownership was settled in May and the total purchase price was $435,000, $225 per square foot. The house was built in 1920. The deal was finalized on May. 16.

2. $515,000, condominium at 1 Spring Street

A sale has been finalized for the condominium at 1 Spring Street in New Brunswick. The price was $515,000 and the new owners took over the condominium in May. The condo was built in 2006 and the living area totals 1,310 square feet. The price per square foot ended up at $393. The deal was finalized on May. 16.

1. $780,000, single-family house at 11 Edgebrook Road

The property at 11 Edgebrook Road in New Brunswick has new owners. The price was $780,000. The house was built in 2005 and has a living area of 2,884 square feet. The price per square foot is $270. The deal was finalized on May. 16.

Real Estate Newswire is a service provided by United Robots, which uses machine learning to generate analysis of data from Propmix, an aggregator of national real-estate data.

Four-minute read

NEW BRUNSWICK - Johnson & Johnson, the New Jersey health care giant with a storied history, underwent a reboot on Thursday when it replaced its 136-year-old script logo with a more modern style featuring letters spelled out one pen stroke at a time.

The change puts a stamp on what has been a major shift for the company. Last year, J&J spun off its consumer products division that makes Band-Aid and Tylenol to focus exclusively on health care through its two remaining segments: pharmaceuticals and medical technology.

"This is a unique time for Johnson & Johnson," said Vanessa Broadhurst, executive vice president of corporate global affairs for J&J. "We're really entering a new era."

Johnson & Johnson, based in New Brunswick, has 16,000 employees in the state, along with a sizable economic impact. In 2022, for example, it spent $2.8 billion on supplies with 3,000 vendors in the state.

The company helped give New Jersey claim to its status as "the medicine chest of the world" — a title that in recent years has carried mixed messages. J&J has created highly paid jobs and developed lifesaving medicine. And it has faced thousands of high-profile liability lawsuits on products ranging from the antipsychotic drug Risperdal to hip implants.

Experts said the new logo could appeal to a new generation, not only of consumers, but also potential employees who are looking for innovative places to work. It's a generation more familiar with straight-edged letters on the keyboard than the loops of cursive penmanship.

"I think (the new logo) contemporizes a brand, it makes the brand design more relevant for today," said Mark Beal, a communications professor at Rutgers University in New Brunswick and author of "Gen Z Graduates to Adulthood."

"And in doing that it sends a message to potential employees who might say, 'Wow, I thought J&J was maybe a traditional, stodgy, maybe older company. Maybe I should take a second look at them. Maybe they are actually innovative and transformative and doing some interesting things there."

A change in the logo is particularly notable for Johnson & Johnson, a company that holds its history tightly. The cursive logo, for example, first appeared in 1887. It was modeled after co-founder James Wood Johnson's signature, featuring large loops that appeared on its earliest products, used in sterile surgical procedures.

The logo added to J&J's culture, which helped make the company one of the most trusted in America. But its reputation in the 2000s began to lose its luster as lawsuits piled up, taking aim at some of its best-known products, including talc-based baby powder.

The company shifted course. It named Joaquin Duato as chief executive officer early last year. And it spun off its consumer products division — home of Band-Aid, Tylenol, Neutrogena, Listerine — into a company called Kenvue in 2023.

While Johnson & Johnson was an iconic brand, Broadhurst said in an interview that market research found the public didn't have a clear idea of who J&J was or what it did.

The company as part of its makeover will rename its Janssen Pharmaceuticals division to Johnson & Johnson Innovative Medicine. Its medical device division will keep the name Johnson & Johnson MedTech. And its new logo, with straight-lined letters, is designed to be more personable, particularly when used in digital media.

"We really want to be sure that we start to speak to people in a way that conveys all the things that we do," Broadhurst said. "We really have the aspiration that the next 10 years of scientific innovation than the last 100."

Michael L. Diamond is a business reporter who has been writing about the New Jersey economy and health care industry for more than 20 years. He can be reached at mdiamond@gannettnj.com.

Investment in downtown New Brunswick's real estate market is continuing with the second phase of the New Jersey Health + Life Science Exchange, or HELIX, a $732 million project on four acres opposite the train station.

SJP Properties, in collaboration with New Brunswick Development Corporation (DEVCO), has unveiled plans to develop H-2, the second phase of HELIX

In recent years, New Brunswick has experienced public and private real estate investment totaling nearly $3 billion, with an additional $1 billion in the pipeline.

“We are establishing the only ecosystem in the county where academic researchers, private sector researchers, entrepreneurs, medical students, and educators will co-locate in an environment of discovery and collaboration – where creative collisions can occur,” Christopher Paladino, president of DEVCO, said in a statement.

HELIX, to be built in three phases, will be the largest investment in life sciences and medical education in New Jersey.

H-2, a mixed-use project, will include 600,000 square feet of custom lab and office space that can accommodate a range of uses for large corporate life sciences and technology companies.

H-1, the first phase of HELIX, is under construction and will be 574,000 square feet that includes the New Jersey Innovation HUB, the new home of Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, and a Rutgers translational research facility equipped with a variety of labs.

Rising two stories, H-1’s ground floor will feature amenities and kiosks that will be accessible to the public, including a 10,000-square-foot market hall with food options and a 3,000-square-foot restaurant that opens onto a 70-foot-wide plaza.

H-3, the final phase of HELIX, is proposed as a 42-story mixed-use building with additional office space and 220 housing units.

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“New Jersey is one of the most important regions in the country for the life sciences industry with New Brunswick emerging as a hotbed for biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies in recent years,” Steve Pozycki, CEO of SJP Properties, said in a statement. “As more innovators enter the region, the location of their research and development facilities will be of paramount importance. With a prime position directly across the street from two major rail lines, and situated within commuting distance of both New York City and Philadelphia, HELIX will provide exceptional access to workforce talent, enabling its future tenants to attract professionals from both cities’ life sciences and technology industries.”

The New Brunswick train station has been earmarked for a $49 million renovation.

The headquarters and regional offices of several major health, pharmaceutical and life sciences companies are located near HELIX, including Johnson & Johnson, Bristol Myers Squibb and Ascendia Pharmaceuticals.

HDR is the lead architect for H-2 and JLL will serve as the building’s leasing agent.

“The unique combination of Northeast Corridor train service, Big 10 college town atmosphere and the expanding presence of New Jersey’s most prominent higher education, corporate and healthcare stakeholders make the HELIX project incredibly attractive for innovation and talent recruitment,” Daniel J. Loughlin, vice chairman of JLL, said in a statement.

Headquartered in New York City, SJP has developed 250 million square feet of commercial and office property along with thousands of residential units. SJP owns the Somerset Corporate Center in Bridgewater and is the developer of M Station in Morristown. opposite the town's train station, where Sanofi will be moving its American headquarters from Bridgewater.

Email: mdeak@mycentraljersey.com

Mike Deak is a reporter for mycentraljersey.com. To get unlimited access to his articles on Somerset and Hunterdon counties, please subscribe or activate your digital account.