By Charles Layton. (2011 on Blogfinger.net)

I happen to be reading The War in the Air by H.G. Wells, the turn-of-the-century British author famous for his prophetic ideas, depicted in what later came to be called science-fiction novels. The War in the Air foresaw World War I, describing it as a global combat employing enormous and powerful flying machines. It was written in 1907, only four years after the Wright Brothers’ first successful flight at Kitty Hawk.

About halfway through the book, a fleet of German airships moves in from the Atlantic to launch a surprise bombing attack against New York City. This German fleet, Wells writes, “reached New York in the late afternoon and was first seen by watchers in Ocean Grove and Long Branch coming swiftly out of the southward sea and going away to the northeast. The flagship passed almost vertically over the Sandy Hook observation station…”

What a picture! All those Methodists standing beside their tents marveling at the passage of an airship armada.

If anyone else has happened across an interesting reference to Ocean Grove in literature, please let us know.