Chester Township, New Jersey. By Paul Goldfinger. 2012.
SOUNDTRACK: Diana Krall from her Christmas album. Diana appeared last summer (2012) in the Great Auditorium –a rare performance there by a jazz artist. Let’s hope for more. — Paul Goldfinger
Archive for the ‘Blogfinger News’ Category
Chester Township Pastoral
Posted in Blogfinger News, tagged Sleigh ride with Diana Krall on February 21, 2023|
Blogfinger has received visitors from 153 countries, around the world, in the last 365 days.
Posted in Blogfinger News, tagged Visitors to BF from around the world, What's a shtarker on February 19, 2023|
We had 87 visitors from Israel, so since it’s Passover, here’s a tune that you might recognize if you have ever attended a bar mitzvah or a Jewish wedding. You can get up and dance a hora–you join hands and go round and round in a circle. Not very good if you suffer from motion sickness as I do. Or you can let some shtarkers* carry you around in a chair–a fairly terrifying experience.
* shtarker: a Yiddish word for a strong person, usually a male. I used to be a shtarker who could help carry the bride around, but now I sit at my table and nurse a scotch and water while checking out the dancers. Here is Hava Nagila. (which means “Let’s rejoice” which is what my people like to do–which is good to do after 4,000 years of ups and downs.) —-Paul Goldfinger, Editor @Blogfinger.
Just the facts, M’am: Blogfinger watches for inaccurate reporting about our town.
Posted in Blogfinger News, tagged Pink Grove, Pinkification of Ocean Grove on December 17, 2022|
Blue is the new pink. Blogfinger photo and news report. May, 2015.
By Paul Goldfinger, Complainer-in–Chief. @Blogfinger. This piece is from 2015 with a 2022 update on the bottom.
Ocean Grove is a fairly complicated place when it comes to news, so when other media get it wrong, and that often happens, we complain. In fact Blogfinger.net is the leading media source of Ocean Grove news, so we keep our eyes open.
For example, when the Asbury Park Sun got the facts wrong regarding why FEMA refused to pay for our boardwalk, we made a fuss.
The Asbury Park Press almost never publishes news about Ocean Grove . They used to send a reporter to those interminable Neptune Township Committee meetings, but they no longer do so, probably because their reporter may have slipped into a coma due to boredom during one such session. Besides, who wants to go there when the Mayor might yell at you and call a cop. Ask Jack Bredin about that!
Even the National Geographic, when reporting on our zip code in the 1990’s, made us look like the religious retreat that we were in 1870. I sent them a letter.
And the Tri-City News could care less even though OG might be considered one of the “Tri-” in the hood. But it’s just as well that they do ignore us. A few years ago I complained to their editor Steven Froias, a Grover, about their lack of OG coverage , and he said that it wasn’t true. Really? Well, that’s no loss.
Just last week, we had to critique the Coaster when it made a bunch of errors in their front page story about the new Ocean Grove NERP. (North End Redevelopment Plan.) They found that story when the Township handed them some talking points, but even then, there were mistakes.
In today’s issue of the Coaster they seem desperate to write something about Ocean Grove, so they have two photo stories about pink ribbons in the Grove, including one on the front page.
But guess what—they even got those stories wrong. In both photo captions they tell us that “May is Breast Cancer Awareness Month”—– but actually, October is; May is brain cancer awareness month, and that color is gray.
Did the Coaster or Meridian get their diseases or their colors mixed up? It’s a good thing that Blogfinger is around to keep the facts straight and the road paint white in OG.
2022 update: Perhaps you have noticed recently that the Coaster is beginning to pass us by. Maybe we are too boring even for them.
We do get lengthy reports every meeting of the Home Groaners Ass. written by the Coaster stenographer. We heard that the HGA will be having a “forum” in January 2023 identifying a new group in town called “the non-religious.” I can’t wait to hear what that’s all about and why such a meeting could be helpful in town.
It seems that the “forum” will be a set-up designed to embarrass the Camp Meeting Association. It will bring two groups together for what? And who will represent the “non-religious,” and who says that the CMA will show up?
