This Week in Ocean County, 1921! (September 16th)

9/17/2021

BREVITIES AND EDITORIALS

(often written by NJ Courier editor, William H. Fischer, as he sat at his desk above Main Street near Washington Street; it was much like a collection of online social media updates seen today)

Moonlit evenings.
Full moon tomorrow.
First week of school.
Farmers want more rain.
Primary a week from Tuesday.
It rained the first day of school.
Freeholders meet again next Tuesday.
Dry weather has caused many leaves to drop while green.
Election boards made their house to house canvass this week.
Cranberry men are rushing the crop off the bogs, fearing cold snaps.
A son was born last week to Mr. and Mrs. James R. Hensler of Water street.
Sweet corn and lima beans seem about the only prolific vegetables of the summer.
The farmers will get enough out of their potatoes to pay for what they put in the crop.
Grapes are high priced—not enough to eat, let alone for the fellows who want to put up a little grape juice.
The new poultry packing house is shipping eggs daily except Saturday for the present. Later it is expected to ship three days a week.
Last Saturday was as fine bathing as there had been all summer—the water in the ocean has been warmer in September than it was in mid-summer; though that is not unusual.
Miss Annie Allen yesterday took over the newsstand next the postoffice, and Miss Lula H. Robbins retired from active business. It is the only newsstand and stationary store in the village, and has a large clientele.
Huddy Park is losing its wealth of summer flowers.
The Gypsies have spent the summer on the Miller Chamberlain lot in Berkeley.
Mars and Venus are both morning stars now, and Jupiter will be after September 22.
Sun rises tomorrow at 5.42 and sets at 6.07, standard time, or 6.42 and 7.07, daylight time.
One week more of summer according to the calendar, autumn beginning next Friday.
A week from today is the autumnal equinox, when the sun crosses the line and the days and nights are about equal length.
There is no shortage of work for those who want it in this section. Building keeps up and the building mechanics are busy.
A.P. Greim is building a house of cement block at Birdville, which will be a big addition to his property there. He already has a big shop of cement blocks.
Rumor says that the State Board of Health has had agents here inspecting the houseboat colony and sand spit squatters situation from a sanitary point of view.
Have you seen the wildflowers in the fields and along the roads? Goldenrod blooms in great profusion; purple asters, yellow asters, and tiny white asters, add their brightness; there is still much butterfly weed, with its gay orange coloring; on the cranberry bogs a yellow daisy like flower gives a sheen of yellow at a distance, old field balsam overruns fallow grounds on the uplands; water lilies still bloom in ponds and streams.
First day of court is a sad and sorry imitation of the first day that the oldtimers knew. Now a few lawyers, judges and grand jurors meet. In the old times, it was an event, and everybody of importance in the county would be on hand, especially on the first day of September court, which was the best time to get a line of political happenings. But alas, the glory of the first day of court has departed. The lawyers have captured the court completely.
Capt. Lambert made a trip to Atlantic City last week in the Ariella.
The clock is expected to turn back to standard time on Sunday, September 25.
Mrs. Xydias has bought from Charles R. Berrien the house he owned on the south side of Dover street.
The Toms River Amusement Company has started its sixth house on Irons street, near West Water street.
The Pennsy is to change its train schedule, dropping summer trains, on September 25. Some folks expect it to drop daylight schedule at that time, but no announcement has been made as yet.
George Wolf of this place bought a Ford car on Monday, and on Tuesday evening, when he went to crank it, broke the big bone in his right wrist. He will be unable to use the wrist for six weeks.

A FAVORED REGION
The Ocean County Shore is a favored region. The past summer has been the best it has ever known in a good many ways. Not everybody has got rich and not everybody has made a big summer's money, but it seems that at least everybody has made a living. And the average business man in the average shore town—seashore or bayshore—has had better business this past summer than in the average season. In fact, take it as a whole it is by far the best summer the shore ever had, ranking with last year, and in some respects surpassing 1920.
This is a favored region, anyway. There is less real want, less dire poverty here than any other section I ever visited; and there is more independence of thought and action, as well as more independence economically. It is true that we have no big industries, but that has its compensations, for our people either work for themselves or for neighbors, which is mightily different from working for a big corporation. If you know of any place where the average working man lives as well as on our shore, I have not found that place, that's all.

HEADLINES AND NEWS NOTES

SEASIDE PARK HELD RACES SATURDAY IN 3 CLASSES
Last Saturday Seaside Park Yacht club held races in the sloop, catboat and sneakbox classes, as a windup of the season. It was a neighborly race, a club affair, only Seaside Park Yacht club boats entering. The result (corrected time) was as follows:

Ardo Won in Sloop Class
Ardo, the smallest of the sloop fleet, with a big time allowance, won in the sloop class.
Ardo, Walling – 1:43:07
Sonoma, Elverson – 1:43:45
Wanda, Davis – 1:50:32

Thacher's Romp a Winner
The oldtime cupwinner Romp gave the other catboats a drubbing in the race for single-stickers.
Romp, Thacher – 1:43:21
Dorothy, Larkin – 1:45:37
Mouser, Atkins – 1:46:28

Townsend Took Sneakbox Honors
In the sneakbox class the honors of the day went to Townsend, one of the new type, built by Capt. Eli Townsend, and named after her builder.
Townsend, Pennock – 1:04:01
Windlass, Thacher – 1:04:25
Mower, Lloyd – 1:07:00
Loop, Trumpy – 1:26:18
There was a strong southeast wind blowing and making a fairly heavy sea in the mouth of the river. The course was from Seaside Park dock to Coates Point.

