Located in Western Monmouth County, Manalapan Township provides a suburban setting just 15 miles from the Jersey Shore and 45 miles southwest of New York City. The township has a total area of 30.839 square miles with a population of 38,872 as of the 2010 Census.
Manalapan township completely surrounds Englishtown, making it part of 21 pairs of "doughnut towns" in the state, where one municipality entirely surrounds another. Other unincorporated communities located within (or partially within) the township include Yorketown, Cahalls Corners, Clarks Mills, Elton, Gordons Corner, Lafayette Mills, Millhurst, Monmouth Heights, Oakland Mills, Smithburg, Taylors Mills, Tennent, Tracey, Whittier Oaks and Woodville.
The Battle of Monmouth was fought in 1778 on land that is now part of Manalapan and Freehold townships. Monmouth Battlefield State Park occupies 2,928 acres in the two townships.
Manalapan's Recreation Center covers 162 acres and offers handball courts, softball/baseball fields, a fitness trail, football fields, soccer fields, street hockey courts, tot lots, basketball courts, tennis courts, bocce courts, sand volleyball courts, a nine-hole disc golf course, a small water park, concession stand, picnic areas, and shelter buildings.
Public school students in pre-kindergarten through eighth grade attend the Manalapan-Englishtown Regional School District. As of the 2014-15 school year, the district's seven schools had an enrollment of 3,956 students and 332.7 classroom teachers for a student–teacher ratio of 11.9:1.
Students from Manalapan Township in public school for ninth through twelfth grades attend either Freehold Township High School or Manalapan High School, with the school attended based on the student's address.
Photo: amberry46 [CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)]