What will it be? A debate? An argument? a consultation? A new direction in town?—fuhgetabout it.
Yes, the CMA deserves perusal and, when appropriate, public criticism if their public policies might be bad for the future of the Grove, but to frame it as some sort of religious or “non-religious” confrontation is without merit.
The Coaster never reports on culture issues in the Grove. They never report on anything without a press release from somebody with an ax to grind; eg Michael Badger of the CMA or one of the five gay caballeros at the Neptune Mother Ship.
And now the Coaster is avoiding Grove news unless they must pay attention to something like an invasion of Martians on Ocean Pathway. Or, if we ever get our first Bartender of the Week, they will be on the scene.
And they are even avoiding us for the “question of the week” department. We are not even allowed to tell them what we are doing New Years Eve.
Now their fine journalist Don Stine is gone, so there is a replacement who so far is doing pretty well, if only they would let her do some real reporting in the Grove. And maybe she would ask some probing questions in town. Blogfinger would welcome that and maybe we will avoid calling them “Coastericans.”
TAYLOR SWIFT. “Today was a Fairy Tale.”
SUGGESTIONS FOR A NEW TOWN SLOGAN. From Blogfinger in 2012. See the comments. You can add your own now in 2022..
Posted in Blogfinger News, Feature article on December 17, 2022| 13 Comments »
What say we fly over to Clancy’s for a brewski.
By Charles Layton. 2012.
Ocean Grove has a time-honored town slogan: God’s Square Mile. It is memorable and succinct. However, as we know, OG is really only about half a square mile – less when it’s flooded — and surrounding its Methodist core there has arisen a large and vital secular community. We think that community needs a slogan of its own. Therefore, here are our “top ten suggestions for a new town slogan.”
10. Ocean Grove: Not responsible for lost or stolen items.
9. Ocean Grove: A National Historic Site – but you can get a variance.
8. Ocean Grove: Gayer than thou.
7. Ocean Grove: Absolutely no mosquitos. Honest.
6. Ocean Grove: No parking at any time.
5. Ocean Grove: Property of Jack Green.
4. Ocean Grove: Where’s my bike?
3. Ocean Grove: Home of Blogfinger. (Well, why not?)
2. Ocean Grove: It only floods when it rains.
And the Number One suggestion for a new town slogan:
1. Ocean Grove: What do you have to do to get a drink around here?
Here’s a 2022 musical suggestion with Peter Allen: “Everything Old is New Again.”
MUSIC: Jerome Kern, Oscar Hammerstein II, Carly Simon , and Ken Peplowsky and friends “All the Things You Are.”
Posted in Blogfinger News, Music: The Power to Enchant, tagged Dizzy Gillespie and Jerome Kern, MUSIC: "All the things you are" on September 9, 2022| 1 Comment »
—Paul Goldfinger, Editor, Blogfinger.net
Some songs really need to be performed with a vocalist because the lyrics are so beautiful. And that is true for the jazz classic “All the Things You Are.” It was written in 1939 for a show called “Very Warm for May.”
Jerome Kern wrote the music while Oscar Hammerstein II wrote the words. These two musical geniuses collaborated for many great songs. Here are some of the lyrics from the verse, so you can see how remarkable the words are:
“You are the promised kiss of springtime
That makes the lonely winter seem long
You are the breathless hush of evening
That trembles on the brink of a lovely song
You are the angel glow that lights a star
The dearest things I know are what you are
Some day my happy arms will hold you
And some day I’ll know that moment divine
When all the things you are, are mine”
But the music is so gorgeous on its own, that in the hands of a great jazz musician you can get this–
Ken. Peplowski and friends:
BONUS TRACK: This time with the words. Carly Simon from her 22nd album “‘Moonlight Serenade.” (2005)
Carly SimonModern OG history: With New Pipes, a Great Organ Becomes Even Greater. 2012 Blogfinger. By Mary Walton.
