Seaside Heights

Best Shore Towns in New Jersey

/ johnfea
Jersey ShoreOct2009 014

Looking for gold at Ocean Beach

Here are the top ten, according to NewJersey.com:

  1. Cape May
  2. Harvey Cedars
  3. Manasquan
  4. Beach Haven
  5. Ocean City
  6. Bradley Beach
  7. Cape May Point
  8. Surf City
  9. Ship Bottom
  10. Island Beach State Park

Here is my ranking (I’ve been to just about every beach listed by NJ.Com and others that are not listed):

  1. Ocean Beach (Dover)
  2. Beach Haven
  3. Island Beach State Park
  4. Seaside Heights
  5. Ocean City
  6. Cape May
  7. Asbury Park
  8. Ortley Beach
  9. Wildwood
  10. Harvey Cedars

More Seaside Heights

/ johnfea

I continue to be devastated by this.  A piece of New Jersey history (and my childhood) may be gone for good.

Here is a Facebook post from Kohr’s Frozen Custard:

What can we say? Our hearts are broken. Kohr’s Frozen Custard lost all 4 stands to yesterday’s fire.

Not only did we witness our business being taken from us, right before our eyes, we also witnessed our family’s history go up in smoke. Our hearts go out to all our neighbors, friends, and “family” that had to witness the same. Thankfully no lives were lost and nobody suffered serious injury.

Thank you to the firefighters that fought tirelessly to save what they could.

Finally, thank all of you for your thoughts, prayers, condolences, and well wishes.

Sincerely,
Bruce and Nancy Kohr

Here is some raw video from NBC-New York:

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Here is what’s left of the carousel at Funtown Pier:


Here are some of our past posts about Seaside Heights:

Seaside Heights: The Town That Fun Built

The Corporatization of Seaside Heights

Seaside Heights vs. Wildwood

Thirty Minutes of Unedited Footage From Seaside Heights, NJ–1985

Does Anyone Know Where I Can Get a Copy of This Concert Poster?

Fire on the Seaside Heights Boardwalk

/ johnfea

First there was Sandy.  Now this:

http://cdn.abclocal.go.com/static/flash/embeddedPlayer/swf/otvEmLoader.swf?version=fw1000&station=wpvi&section=&mediaId=9246601&parentId=9245840&cdnRoot=http://cdn.abclocal.go.com&webRoot=http://abclocal.go.com&configPath=/util/&site=

My childhood vacation destination can’t seem to catch a break.  The fire started at Kohr’s, my favorite custard stand on the boardwalk (and in the world).

So sad.

The Last Summer at Seaside Heights? or "Place Is Not Meant to Be Eulogized"

/ johnfea

This New York Times op-ed really hit me hard. 

Carmen Petaccio knows Seaside Heights, New Jersey.  His grandfather was the long-time owner of one of my favorite Seaside boardwalk arcades–Sonny & Rickey’s.  I played a lot of skee ball in that arcade in the 1970s and 1980s and took home a lot of spider rings.

We try to visit Sonny and Rickey’s every Fall.  The old school skee-ball lanes are gone.  Today my kids drop dollar bills into crane-type machines in the hopes of lifting out a stuffed animal.

I am assuming that the Petaccio family is part of the large Italian-American population that live on the south end of the Barnegat Peninsula.  Even as Carmen pursues a M.A. in fine arts at Columbia University, he still spends summers working the redemption counter at Sonny & Rickey’s.  Now, as the boardwalk reopens in the wake of Hurricane Sandy, he wonders if the Seaside of his childhood (and my childhood) will ever be the same.

Here is a taste of his piece.  Anyone who loves Seaside or the Jersey shore should read it.

Seven months later, my town is still standing. The businesses have reopened. The White Oak Market is selling its beach chairs and deli meat. Riggers, the local diver bar, serves its first customers at 7 a.m. The lifeguard stands have been re-propped. The rebuilding of the boardwalk is essentially complete, just in time for Memorial Day, the start of beach season. This year, Seaside is celebrating its centennial, 100 years of forgotten worries, breezes slipping through the heat like a friend through a crowd.
As for Sonny’s & Rickey’s, mold still scales the outside walls, street to roof, and its steel door continues to dangle, forebodingly, three feet clear from where it once met the building, like a dislocated shoulder. To this day, despite decades of payments to our insurance provider, we have yet to receive a dollar in compensation.
And yet, we’re up and running. This summer, like each of my past 25, I’ll spend my mornings on the beach at Brighton Avenue, and nights behind the arcade’s redemption counter. Whenever I’m not there, my family will be.
What’s less clear is if our customers will show up too, if the beach houses will be rented, if the vacationing families will descend on schedule.
We can’t help but wonder if the summer of 2012 was the last summer to resemble those we’ve known and loved. Who’s to say there isn’t yet another hurricane brewing?

The Jersey Shore: Six Months After Sandy

/ johnfea

Joe Scarborough devoted some time on “Morning Joe” to the Jersey Shore.  (They are positioned in front of the Paramount Theater in Asbury Park).  Six months ago Hurricane Sandy ripped through this area.  This video reports on the slow-moving recovery efforts:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32545640

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Great line in this next video by New Jersey Governor Chris Christie: “Presidential politics was not on my mind that day.” 

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32545640

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

I wonder how much time Jon Meacham has spent in the working-class shore towns of Seaside Heights and Asbury Park?  I respect Meacham’s historical works on American religion, Andrew Jackson, and Thomas Jefferson, but how much does he know about the Jersey Shore?