BAY HEAD YACHT CLUB
Bay Head Yacht Club has elected officers for the coming year...
The club expects next year to have a new catboat to rival the newer boats in the Island Heights and Seaside Park fleets; also two or more of the twenty foot sneakbox class. Bay Head Yacht Club members agree thoroughly with the suggestion made this summer in the Courier that the 20 footer should be kept a working boat and that freak craft should not be allowed to creep in and take all the prizes, and drive out the real boats.

ISLAND HEIGHTS WILL FIGHT ABANDONMENT OF R.R. BRIDGE
Property owners at Island Heights are up in arms, and will fight to a finish, so they assert, any attempt on the part of the Pennsylvania Railroad to abandon either its bridge or its train service across Toms River to Island Heights. This proposed abandonment it is alleged, was being quietly nursed along by the Pennsylvania Railroad officials, who were letting Pine Beach property owners, in their fight to retain a station the year around, get ready to put before the Utility Board the fact that the Island Heights bridge and spur train service combined are a costly item to the railroad. Then if the Utility Board could be induced to order the abandonment of the bridge, because it did not pay, the railroad officials might not have appeared in the matter at all as being the parties wanting to stop running trains into Island Heights. But, unfortunately for the working out of this well laid plan, it is alleged that a news story in the Courier 3 weeks ago “spilled the beans,” or “let the cat out of the bag...” as it has been differently charged by various interested and irate people, who are demanding to know how the Courier got this carefully covered up information.
But whatever the intentions of the railroad officials, Island Heights people will fight any abandonment of railroad service. The railroad officials are alleged to have offered to Island Heights residents, who immediately went to the front on reading the Courier story, the bridge, as an automobile bridge, saying that the county could have it, so the story goes...
Old residents of Island Heights and Toms River will recall when the bridge was built. The yacht owners of Toms River vehemently opposed it and went into court to prevent its construction, but lost out. The bridge was built by the Island Heights Railroad Company, composed of men interested in the Island Heights Association. This was about 38 years ago, shortly after the railroad had been extended from Whitings to Seaside Park. When the extension was planned, both Toms River and Island Heights people thought it would run on the north side of Toms River, thus going through both villages, and then up the bay shore to Point Pleasant; but George M. Dorrance, at that time realty man for the officials of the Pennsylvania Railroad, quietly bought up large tracts of beach land, and the route was run on its present line, south of Toms River and across to the beach. This left Island Heights out in the cold, and brought about the demand for the spur and bridge.
When the Island Heights people built the bridge, they leased it to the railroad company, it is alleged, for 99 years, for the consideration of one dollar and the agreement of the railroad company to furnish service over it for that length of time. This is the story as told by oldtimers who were actors in those days of shore development. It is alleged that the Island Heights men also got the right of way and graded the spur, but the Pennsy laid the ties and the rails on spur and bridge, and built the draw...

SPECIAL REPORT: 1881 LAKEWOOD TIMES AND JOURNAL

Having read the account of the Pennsylvania Railroad attempting to abandon its Island Heights spur, which today has been a reality so long it only exists in awareness with historical accounts, we dove back into Ocean County Library System archives and pulled this account published on the front page of the Lakewood Times and Journal on Saturday, August 6th, 1881, over 140 years from where we stand now in time.

Special Correspondence of the Philadelphia Press
CITIES BY THE SEA.
Time was when those who went down to the sea in ships had a monopoly of the going, but later on the railroads began to strike out for the shore, and now they carry more people to the sea in three months than sailing vessels carry on its bosom in as many years. So rapidly has the summer population of the New Jersey coast increased within the past decade that where the then pine forests and sand dunes were unmolested by humanity prosperous towns and villages are now seen; and there is at this writing hardly an acre of land on the coast which has not been purchased by some company or individual and given prominence by a name having generally a local significance. There is hardly a prominent point which is not accessible to the cities by rail...
[The article goes on to describe the rise of interest in summer resorts and residences with the railroads providing new service, and begins a firsthand account of riding the rails from the Camden depot to Seaside Park, continued below as it leaves Pemberton for Toms River:]
...Leaving Pemberton we soon reach a stretch of open country known as the New Jersey Plains. The land is nearly level for the next eighteen miles. Whortleberries [similar to blueberries] grow by the roadside with pine and shrub oaks, and occupy almost all the intervening space on the “Plains,” where thirty years ago were deer and other game in abundance, and where an occasional buck or doe is still seen browsing miles in the distance. The airbrakes again hiss and we are at Whitings Station, where there is a junction with the New Jersey Southern Railroad and the Tuckerton Railroad. Two or three cars are dropped from our train and taken up by the last-named road, over which passengers seek the sea in Beach Haven... [We continue our] journey over the new road proper and glide at surprising speed over rails only laid a few weeks ago. But the road-bed is level, the irons are new throughout, and the route is an air-line. We glance at the engineer and wonder if he is not outrunning his time table. But he keeps steadily on.
TRACES OF THE ABORIGINES.
We have hardly time to note that the face of the country is unchanged, when a glance toward the northeast reminds us that Toms River is almost within hailing distance.
Toms River, the county-seat of Ocean County, is located on the north side of the river of the same name. It has the usual Indian tradition, and, as many believe, takes its name from one of the aborigines known as “Old Tom.” An occasional long-buried hatchet or bit of indescribable pottery is still turned up in the fields and serves to keep the Indian memory green. It is an old village, much modernized by the enterprise of a few speculative New Englanders who came to view the land, bought it, and induced their friends to follow them. About every third man in the place is called “Captain;” all speak, more or less, the sea vernacular, and native boys in knee-pants sail yachts upon the river. A fleet of the finest yachts, aside from those of New York or Philadelphia, is found at Toms River, and the annual regatta is an event anxiously looked for and reluctantly left in the distance. Just east of Toms River is Money Island, which derives its name from another tradition to the effect that the tiresome Captain Kydd buried a heap of his treasure there. What with an aborigine and a pirate of their own, the inhabitants have something to exchange romances about when the topics of weather and crop—the county has never had a case of capital punishment—are exhausted.
The railroad continues its course on the south side of the river, and the next station is known as and is opposite to Island Heights. This is, indeed, an attractive spot. Along the river front is a levee, back of which, on gradually ascending ground, is the village. Broad and well-kept avenues run down to the levee, at which yachts float and swing with the wind and tide. Three years ago this place was an unbroken forest; now there are many pretty cottages erected, streets are regularly laid out and the store and the restaurant flourish. The auditorium, which is a natural amphitheatre, has echoed in camp-meeting times the stentorian tones of the fiery Corbitt and the eloquent discourse of the late Bishop Simpson has been wafted by gentle breezes over the heads of hundreds and into the hearts of many...