Posted in Blogfinger News, Feature article, Ocean Grove feature article, Ocean Grove news, tagged Great Auditorium organ, Mary Walton, the Great Auditorium in Ocean Grove on September 8, 2022| 3 Comments »
Organ curator, John Shaw preparing the new harmonic flute pipes for installation at the Great Auditorium. Photo by Mary Walton
By Mary Walton, Blogfinger staff. 2012.
Back in the 1960s, in what organist Gordon Turk deplores as “an unfortunate attempt to modernize” the magnificent organ in the Great Auditorium, 44 large open wood pipes were removed, cut up and used for wind ducts.
Their absence robbed the organ of its heft and rich, deep-throated tone. The person responsible “claimed to be an organ specialist but really should have been a plumber,” said Ocean Grove’s organ curator, John Shaw.
But when Turk puts the pedal to the metal for the opening concert of the 2012 summer season at noon Saturday, the Auditorium will once again fill with the sound that organ designer and builder Robert Hope-Jones intended listeners to hear.
Earlier this month replacement pipes made of poplar, constructed by A.R. Schopp’s Sons of Ohio and ranging in size from four to sixteen feet, were shoehorned into the tight quarters behind the choir loft by a team of Philadelphia riggers. To gain access, a wall to the building superintendent’s office had to be removed and then replaced.
There’s more. For some years Turk had longed for a set of harmonic flute pipes such as those found in the organs of certain French cathedrals. The Ocean Grove organ has many flute pipes, but harmonic flute pipes are distinguished by a small hole which reinforces certain overtones, giving them a clear “ringing” quality.
Until recently Turk believed they would render superlative sound only if housed in stone cathedrals. That is, until he played the organs at halls in Zurich and Vienna with acoustics similar to the wood-lined Great Auditorium. Could such pipes be installed here?
Turk consulted, among others, Jean-Louis Coignet, the organ curator of the City of Paris, who had once visited Ocean Grove and pronounced the auditorium’s organ “magnifique.” Over the winter they worked via e-mail to establish specifications for 306 harmonic flute pipes ranging in size from one and three-fifths to eight feet, divided into five “ranks” played from the organ’s five keyboards. John Shaw installed them just this week.
The two installations bring the organ’s total pipe count to 11,558.
The cost of the additional pipes is $65,000, made possible by gifts from two donors, James G. Howes of Clearwater, Florida, a transportation consultant, and Dr. Liselotte Schmidt, a retired music professor who lives in Newtown Square, Pennsylvania.
Howes, the grandson of Methodist minister G.E. Lowman, a noted Baltimore radio evangelist, contributed $45,000 for the construction and installation of the open wood pipes in memory of his grandfather. “I thought this would be a wonderful way to memorialize my grandfather and make a contribution to Ocean Grove that everyone could enjoy,” he said in an interview.
Howes learned to play the organ in his grandfather’s church, the Baltimore Gospel Tabernacle, now an historic landmark. “I’m just good enough,” he said, “to know how much more I need to know.” He has also played and sung in the choir of the interdenominational Riverside Church in New York City.
Howes’ grandparents were frequent visitors to Ocean Grove, as was his mother. Howes himself has been coming here since childhood and never misses a Choir Festival. A pilot who forged a career in airport management, Howes is also the president of Atlas Communications, which offers a weekly radio program, Sacred Classics, and produces CDs and concerts.
One CD recorded in 2001 features Gordon Turk. Titled “Sacred Classics at Ocean Grove,” it has sold more than 3,000 copies, which Howes says is “very good for an organ record.”
He will be in the audience Saturday when Gordon Turk will debut the organ’s new additions.
Turk will also offer a July 4 recital (“Storms &Thunder, Stripes & Pipes”) and will play at a July 5 Summer Stars performance with the Philos Polished Brass Ensemble. And featuring, of course, the Auditorium organ.
One of the new 16-foot open wood pipes under construction earlier this year in Ohio
Editor’s note. September, 07, 2022. Below is a comment from OG historian David Fox dated today.
The Auditorium organ was purchased at a supposed discount in return for having, “Hope-Jones Organ Co. Elmira, N. Y.” emblazoned in gold on the base of the central display pipes. This ceased to appear on postcards in the 1920s.
