Springsteen Recalls Mother Adele In Song With Freehold Memories

FREEHOLD, NJ — One of Freehold's most beloved residents, Adele Springsteen, has died, her son announced.

Bruce Springsteen, a music icon and a most famous son of the borough, reflected on his mother's passing in his music from the "The Wish," in a social media post:

"I remember in the morning mom hearing your alarm clock ring. I’d lie in bed and listen to you getting ready for work, the sound of your makeup case on the sink. And the ladies at the office all lipstick, perfume and rustling skirts, how proud and happy you always looked walking home from work.

"It ain’t no phone call on Sunday, flowers or a Mother’s Day card. It ain’t no house on the hill with a garden and a nice little yard. I’ve got my hot rod down on Bond Street I’m older but you’ll know me in a glance. We’ll find us a Little rock ‘n roll bar and we’ll go out and dance."

Bruce Springsteen, "The Wish"

He began his tribute with a simple line: "Adele Springsteen - May 4, 1925-January 31, 2024."

She was a legal secretary, Springsteen explained in his Broadway show, "Springsteen on Broadway." She worked hard at her job, but never considered work a burden, he said in a clip from the show on the Spring-Nuts Twitter site.

She would "stride along, statuesque," he recalled. She made him understand how "good it felt to feel pride in someone that you loved."

His mother rented him his first guitar, and Springsteen recalled her love of dance, growing up in the 1940s.

His social media site shares a video of her dancing, even at an advanced age. News outlets reported that she died from Alzheimer's disease.

The Borough Council of Freehold, the historic county seat of Monmouth County, preserves the borough's legacy in many ways. And in the proposed Hometown Redevelopment, plans include a museum dedicated to Springsteen, which Mayor Kevin Kane has often said is fitting to be sited in a place so seminal to his work.

Kane expressed his condolences for the borough: “On behalf of my colleagues on the Borough Council as well as all of the residents of Freehold Borough we express our sincerest sympathy and deepest sadness upon learning of the passing of Adele Zerilli Springsteen," said Kane in a statement posted on app.com. "Our prayers and condolences go out to Bruce and his entire family as we recall his mom and her days in our hometown.”