Onward we speed, and the sea breeze, which met us several miles back, grows fresher and stronger. Soon we are at the bridge which united either shore of Barnegat Bay. This bridge is a mile and three-eights in length and is as solid and firm as need be. At the draw we see the little steamer Hessie, which plies between the bridge and the incipient Barnegat City. Passengers alight and their baggage follow them, while their eyes dilate as the passengers who have just disembarked board the train with several handsome sheepshead, the product of the famous fishing grounds at the inlet and the outcome of a day there with rod and reel. Where may not a man do as well if not in the open country sixty miles from the dust and noise of the city.
Over the [bay], a slight detour northward a few hundred feet, and we are at Seaside Park. Engineer Wilkinson looks at his watch, and, including the run over the spur to Island Heights and the turning of the engine there, we are on time at 5:25, having made the sixty miles in less than two hours. At Seaside Park there are two large hotels and a number of cottages, all of which are filling up with people. The beach is one fo the best for bathing along the entire coast, and what is now a village in embryo promises soon to be a popular and populous resort. We may go a few miles toward Point Pleasant City by rail, but as the route is not yet open to travel we secure a room at the Berkeley and settle down to enjoy the seabreeze, preparatory to a good night's rest.

And now, back to 1921...

PINE BEACH FIGHTS SHUT DOWN OF P.R.R. STATION
Pine Beach is fighting its hardest to prevent the shutting down of the Pennsylvania Railroad station at that point during the winter months. The reason given for this proposed action on the part of the railroad officials is that the Island Heights-Pine Beach spur does not pay for itself. The Pine Beach residents come back with the assertion that they are on the main line and that their station amply pays for itself in traffic the winter through...

BIG SUMMER AT TOMS RIVER
This has been the biggest summer for a good many Toms River business places, that they ever had. The hotels were overflowed again over the last week end, and had to put people out in private houses to lodge. The new Marion inn has had a fine business this summer, and it is also true that the Ocean house and Central house have had a big summer. Deposits in the First National Bank on Tuesday reached the high water mark of $1,465,000, while at the Trust Company in round figure deposits were $950.000.

OCEAN COUNTY BOYS SHOW WIRELESS AT SPRINGFIELD, MASS
The Ocean County Wireless club, the first in the U.S., has the distinction of setting up and exhibiting a wireless outfit at the gathering of club members from all the northern and eastern states this week at Springfield, Mass. This station, to be erected by the Ocean county lads at the expense of the government, will be made permanent. Three boys leave today, Friday, for Springfield, to set up and operate the station: Melton Cranmer, Lakehurst; Richard Huggard, Lakewood; and E.R. O'Connell of Lakehurst, who takes the place of Stewart Newman of Toms River, whose untimely death a fortnight ago cut short a promising future.

TO THE TAXPAYERS OF ISLAND HEIGHTS
In November I worked 18 days burning leaves and cleaning gutters. Up to May 1 during 14 days a month doing same, I visited the town at least three times a week and found windows, doors and shutters open which I secured. I also looked after washouts in the streets and placed as many as five lights a night on them. Up to the 1st of January, 1920, I received at the rate of $2-per day; from Jan. 1 to July 1, rate of $1.35 per day, which the borough would have to pay the rate of $4 per day.
PETER NEWMAN, Marshall

BRANT GOT POLHEMUS PLACE
The Clarence Polhemus property on the north side of town was sold Tuesday by Sheriff Chafey, under judgment secured by the A.A. Brant Lumber Co. Henry L. Brant, owner of the company, bid in the property at $500. Polhemus, as contractor and builder, put up a number of houses at Beachwood, buying his supplies of the Brant Co. There was a dispute in the settlement and they secured judgment for the amount owed them. While this matter was in dispute, Polhemus deeded his property to Will Riley Applegate, who the same day deeded it to Polhemus's wife. The Chancery Court set these deeds aside and the property was sold under judgment.

POULTRY MEETING AT WHITES
A meeting of the poultrymen in the Whitesville section was held on Wednesday of this week at that place. M.R. Hecht, manager of the Poultry Producers shipping plant at Toms River, explained the business methods of that organization and instructed the egg producers how to pack their eggs to avoid breakage and loss in getting them to the packing house here.