While the company went out of business in 1910 and the present instrument is mostly not Hope-Jones, I feel it would be a nice historical touch if the name were restored.
It also had some now vanished “U”-shaped wooden ornaments running along the slanting tops of the pipe screens.
CANTILENE. This is a Gordon Turk recording on the Ocean Grove organ.
Postcards From Ocean Grove
Posted in Blogfinger News on August 17, 2022|
“September Tents.” By Paul Goldfinger
JUDY KUHN. “Time After Time”. written in 1946 for a Sinatra movie. It Happened in Brooklyn.
“No Turns”
Posted in Blogfinger News, tagged Photo: No turns in NYC on July 13, 2022|
“No Turns.” NYC Street Series: By Paul Goldfinger. Click photo for full view. ©
SHIRLEY BASSEY with a New, York, New York medley:
Autumn in the Poconos. Music from Russia.
Posted in Blogfinger News, Music: The Power to Enchant, tagged Autumn in the Poconos, Russian music for autumn on July 11, 2022|
Autumn, Scotrun, Pennsylvania. By Paul Goldfinger. Left click for full image. Copyright 2012.
There’s a town in the Pocono Mountains, Pennsylvania, near the Delaware Water Gap, called Scotrun. John and Jean live up a curved country road named after the family that settled that area. It’s called Krantz Hill Road.
You drive up the hill and pass old barns and houses, spread apart. Hunters track deer in that part of the country. When deer season starts, schools are closed so the kids can join in. It starts with bow season, and then the guns appear.
John and Jean have a long driveway that rises to their home which was built in the 1930′s and sits on a hill. It’s a perfect house for that property which consists of woods and fields. They can relax in their living room and see the Gap. (No, not the store at the mall.)
They also can see the deer moving through along with bear that prowl around the neighborhood. They have rigged up a bird feeder that the bears can’t reach, and quite a variety of birds migrate that way.
Delaware Water Gap taken from John and Jean’s porch in Scotrun. By Paul Goldfinger
If you walk through those woods, you find old stone walls which are common through woodsy areas of Pennsylvania and New Jersey. John is a hunter whose field dog is a German short hair named Gillie who gets to run free through the woods around the house until John calls him. John is a no-nonsense guy, and that dog comes right back when summoned.
SOUNDTRACK. “Snowstorm Suite III: Spring and Autumn” by the Hermitage Museum Orchestra conducted by Alexander Titov. The Suite is composed by Georgy Sviridov (1915-1998. Russian)
Don’t Know Much About History? Ocean Grove’s Remarkable Story Timeline is About Much More Than Religion.
Posted in Blogfinger News, Ocean Grove history, Ocean Grove history by Blogfinger, tagged Ocean Grove history, Ocean Grove history timeline, Timeline on April 11, 2022| 2 Comments »
This photograph (with permission) is the first in Ted Bell’s ” Images of America: Ocean Grove.” CLICK TO ENLARGE
BLOGFINGER RE-RUN FROM 2010. It’s important that more people other than tourists learn OG history. This timeline gives some perspective for new Grovers and others who ought to educate themselves to this sequence of events. Thus we periodically re-post this timeline.
By Paul Goldfinger, MD, Editor @Blogfinger.net.
Ocean Grove’s history is a fascinating saga about how a Methodist summer community founded in 1869 eventually evolved into a historic and diverse year-round tourist town while preserving its religious and architectural characteristics.
Sure it’s about the Camp Meeting Association (CMA), the Great Auditorium, the tents, and the famous religious figures who took center stage since the founding, but there is so much more to tell, particularly about the town’s secular history including: its governance; the multiple attempts to secede from Neptune; the successful but temporary creation of an independent secular Borough of Ocean Grove in 1920; opening of the gates in 1979; loss of governance by the CMA in 1980; the decline of the “blue laws”; the extraordinary successes of the Ocean Grove Homeowner’s Association as they transform OG from shabbiness to renaissance by the 1990’s; the remarkable demographic changes of the 1990’s including the growth of the gay community, the amazing musical heritage, the fights over taxes, and there is so much more.
