Feature articles that have appeared in Cape May Magazine
It’s a system of loyalty and trust. Loyalty to those who visit Cape May beaches, and trust among the lifeguards themselves. No occupation seems to embody the all-American summer like that of a well-tanned, able-bodied, vigilant and attentive lifeguard. Lifeguards sit upon their chair, constantly scanning the horizon looking for […]
When a November 2014 storm uncovered a span of railroad track at Sunset Beach, people were surprised. Few knew why train tracks would even be there, or about the forgotten role of trains in Cape May’s history. Across much of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, trains made a huge impact […]
Forty-two years ago, God visited the Mainstay Inn. Well, it wasn’t actually the Supreme Being, and it wasn’t quite the Mainstay Inn, at least not the one that stands proudly on the intersection of Columbia Avenue and Stockton Place now. But back in the early 1970s, the self-appointed deity of […]
Your family’s day at the beach is done. The kids have had enough of surf and sand, soft-serve custard and SPF 50. But in Cape May, the fun doesn’t end when the sun goes down. New Jersey’s southernmost resort is a far cry from Wildwood, with its mega-amusement piers and […]
In a Coast Guard town like Cape May many tales are told about old salts and their adventures at sea. But this story, about an extended Coast Guard family, is one for the history books. Llewellyn “Lew” Midgett was among the first young men to finish boot camp when the […]
Winterwood Gift & Christmas Shoppe is a place of perpetual good cheer.
“It’s like a Norman Rockwell painting,” I’d say, describing Cape May’s charming atmosphere. I grew up 50 miles “up the road” from Cape May, and visiting was a bi-annual excursion. On college Christmas breaks, my mother and I would walk the quiet beaches and streets and look at the historic […]
In the tense years before the Civil War, when heated debates about slavery resonated in the halls of Congress, when churches increasingly denounced its evils, when free blacks were beaten in northern cities, when thousands of courageous, determined people managed to free themselves and escape north, Cape May was deeply embroiled in this struggle for freedom.
It took a tanking economy to launch one of Cape May’s most distinctive shopping destinations. This year, the West End Garage marks 10 years of serving customers near and far.
It has been more than half a century since two major fires ripped through Schellenger’s Landing. The first, in 1966, destroyed the Lobster House restaurant, and the second, a year later, incinerated Fisherman’s Wharf and threatened a major explosion. Just this summer, a treasure trove of never-seen-before photographs of the […]
TV viewers may be familiar with the iconic opening from HBO’s Boardwalk Empire. Bottles of liquor from some unknown smuggler’s boat wash ashore on the Atlantic City coastline at the feet of fictitious Prohibition kingpin, Nucky Thompson. The isolated sandy shore of South Jersey was a convenient offloading spot for […]
On the evening of December 8, 1980, Gene Schultz, now a Lower Township resident, but then of the prestigious Frank E. Campbell Funeral Home in New York City, was assisting a family with funeral arrangements for their deceased loved one at one of Campbell’s associate chapels. During their solemn preparations, […]
“Cape May is the place of places for an epicure. All our great hotels…have become famous justly for their cuisine. Everything that the world gives in the edible line is to be found in the bills of fare of our Cape May hotels—aye and on their tables.” Cape May Ocean […]
He has been named “The Master of Disaster” and “Katrina’s Point Man.” U.S. News & World Report lists him among the top 20 leaders of 2005. In 2011, he was featured by the Council on Foreign Relations in its HBO series History Makers, which focuses on some of the most […]
For brainless, primitive bivalve mollusks, Atlantic sea scallops lead pretty interesting lives. The deceptively simple organisms live in vast beds along the ocean floor. Tucked just beneath the sand, where they burrow for safety, scallops are virtually invisible at first glance. But these plucky little creatures aren’t content to let […]
For half a century, South Cape May was the summer retreat of working-class families, tourists and titans of industry. By the early 1950s, most of the town had washed out to sea. But for one early resident, the memories linger on.
A Famous Surgeon, a Marital Scandal, a Live Branch, and a Ghost
Even the Boss couldn’t save the Beach Theatre. Ten years ago, in the midst of a campaign by an ad hoc group of Cape May citizens to rescue the historic Beach Theatre, Bruce Springsteen joined the chorus. The citizens group, assembled under the banner of the Beach Theatre Foundation, had […]