NOT TO ENFORCE LAW IS ANARCHY, STATES JUSTICE
Not to enforce law, or the refusal of the minority to abide by the decision of the majority, is a reversal of the principles of our system of government, said Justice James F. Minturn in charging the September grand jury on Tuesday, 13th inst. Justice Minturn was talking openly about the situation in this state in regard to prohibition enforcement, when he told the grand jury that not to enforce the law, whether the law suits us individually or not, will overthrow law and order, and supplant the rule of law with anarchy and chaos.
Justice Minturn charged the grand jury in the absence of Justice Samuel Kalisch, who is in Europe taking the baths, because of his ill health. The Justice, notice the presence on the grand jury of several women, said that because of tehse new members, who might not be so well acquainted with the growth of our judicial and court system, he would tell them at length the duties and responsibilities of the grand jury.
He then took up the matter of the enforcement of the liquor law. He said that he might have had a different view of the need of the prohibition law than that entertained by the lawmakers of the state and nation, and the individual grand juror might also entertain different view, but that made no difference. The lawmakers of the nation and of the state, representing the majority of the voters, had, in order to protect society from the evils of drink, outlawed the sale of alcoholic drinks. The bootlegger or whoever sold liquor contrary to those federal and state laws, was a criminal, and they must so consider him. To allow the individual to nullify any law he chose, meant anarchy and chaos, and subversion of the principle of the rule of the majority, on which our government is based...

LAST GAME OF 1921
What was said to be the last game of 1921 was played yesterday afternoon, ((Thursday) with the Brooklyn Royal Giants, claimed to be the best and foremost colored team on the coast. Score was: Brooklyn 6—Toms River 3.

MATERIAL FOR ZR-1 COMES
Several carloads of material for the big airship ZR-1, which is to be assembled at the naval air station, Lakehurst, arrived there last week from League Island Navy Yard, Philadelphia, where the duraluminum frame has been fashioned, ready to put together.

RAILROAD CO. NOT TO BLAME FOR TWO DEATHS AT CROSSING
The double tragedy on Labor day, 1919, when Charles Jones of Tottenville, Staten Island, a cottager at Beachwood, and his apprentice boy, Ralph Knudson, had their lives almost instantly wiped out at the Main street crossing of the Central railroad, just at the station in Toms River, was rehearsed again in our courts this week, on Wednesday and Thursday. Lizzie Jones, widow of Charles Jones, and William Knudson, father of the boy, brought suits against the Central Railroad for damages for these deaths, and the cases were tried together. Owing to the fact that the railroads were in government control when the accident happened, the suits were against the Director General of Railroads. Prosecutor Joseph E. Stricker of Middlesex county, represented the plaintiffs; DeVoe Tomlinson of the Central railroad legal staff, with former Prosecutor T.J.R. Brown and Mr. Thomas, represented the road.
The jury, after hearing the evidence and the summing up by the lawyers, brought in a verdict that the railroad was not to blame, and giving no damages to the relatives of the victims...
One result of this tragedy was the order of the State Utility Board that the crossing should be guarded with gates, which very likely has saved similar accidents in the past summer.

CAPT. JOHN HULSE
After an illness of about ten days Capt. John Hulse died at his home in Osbornville on Tuesday afternoon, August 30. He would have been 81 years of age had he lived until the 17th inst. Capt. Hulse was a civil war veteran, having enlisted in the 28th N.J. Vols., served the required time, re-enlisted again in a New York regiment with which he fought until the close of the war. He participated in some of the hardest battles of the war, among them being Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville and Gettysburg. He was wounded twice but not seriously.
For 23 years he was attached to the coastguard station at Chadwick and when he was retired a few years ago because of physical disability, there was not a black mark against his long and faithful service. Since his retirement he had spent considerable time duck shooting and most every duck hunter who is in the habit of enjoying this rare sport on Barnegat Bay, was familiar with the name of Capt. John Hulse, who was one of the best wing shots in the state. The civil war veterans are now few in number; they are fast passing away. It will only be a short time before they will all be summoned to answer the final roll call and, like Capt. Hulse, join their comrades on the other side...

PERSONAL
President Harding [yes, the actual president – anybody traveling from New York City/northern New Jersey and Atlantic City had to use the most direct land route before the Garden State Parkway was installed in the early 1950s – which went right through downtown Toms River] and party drove through town on Monday afternoon, en route from Atlantic City to New York. Their only stop in Toms River was at Main and Washington streets, when the driver of the leading car slowed down enough to ask directions for the road.
Congressman T. Frank Appleby of Asbury Park, was in town Monday. He is spending part of the Congressional recess circulating about the district to learn if he can what his constituents are thinking about and what they want done. This is a pretty good idea, but one that is rather a new plan in this district. Mr. Appleby said that he was now at work on the Barnegat light matter, trying to convince Commissioner Putnam that the jetties needed there could be built for much less than the $175,000 estimated by government engineers. He believes the work can be done for perhaps $50,000.
Mrs. H.G. Flint and son Richard have returned to Niagara Falls, N.Y., for the winter, after spending the summer at their home on the Main Shore road in Berkeley [later, South Toms River, where H.G. Flint would become its first mayor and give his name to Flint Road, where he lived, and which was the original highway before what is today's Route 9 followed closer to the river]. Mr. Flint is manager of the Shredded Wheat company which has its factories at Niagara Falls.
Mr. and Mrs. Andrew Schwarz and Mr. and Mrs. Wm. B. Pierce, who went down to Long Beach on a camping trip last week, made a short stay. They took a violent antipathy to the warm welcome that the Long Beach mosquitos had prepared for them, it seems, and came home.
Latest reports from Mt. Holly say that Philip S. Irons, formerly of Toms River, and one of those very ill from typhoid, following the church supper at Jacobstown, is now improving, and if he continues without setbacks, will recover. This is very good news for “Sherd's” many friends in Ocean county.