The Historical Society of Ocean Grove has offered wonderful exhibits about such topics as the women’s suffrage movement and the African-American “history trail” here, and we at Blogfinger have run two pieces about John Phillip Sousa in Ocean Grove as well as the account of Paul Robeson’s 1925 concert in the Great Auditorium.
We plan to continue our series of articles on some of the less well known accounts in Ocean Grove’s history, especially focusing on secular events. We will begin the process of digging into Ocean Grove’s fascinating past with a time-line. It’s important for Grovers to know this history. You may be surprised by some of the items below:
1869: Ocean Grove is founded by the Rev. William Osborne and his colleagues. They form the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association of the Methodist Episcopal Church (CMA) and begin purchasing land. The town is part of Ocean Township. The CMA’s goal is to provide and maintain a Christian seaside resort.
1870: The New Jersey Legislature grants a charter to CMA which allows them to govern in Ocean Grove. They can make ordinances, establish a police department and a court of law, and administer all infrastructure and services including schools, sanitation and library.
The town is designed “from scratch,” becoming one of the first planned communities in the US. The first lots are “sold” (i.e. leased) from the CMA which retains ownership of all the land. The first cottage is built in 1870.
1872: Over 300 cottages have been built.
1875: Rev Adam Wallace founds the Ocean Grove Record, the town’s first newspaper. Rev. E. H. Stokes, the first CMA President says, regarding the gate closure on Sunday, that “there is no human probability that these rules will ever be revoked.” The first train from New York arrives in OG. People begin to stay year round.
1879: The NJ Legislature creates Neptune Township by carving it out of Ocean Township and incorporates Ocean Grove’s boundaries as part of Neptune. Ocean Grove CMA and lot/home owners pay taxes to Neptune. Leaseholders (“lessees”) must continue to pay “ground rent” to the CMA.
The CMA refuses all services from Neptune and continues to function as the “governing authority,” maintaining rigid control in OG. Physical isolation within its boundaries, “blue laws,” land ownership, and a homogeneous population of Methodists contribute to the sustained CMA rule. Ocean Grove is, in practice, a theocracy. But that will become a problem for them over 100 years later.
1897: The first mention of tax discontentment appears as CMA President Bishop Fitzgerald speaks publicly about Neptune’s tax bill and says, “Of the discrimination against us in the matter of taxation does not as yet seem to admit of remedy.”
1898: Ocean Grove’s “lessees,” who pay property taxes to Neptune Township, want the CMA to pay the land taxes to Neptune. A suit is brought by the homeowners, but in 1900 the NJ Supreme Court sides with the CMA.
1912: Ocean Grove’s citizens want to participate in the town’s governance, so they elect a Board of Representative Lessees to join with the CMA in managing the town’s affairs. There was unrest, with many citizens disliking this peculiar arrangement and wanting Ocean Grove to be a regular town with an elected secular government.
1915: the Ocean Grove Taxpayers and Protective League is formed.
1918: CMA has financial problems and asks Neptune to take over police, garbage and sanitation functions. Neptune refuses.
1920. The Lessee Board is dissolved, and the Civic Betterment League is formed. Its goal is the creation of an independent Ocean Grove Borough. The CMA supports the idea, and the NJ Legislature passes an Ocean Grove Borough bill which creates an incorporated borough, apart from Neptune. Governor Edwards signs it into law, a referendum in town receives wide support, and local elections are held.
The new Borough of Ocean Grove operates for one year, but they retain the CMA “blue laws”. Opponents in town want things the old way and they form the “Lessees Association” They sue in State Supreme Court.
1921: The NJ Court of Errors and Appeals finds the Borough bill to be unconstitutional, because the Borough has allowed religious ordinances to stand. The Borough bill might have been upheld if the “blue laws” were discarded, but the CMA and its supporters refuse. The Borough is dissolved, and governance goes back to Neptune and the CMA. This was not the first attempt to gain secular control of OG, but this one came the closest.
1923: A bill to make Ocean Grove a separate tax district with its own tax rates gets “lost in the legislature.”
