The Stevens family played a leading role in the political and economic life of New Jersey throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. John Stevens (ca. 1682-1737), the founder of the family, came to America in 1699 as an indentured law clerk. In 1706, he married Ann Campbell (ca. 1680-1731), the daughter of one of the Scottish proprietors of East New Jersey and a founder of the town of Perth Amboy. The marriage cemented long-lasting ties to other leading colonial families with attendant opportunities in politics and business.

Their son, John Stevens II (1716-1792), was a sea captain and merchant of Perth Amboy, and a member of the New Jersey Assembly and the Continental Congress. He was also a member of the Board of East Jersey Proprietors, the holders of the original colonial land grant. He was heavily involved in land speculation in New Jersey and southern New York. His marriage to Elizabeth Jemima Alexander (1720-1800), the daughter of James Alexander (1691-1756), in 1748 also brought ties to the Parker, Rutherfurd, Reid, and Livingston families, further strengthened by the marriage of their daughter Mary "Polly" Stevens (1752-1814) to Robert R. Livingston in 1770.

Their other son, Richard Stevens (1723-1802), concentrated on the family mercantile business, specifically the triangular trade with Britain and the West Indies. Campbell Stevens (1714-1770) and Lewis Stevens (1720-1772), two of their other sons, served in the British forces in the West Indies and the attack on Louisbourg.

Third-generation family member John Stevens III (1749-1838) served as the Treasurer of New Jersey in the American Revolution. In 1784, he purchased the Hoboken Tract opposite New York City, which became the family seat. Stevens was interested in mechanical improvements of all kinds, his principal object was to create a workable steamboat, initially with the collaboration of his brother-in-law Robert R. Livingston (1746-1813) and Nicholas J. Roosevelt (1767-1854), a skilled mechanic, and after 1800 with the aid of his sons. In 1804 he produced the Little Juliana, a small launch with twin screw propulsion, and two years later he began work on the Phoenix. Before it could be completed, Livingston and his new partner, Robert Fulton (1765-1815), put their first boat in service and secured a monopoly grant for steam navigation in New York waters. Stevens sent the Phoenix around to Philadelphia and operated her on the Delaware River, with a connecting stage service across the waist of New Jersey. By the 1820s, the Stevens family had also secured a major interest in the stage route. Stevens also owned a lucrative ferry franchise between New York and Hoboken.

In 1812, John Stevens began promoting the building of railroads. On February 2, 1815, he secured the first American railroad charter for a line between Trenton and New Brunswick. In 1823, he secured another charter for a railroad from Philadelphia to Columbia in Pennsylvania, and in 1825, he displayed an experimental locomotive as a novelty on a circular track on his Hoboken estate.

In 1830, his sons, Robert Livingston Stevens (1787-1856) and Edwin Augustus Stevens (1795-1868) became the prime movers in organizing the Camden & Amboy Railroad and Transportation Company, which completed its line across the state in 1834, replacing the old stagecoach link. Robert is credited with designing the American pattern of T-rail and spikes and other railroad and steamboat improvements. Together, the brothers developed the Stevens plow, and in 1842, began developing the Stevens floating battery under contract with the Navy. This early ironclad remained uncompleted by the Civil War and was eventually abandoned. In his will, Edwin created and endowed the Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken.

The Stevens family continued to develop new inventions and improve transportation methods in New Jersey during the principal years of establishing the recently independent United States.