FISH AND GAME
Partyboatmen at the shore towns along the bay say that this was one of the best summers they ever had. Forked River boat captains had an especially good summer. With some fo them during the latter part of the summer, when the city sportsmen found fish often bit better at night than in the day, many boatmen took out two parties every twenty-four hours, one at night and one by day, and they were almost dead for want of sleep when this last week gave them a little letup.
Fish have been biting at nights, the baymen say, except when the water was full of phosphorous. At such times the fish apparently would not bite except at dusk or in the early dawn.
From every section of New Jersey come reports that rabbits are unusually plentiful this season. Farmers and sportsmen agree that it has been many years since the cottontails were so numerous. The reports also indicate there is a bountiful supply of pheasants and quail this year. A dry summer is usually credited with insuring a big crop of young game, and every farmer can testify to the thoroughness of the drought during the last few months. Other factors that had added to the game increase have been the liberal restocking with birds by the Fish and Game Commission and the increased efficiency in the enforcement of game conservation laws...
Reports from Waretown, Forked River, Tuckerton, Seaside Park, Beach Haven and other points on Barnegat bay late last week were that immediately after the northeast blow that began a week before had subsided the fish began to bite both inside and outside of the bay. Big weakfish, some as heavy as eight and nine pounds apiece, weer caught by many boat parties, from eight to thirty fish to a boat being reported.

PLEASANT PLAINS
The state road is some road all right. It makes some folks seasick to ride over it. By the way, the township roads are in bad shape also. Maybe not so wavy so as to get seasick but very uncomfortable to drive over.
Wilmer Clayton has a fine patch of watermelons.

OCEAN GATE
The graveled streets through Ocean Gate were so much in use this summer, and the improvement so much appreciated, that it is hoped more can be improved next spring. As it is you can drive a car within east distance of almost any residence in the borough. The new approach to Ocean Gate via Pine Beach has been much used by motorists this summer, since it was opened to travel, and is well liked.
The tightness of money has prevented considerable building that had been contemplated here this summer. However the outlook is good for the winter and spring in the building line, particularly so if costs drop a little and the money market loosens up a trifle.
Hotel Keisel has had a very successful summer, so Mrs. Keisel reports, with guests from every part of the country, Main to Texas, and Canada to Florida. Instead of going to Florida this winter, the Keisels plan to remain in Ocean Gate and keep the hotel open for guests through the winter, which will be a great convenience for week end auto parties.

BEACHWOOD
The long heralded Beachwood movies taken with the picture outfit owned by Mr. and Mrs. Butler, had their first presentation at the yacht club on Saturday evening. The place was crowded and many of those present had the pleasure of seeing themselves on the screen for the first time. Wm. A. Stephan had charge of the projector and R.B. Smith, with previous experience with professional movies, explained the pictures and made witty comments which drew roars of laughter. In his serious moods he explained the modus operandi of taking and showing the amateur movies as compared to those of a professional nature. In the latter the actors are made up for the occasion and have a field twice as large in which to move about. In spit of their limitations the Beachwood movies were a big success and many of those appearing in them showed genuine talent. Who knows, this may be the beginning of some Mary Pickford's career, or of some Charlie Chaplin. The community spirit was reflected in the pictures also, as for example in the handling of the newly-purchased fire apparatus at a supposed fire. The net proceeds of the showing of the films go towards pine and fire protection funds. New features are constantly being added and it is expected that another entertainment will be given at the yacht club next Saturday evening with vocal selections and recitations between the waits.
The summer is nearly over here, though numerous bungalows are still open, and it is expected that week end parties will be plentiful till the snow flies.
The Polyhue Yacht Club expects to see several more colored sails on the river next year. The 15-footer class seems to have put on Barnegat Bay to stay by means of this club, and the other clubs on the bay will have racing fleets to compete in interclub races next year.
Mrs. Wanda Lohr [owner of the Japanese-style pagoda house that still stands today at Capstan and Brigantine] will keep her home here open till cold weather. Mayor and Mrs. Senior are planning to stay here till about the middle of November, and then will take apartments in a New York hotel.
Wm. Mill Butler showed the famous Beachwood Days motion pictures at the yacht clubhouse on Saturday evening. The pictures were half the size of the commercial photographs, but showed many Beachwood scenes and Beachwood notables, making a great deal of fun. There was about 700 feet of film. More is being developed in Rochester, N.Y.
Rev. Dr. Martin Luther Stimson, who spent last winter and spring in Japan and China, visiting his old mission station and Fenchow, is expected here soon at his handsome bungalow.

BARNEGAT
Freight trucking is making great inroads in the steam roads' traffic. Well perhaps if the public kept up the railroad tracks they might do the same. The steam roads must pay the highest wages in the country, maintain depots, keep up their roads, furnish commodious coaches with softest cushions, ice water and sanitary cups, pay out millions yearly for freight damaged by these high salaried men who are paid to safely transport goods; agents and clerks to keep account of their business, scores of high salaried officers who ride around in special cars, at whose expense? Huge sums for repair shops and coal; these and many other expenses are what compels the roads to exact such rates to bring us a little stuff from the cities.
On the other hand what does it cost to a big truck to run from New York or Philadelphia to anywhere along our shore? Who keeps up the road, what are their expenses? Size up both sides and one can readily see why. But it's a great blessing to the public and the time will soon be when one can take a fast auto bus and go to Philadelphia and back much less than the steam roads can take you.
Labor day has passed, our summer visitors have gone, school is open, fall is here and before we know it Thanksgiving will be here.

HIGH POINT [a section of what is now Harvey Cedars]
Wesley and Horace Hellman and Wallace Sloan expect to sail the northern waters of Barnegat Bay in their sneakboxes “The Dark Hoss,” and the “Dam Slo.” They contemplate visiting all the towns on the way to Bay Head.

SEASIDE PARK
Quite a number of our summer people are still here and have enjoyed the fine September days.
The borough school opened Monday with B.M. Gould as principal and Mrs. Mangold as primary teacher.
Holmes VanNote, steward of the yacht club, will keep the clubhouse open till October 1. The tennis courts as well as the yachting have been very popular with the younger members this season, and match plays were frequently held on the club courts.