1924: A big battle ensues as Neptune tries to substantially increase the CMA’s taxes, including high taxes on the beach, Auditorium, streets, sewers, etc. CMA wins in 1925 at the NJ Tax Board, and most of their holdings are not taxed.
1925-1960: The town is a popular summer resort and is known internationally. Huge crowds visit along with US Presidents and many celebrities. As for the ongoing arguments in Ocean Grove, the historian Gibbon says, in 1939, “Many times residents and land lessees of the town have voiced their objection to the local rules, to the tax situation or to the form of government, especially from 1900-1925, and there have been many court fights.”
For the most part, things stay the same.
1960-1980: Ocean Grove declines, along with much of the Jersey shore. (See below)
1975: A group of dedicated citizens led by Mr. Ted Bell and his colleagues obtain approval for OG’s designation as a State and National historic district. It is a complicated process. Formation of Board of Architectural Review (BAR) happens in 1984. (Later re-named the Historic Preservation Commission—HPC.)
1975: A newspaper service sues over Sunday’s gate closures, which had been permitted by town ordinance. The NJ Supreme Court strikes down the ordinance on grounds that it violates the first amendment to the Constitution (freedom of the press). The gates are opened for the news service only, but the CMA is allowed to continue its theocratic governance of Ocean Grove and the enforcement of other “blue laws”. Many people in Ocean Grove view the gates’ opening as an unhappy event.
1977: A lawsuit stemming from a drunk-driving conviction challenges the authority of Ocean Grove’s municipal court. The NJ Supreme Court widens the scope of the case and decides in June, 1979 that CMA governance in Ocean Grove is in violation of the Constitutional separation of church and state. Appeals are filed. This marks the beginning of the end for CMA governance in OG.
1980: The US Supreme Court would not hear the appeal, so governance of OG is transferred from the CMA to Neptune Township. Neptune eventually eliminates most of the blue laws. Only the Sunday morning beach closure and the ban on alcohol sales remain.
1980’s: By the 1980’s, the town is characterized by an overall “decrepitude,” including deterioration of buildings, declining tourism, crime, and a growing poor elderly population. (2) Deinstitutionalized mental patients are housed in empty old hotels and rooming houses in Ocean Grove. The town becomes a “psychiatric ghetto” (NY Times, October 1988), and, by the 1980’s, 10% of the town’s population are mental cases who are not receiving appropriate services and are sometimes abused by landlords. The prognosis for Ocean Grove is dire.
During this period, the Ocean Grove Homeowner’s Association (OGHOA) develops as a political and activist force that successfully begins the process of converting the town from decay to renaissance. (2f)
1990’s: OGHOA, led by Mr. Herb Herbst, Fran Paladino and others, fight for fair treatment in the allotment of the mentally ill around the state. The group’s political contacts and influence are considerable. The process is complex and difficult, but the numbers of “de-institutionalized” in OG drops considerably.
The group also saw to the closing of many substandard boarding and rooming houses. The HOA presents Neptune with a “master plan” to protect the historic nature of OG and to rezone for the promotion of single family houses. OGHOA promotes secular tourism while working with CMA to increase religious tourism. New people come into town to buy homes and invest in businesses.
1995:
The historic Neptune High School is saved from becoming low income housing by a group of Ocean Grove homeowners led by Mr. Herb Herbst and with the assistance of State Senator Joseph Palaia and others. (3, 4) The Jersey Shore Arts Center is owned and run today by a nonprofit tax exempt organization: The Ocean Grove Historic Preservation Society.
2000: Secular goals achieved as of 2000: increased property values, increased upgrading of houses, improved relations with Neptune, improved downtown with quaint shops, art galleries, cafes, etc., reduced crime, increased tourism, reduced de-institutionalized patients, demographic changes (increased gays, empty nesters, retirees, professionals, academics, young artists, and middle class families).
2005: House prices peak.
2007: New topics emerge: North End development, Ocean Pavilion dispute (gays vs. CMA), evolving demographics including more second home purchases, significant increases in property taxes, parking problems, Asbury Park development stalls, and home prices decline.
2009: Ocean Grove blog is founded (Blogfinger.net) by Paul Goldfinger, MD to help fill in the gap created when the OG newspaper closed. It offered a place to voice opinions about Ocean Grove’s many ongoing issues.
October 29, 2012. super-storm Sandy hits the Jersey Shore and destroys the Ocean Grove beachfront, part of the Great Auditorium roof, and floods the south side of town.
2009-2022: Blogfinger documents ongoing issues in town. Use the search engine on top right.
SAM AND DAVE:
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS:
1. R. Gibbons, History of Ocean Grove: 1869-1939 (Ocean Grove Times, 1939)
2. K. Schmelzkopf, Landscape, ideology, and religion: a geography of Ocean Grove, New Jersey, Journal of Historical Geography, 28, 4 (2002) 589-608
3. Kevin Chambers, Herb Herbst, and Wayne T. Bell, personal communication,( 2008)
4. Archives, Asbury Park Press, (Feb 19, 1997.)
OG Historical Snapshots: When the Realtors Came to Town—1872.
Posted in Blogfinger News, Ocean Grove history, tagged Ocean Grove history--lesson one, Realtors in the Grove on April 3, 2022| 1 Comment »
Swimwear from “Victorians’ Secrets.” *
By Paul Goldfinger, history editor @Blogfinger
In 1869, the Founding Fathers founded Ocean Grove in Larry’s Park (later, the name was changed to Founders’ Park.) Soon thereafter, many visitors came to this popular resort. Some people wanted to live here, but sleeping in tents began to wear thin, so a building boom began, and along with that came realtors in 1872.
They opened an office on Main Avenue and called it Century 19. Many of the realtors were young ladies who wore billowing dresses with hoops and crinolines that made them extra wide. It was fun watching 2 or 3 of them squeeze inside a tent. They drove their clients around in shiny buggies that said “20% down” on the back.
The sales pitch for selling houses here must have been a challenge because of all the limitations: no horses in town on Sunday, no alcoholic drinks, no tossing pie pans on Sunday, no carousing on Saturday night, and no hanky panky.
Well, that last one was quickly tossed out due to overwhelming opposition by the folks in the choir, especially the basses and the sopranos. Besides, Grovers did need something else to do on Sunday.
Another reason why there was no “blue law” for sex was that a baby was conceived in the tent colony, and that is where the term “Founding Father” was born.
One of the problems was that Rev. Stokes had organized a lot sale. People came from New York City and Philadelphia to buy land in this unique town. Then, somehow, it turned out that they had purchased a lease. “What the heck avenue?” they complained.
But even today, no one knows why their house is sitting on somebody else’s land. Luckily, lawyers followed the realtors into town and they made it all official.
It should be noted that you couldn’t go to Asbury Park for fun back then, because it was a sedate place having just been founded in 1871. The Asburians tried to emulate the example of Ocean Grove, but good luck with that idea.
Watch for our next installment of “OG Historical Snapshots” when we will tell the story of Jewish Grovers and how they introduced bagels with cream cheese to God’s Square Mile.
*One of the girls in the picture is April Cornell. She eventually opened a beautiful shop on Main Avenue in the Grove, but she was forced out by some creepy developer from New York. After that she opened in Spring Lake where the locals appreciate her despite her baggy “cover your butt” fashions.
And now that Stokes is gone we hear that some new women’s fashions will debut this summer in the Grove. This photo reveals an example of a California style miniskirt. Who says that miniskirts cannot get any minier?
This photo from Santa Barbara is by SBCFireinfo/twitter. Their crowds are almost as big as ours in Ocean Grove, sponsored by the Chamber of Commercials and the OGCMA. Will the CMA object when she shows up in the Grove for Bridgefest ?
And here is Dinah Washington, who knows what to do on Sunday:
Beautiful baby at Founders Park…
Posted in Blogfinger News, Postcards From Ocean Grove, tagged Art show in Founders Park 2005 on March 28, 2022|
Founder’s Park Art Show 2005. By Paul Goldfinger. © Click image to see that she must have been a beautiful baby.
This is the sort of small-town community event that we need in OG. So much better for the locals during the loveliest time of year in the Grove (springtime) when we should have our town to ourselves.