LAVALLETTE
At our last council meeting there was a petition for water signed by some of our property owners, asking a committee be appointed to see what could be done towards getting water in the town.
There are several families going to remain all winter in Lavallette, which will increase the winter population.
New houses are going up and we hear several more are to be erected very shortly.
The merchants have had a good season, as there have been more summer people here than ever before.
Gene Piard, has had a very good season with his large powerboat, taking parties out fishing and on pleasure trips. Anyone who wishes to take a trip, he is always on hand.

ISLAND HEIGHTS
Frank W. Henry and family have returned to their home in Merchantville, having spent the summer here. Mr. Henry is the standby in all the yacht races of the B.B.Y.R.A. Being a wizard at figures, in time and figuring out the position of the various contestants.
Never has the public dock been better utilized by more people than this summer. It has been a community center, a social center, a resort for cool breezes in hot weather, almost anything that was needed could be be'd there.
The ladies of the M.E. church cleared the sum of $60 at the rummage sale which was held on Thursday, Sept. 8.
Leo Mampe, our lone fisherman, is still on the job. We think that it would take seven bushel baskets to hold the perch caught this summer.
We are glad to state that Harry Hendricks will keep the Riverview hotel open all winter principally for the accommodation of sportsmen.

MONEY ISLAND
Another big meeting of the Improvement Association was held at the yacht club on the 4th. Mr. Brooks, the president, presided. The general welfare of the Island was discussed and Mrs. Hakspacher, chairman of the committee to visit the residents, turned in the names of a large number of new members... Plans were outlined for a number of improvements for the year 1922. Among the things discussed were the new pier, speed signs, large sign marked Money Island placed on the Main road, improvements to the roads, more lights, collection of garbage and a number of minor matters.
Mr. and Mrs. Wm. Donnelly and Miss Marion and Gordon Donnelly closed their handsome cottage and returned to Phila., on the 7th. This early departure was caused by the opening of the schools. The Donnelly cottage was the scene of much festivity during the season. Mrs. Faulkner, mother of Mrs. Donnelly, came to the Island in very poor health, returning very much benefited.
Whispering Pines, the bungalow of Mr. and Mrs. W.B. McNulty will close about September 15. Mr. and Mrs. Earle T. Ellis will return to Philadelphia at that time.
Mr. and Mrs. Theo. Siefert will keep Audubon Lodge open until the middle of the month.
The season was so enjoyable at Audubon Lodge that it was decided to form a boosters' social to repeat the pleasures of the season just closed during the summer of 1922 and for social enjoyment during the fall, winter and spring. Mr. Leon Siefert was elected president and his estimable wife, who is a charming hostess, was selected as secretary. One of the objects would be to advertise the attractions of the Island. The members of this newly formed Association certainly had a red letter season of pleasure and enjoyment, embracing yachting, fishing, crabbing, bathing and auto trips and in the evenings, moving picture shows, vocal and instrumental music, dancing and refreshments. No better time could have been enjoyed in any other place. This social, congenial body of residents enjoyed an ideal summer.

FLASH FORWARD: MONEY ISLAND, 1973

The Last Days of a Blue-Collar Resort
by Nancy Lyon for the New York Times
Sept. 16, 1973

MONEY ISLAND, N.J.—Soon the little strip of coarse beach will be deserted, Popsicle season will be over and the white enamel chairs at Laura's Candy Store will be turned over the tables. Another summer will become a memory for the folks and kids for whom Money Island, a four‐square‐block area of cottages on the Toms River in Ocean County, N. J., is paradise.

This tiny family resort community, a blue‐collar Fire Island, is paradise to the people who summer here because it is the only vacation style they have known, have been able to afford. Not because it is a paradise. Its backyards are strung with laundry, overgrown with weeds and cluttered with old mattresses and broken refrigerators. Front porches of the cottages serve as extra bedrooms or repositories of broken furniture, inner tubes and old newspapers. Living rooms are furnished with lawn chairs, carpeted with bathroom rugs, and plastic curtains cover the windows. Most of the dwellings lack the air‐conditioning needed to temper the sticky Jersey air. But the unjaded people who vacation here are grateful for the little strip of beach (never mind that the river is polluted) and the willows, mimosas, golden rain trees, spruce and elms thickly shading the streets. If you haven't slept in the Canadian woods or lolled in the Mediterranean, it is beautiful here.

Money Island is special because it represents a vanishing vacation style. Most of the houses here were bought generations ago when the land and building materials were still cheap, and now they are visited by the grandchildren and their families, Every summer they all come back. Everyone knows everyone else. Life is kept as simple as it can be. But one of these years Money Island will be devoured by the cloverleaf Americana on its fringe— strips of Colonel Sanders, gas stations and Ho Jo Inns only 50 feet from some of its cottages. It won't go the way of Lordship Point, a row of flim‐flam vacation cottages on Stafford Point, Conn., that were so decrepit they were condemned two years ago. Instead, Money Island's lots will be grabbed up by realtors offering a fancy price and turned into upper‐middle‐class recreational land, which will force the people of Money Island to more expensive vacation alternatives, or none at all. Ocean County, only 60 miles from New York City, is one of the fastest‐growing counties in the country and every year more and more Philadelphians and New York people pack the motels along the highways in the town of Toms River and adjacent seaside communities. The asphalt strip is closing in on Money Island, and the first sign is the controversy over a muffler shop some builders are trying to locate in the neighborhood. Money Island's residents, organized by Tom Jobson, managing editor of The Asbury Park Press, are protesting the building of the shop, saying that it violates the local residential zoning laws. If the muffler shop people win the case, the residential zoning laws will become meaningless and other commercial builders can intrude.

But for now, Money Island, with a year‐round population of 200 that swells to 1,000 on the busiest of summer weekends, is in striking contrast to its neighboring communities—Point of Woods with its modern split‐level houses; Island Heights with its turn of‐the‐century turreted, bay‐windowed frame homes; Breton Harbors with its clean cottages with gardens; the tawdry Seaside Heights boardwalk world; the Lakehurst Military Base with its Fitzgeraldian white military balls and Blue Angels demonstrations; the Toms River Yacht Club with its Sunday dinners and sailing fanatics. How Money Island is remote from these other vacation communities, and why it has remained so, are what made spending a long week end knocking on its doors an enlightening experience, one that won't be so possible in a year or so.

Mailbox names here: McCloskey, Weber, Pohlig, Murphy, Harrigan, Fuller, Becker, Feretti, Steele, Hart, Kovach, Legradi, Bradley. There are some Irish in Money Island, many Italians, some Polish, but no Jews. Not that the neighborhood is anti‐Semitic. People stick too close to themselves and their families to care about who moves in next door. And the fact is that people in this community rarely move. In years past, only when old people died and there were no children to keep up the house was it sold.

Money Island men are security guards, bartenders, janitors, surveyors, house painters, sales clerks and construction workers And the wives work, too—not because they are liberated, but because the family's summer vacation in Money Island wouldn't be possible if they didn't. So they are school bus drivers, sales clerks and secretaries.

In contrast to its tacky houses and weedy yards, the streets of this tiny community are solemnly named after literary figures—Keats, Poe, Longfellow, Tennyson, Burns, Whittier, Bryant, though no one knows why. And why is it called Money Island? A realtor for the area didn't know, but one of cluster of kids on the street said, “Oh, because Captain Kidd was supposed to have buried his treasure here.”

Some say that the treasure was buried on the bluff under a dead pine tree, others that it might have been buried in the creek, now mostly dried up, that makes the area technically an island. But since 1712, when the area's name was changed from Goose Creek to Money Island, the legend has prompted many a child, especially ones spending their first summers here; to dig up their backyards in search of the loot. Tom Jobson, who has one of the handful of middle‐class homes in the otherwise blue‐collar area, says he and his wife saved up for their swimming pool, party because he loves swimming, but partly out of a frail fantasy that the excavation might uncover the treasure.

Marguerite de Angeli, who summered on Money Island with her family for many years, in 1947 wrote “Jared's Island,” a children's book about a Scottish boy who is shipwrecked, rescued by an American sea captain and taken to Money Island. While Jared is secretly planning to run away from his adopted parents to look for the treasure, which he and his brother Colin had heard of before they left for America, he is told: If it's Captain Kidd thee thinks of, it's nearly seventy years since he was hereabouts. It is now 1760 and he was here in the late nineties. Besides, he roamed the coasts for hundreds of miles, from the Spaniard's Florida to the Massachusetts Colony. Set thy mind on treasures in heaven, lad, and stick to working for thy money.

Jared runs away from home to look for the treasure, winters with some Indians, finally gives up his pursuit and, like the prodigal son, returns home. While digging for fishing worms (right in his own backyard, of course), he accidentally digs up the treasure chest and finds a faded parchment stating:

TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN:
This chest of gold is truly mine and none other's. It is not pirate gold, but earned by me in honest toil in service of His Majesty King George. No man knows of it save me, for it is none of theirs. Whoever it be that finds it may keep it for his own.
Captain Kidd
1695

The legend lends a little excitement to this quiet, conservative community, but the real treasure of Money Island is its remoteness from 1973. Its remoteness from upward‐mobility vacations, fractured families, Hamptons sophistication, drug frenzies and Future Shock. Children still marry the boy or girl next door right out of high school or junior college and settle in the same or a neighboring town. Crewcuts are still popular. The casserole, now flourished with a little Hamburger Helper, is still the diet staple. Parents brag that there is no vandalism or drug abuse here. All the husbands wear wedding rings. Ministers take the place of psychiatrists.

The only commercial enterprise on. Money Island is Laura's Candy Store, a penny candy store in which jaw breakers (now 2 cents), baseball cards, ice cream and soda are sold over musty ancient counters. Money Island's teenagers hang out there day and night in the summer, playing the pinball machines, listening to songs like “Monster Mash” on the jukebox, cutting up and flirting to survive their adolescence, while Laura Lynch, a quiet Christian Scientist in her sixties, supervises them. Her little store is in a paint‐peeled house only 30 feet from the beach, and parents call her during the day to check up on their kids, or to relay messages to them. She closes the place down responsibly every night at 10, and the kids walk home, or if they have cars, stop along the way to park.

Laura's father opened the store in 1920, before Money Island's commercial zoning regulations were drawn up. “I'm selling the store this fall,” she says quietly, almost confidentially, “I'm getting old, and there's no real profit on penny candy and ice cream any more, you know. I'll be pulling up all my roots. I'll be sad. I don't even know if the kids know about it yet.”

The last summer for Laura's. The last picture show.

This particular afternoon at Laura's is like any other. The boys are at their jobs as amusement game operators at Seaside Heights, or in construction, or as electricians or plumbers’ assistants, while the girls wait for them during the day, bloating themselves with Coke, slamming the pinball machines, swapping gossip and confidences. Since the girls have to be 18 to work, and they aren't, they are bored. They don't spend their days curled under willows reading novels because their parents never did. They pursue their identities within this small group through the safely identical summer afternoons. They love Laura's because it is the only hang out they have, and most of them have been coming to her place since they could ride bikes.

Teen‐age Spokesman
“Some of the parents won't let their kids come here,” says one girl in halter top and jeans. “Some of us smoke, and there is some bad language, but no bad intentions. We just love getting together with our friends. We even look out for some of the younger children on the beach when their parents aren't around.”