Am I repeating myself? Well golly..some things bear repeating (or is it bare?)
BILLIE HOLIDAY WITH THE TEDDY WILSON ORCHESTRA :
12 members of heroin drug trafficking organization operating in Manhattan, Bronx and New Jersey charged in Manhattan Federal Courts
Posted in Blogfinger News, Blogfinger Presents, Blogfinger reports, tagged Drug ring shut down in Monmouth County on March 21, 2022| 1 Comment »
DEA and ATF federal officers at a surprise raid to capture an alleged drug dealer. 8/16/17. APP photograph. Manchester, NJ is in Ocean County, near Toms River. APP.com has more photos and an action video. One of the arresting officers is an OG resident. There are drugs in OG and everywhere.
By Paul Goldfinger, MD. Editor @Blogfinger.net
RE-POST: There have been over 150,000 deaths over the last year due to drug overdoses. The problem in 2022 is worse than ever, aggravated by open borders to the south. Evil drug cartels are lacing heroine and cocaine with the highly toxic, potent, and fatal drug fentanyl. Did you read about the West Pointers on spring break who overdosed in Fort Lauderdale? This happens when drug users get hold of what they think is heroine or cocaine and don’t realize that they can die from the fentanyl mixed in.
This drug trafficking ring has been supplying death dealing poisons to citizens of Monmouth and Ocean Counties where opiate related mortalities have been going up sharply.
From NJ.com in March 2017:
“Authorities are working with the Drug Enforcement Agency, the Medical Examiner’s Office and other health officials to figure out why the northeast coastal communities are “disproportionately impacted” when compared to the rest of the state. ”
Below is the official document dated Tuesday, August 15, 2017 by the United States Attorney’s Office, Southern District of New York, by the Acting U.S. Attorney Joon H. Kim. Special to Blogfinger from official sources, August 15, 2017.
“Joon H. Kim, the Acting United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, and Carl J. Kotowski, the Special Agent in Charge of the New Jersey Division of the Drug Enforcement Administration (“DEA”), today announced the unsealing of an indictment charging 12 defendants with participating in a drug trafficking organization that distributed large quantities of heroin in and around Monmouth and Ocean Counties, New Jersey, and obtained the heroin from Washington Heights and the Bronx, among other places. In conjunction with the unsealing of the Indictment, search warrants were executed at several locations in New Jersey.
“Acting U.S. Attorney Joon H. Kim stated: “As alleged, this organization transported large quantities of heroin from Washington Heights and the Bronx across the Hudson to Monmouth and Ocean Counties in New Jersey, helping to fuel the opioid epidemic plaguing our nation. Today’s arrests of twelve alleged members of this heroin distribution organization is part our sustained commitment, along with our partners at the DEA, to stop the flow of heroin into and out of New York.”
“DEA Special Agent in Charge Carl J. Kotowski said: “Today’s arrests should send a clear message to the drug traffickers that DEA and our partners are committed to keeping our neighborhoods safe. Those arrested are facing significant time in prison and will no longer be pushing their poison.”
“Mr. Kim thanked the DEA Monmouth Ocean HIDTA Task Force for their outstanding work on the investigation. The Monmouth Ocean HIDTA Task Force comprises representatives from the DEA, the ATF, the New Jersey State Police, Monmouth County Prosecutor’s Office, Ocean County Prosecutor’s Office, Toms River Police Department, and the Neptune Township Police Department.
Mr. Kim also thanked the Howell Police Department, the Freehold Township Police Department, the Lakewood Police Department, the Monmouth County Sheriff’s Office, Ocean County Sheriff’s Office, the Passaic County Sheriff’s Office, the Union County Sheriff’s Office and the United States Attorney’s Office for the District of New Jersey for their assistance in this investigation. He added that the investigation is continuing.
“This matter is being handled by the Office’s Narcotics Unit. Assistant United States Attorneys Elizabeth A. Hanft and Michael D. Neff are in charge of the prosecution.
“The charges contained in the Indictment are merely accusations, and the defendants are presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.
(note: italics are ours at BF)