After 5 P.M. the fellows start to drift in. A long‐haired boy wearing a “cannabis sativa” tee shirt drops a quarter into the juke box. “Rock and Roll Part I,” Gary Glitter; “Hot ‘N Nasty,” Humble Pie. As the cast gathers, sexual innuendos appear, the gum‐popping coquettes are recognizable now, wearing their careless‐but‐catch‐me looks. The girls are more attractive than the gawky peach‐fuzzy boys, but they are the only boys around, and so they pair off. They try to look sophisticatedly indifferent as they flirt, yet there is candid camaraderie within the group that is refreshing.

They all seem to love Money Island and have a crude awareness about that many of their parents don't have: that it's fun, but not a paradise. “Toms River smells like a dead catfish,” snickers one shiny‐faced fellow. “Man, you can't wear a white or light‐colored bathing suit because it'll turn reddish brown on you. It's the cedar in the water. And when you go home you have to wash the stuff off you and your suit, and it leaves a scum around your tub. We get the red tide here too some times, and it causes a lot of infections.”

They are squeamish when asked if there are drugs around. One girl says, with incongruous levity, “I believe that drugs will never solve or help you with your problems.” There is some talk about a pusher who comes in from Seaside Heights, the local Atlantic City, looking for business, but if these kids were interested in experimenting with drugs, the smallness of the community and fear of their parents would be enough to keep them from it.

The most ambitious of them will go to the local junior college, Ocean County College, which they derisively refer to as “Hooper High” because it's on Hooper Avenue in Toms River. “It's just a different building than the one you went to last year, and you go around with the same high school cliques,” explains one teen‐ager. But these kids don't have the incentive to escape their class, don't care about earning money to go to a better school. Summer job money will go for jalopies and motorcycles. Life is a simple formula—job, marriage, kids—and happiness an accident.

Not all the kids spend their days at Laura's. The pre‐adolescents have their own projects: selling Kool‐Aid on the corner, riding bikes, playing badminton or cards. Because they aren't entertained all day by their parents, summer camp, country clubs, fancy boats or tennis courts, they create their own inexpensive adventures. Brothers Ricky and Mike Folino caught 27 pigeons in one day in downtown Toms River under the Main Street bridge and have spent the summer training them as pets. The one perched at the moment on Ricky's shoulder is Egor the Second. (So that explains the number of backyard birdcages containing pigeons in the neighborhood.) But what about the strange abundance of bird feathers and droppings dusting the streets and yards of Money Island? That is something. else, Ricky says: For the last three years the area has been horridly invaded by thousands of starlings, and every night before dusk as they approach their eerie shrills can be heard. By dawn they disappear, leaving the siege of their feathers behind.

Somewhere on the island rock music blasts from one house, raping the silence of the willows. Inside, in a stuffy living room choked with cigarette smoke, sit three shirtless boys of college age and two slightly younger looking girls. They are down to escape “the city”—Bayonne. The house is being rented by the brother of one of the girls, who makes his money from odd construction jobs. The girls spent one year at Hooper High and left be cause it was “boring.” Yet out of school they are bored, directionless. This is the most severe boredom (the middle class would say ennui) I've seen on Money Island. Most everyone else shares a curious excitement about being here.

At another home, a 50‐year‐old tar paper cottage tilting precariously to one side, its residents, still dripping from their swim, sit on the porch in front of a weedy yard, seemingly admiring it. The cottage is unwinterized and its only amenities are cold running water and toilet. Its Austrian‐Hungarian owners, the Roths, bought it for $3,000 with a sister‐in‐law 19 years ago (now the land alone is worth $10,000) and have been driving the 78 miles from Philadelphia with their six children to be here for two weeks every summer, and on weekends through October. Though Mr. Roth is a carpenter, it doesn't look as if he's tried to fix up his place. He says it can't be winterized because it would be too expensive. For the moment, the Roths’ goal is to make enough money to rent a boat for one of their weeks in Money Island.

Mrs. Roth eagerly asks me what think of the island. She presumes I would love to have a house here, being so close to a nice beach and so many other families.

Because the Roths live in downtown Philadelphia, their children have a broader exposure to the world than the children who live here year‐round. That perhaps explains the ambition of the young Roth girl, who some day wants to be “either a medical technician or an airline stewardess.”

And now, back to 1921...

ADS OF INTEREST

EGGS STRICTLY FRESH
AT RIGHT PRICES
Because of the difficulties in shipping checked eggs (eggs that have their shells cracked, but are otherwise good as the best for immediate use), we will sell these eggs at prices that will please you.
Packing House
N.J. POULTRY PRODUCERS
ASSOCIATION CO-OPERATIVE, Inc.
Opp. C.R. Depot – TOMS RIVER, N.J.
================================
YACHTS FOR SALE
Ten launches and two sailboats (one with power) for sale. James Chamberlain, Toms River, N.J.
For Sale: Crosby cat-boat 26 ft. new sail in excellent condition. Also a 24 ft. raised deck cruiser. M.A. Pyott, Camp Walk, Island Heights, N.J.
For Sale: Tuckerton garvey, 27 ft., 7 1-2 hp. Mianus engine. Boat now in use, excellent condition, tax paid. W.W. Payne, 125 Washington st., Town.
================================
PUBLIC SALE:
Engleside, Beach Haven, N.J.
Hotel Furnishings: Bedstands, springs, mattresses, washstands, chairs, sofas, carpet, dishes, glassware, silver, gas fixtures, baggage wagon, hardness, etc. etc. Tuesday, September 20, at 2.00 p.m. daylight saving time—Adv.

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