The Cape May Historic District is an area of with over 600 buildings in the

resort town A resort town, often called a resort city or resort destination, is an urban area where tourism or vacationing is the primary component of the local culture and economy. A typical resort town has one or more actual resorts in the surrounding ...

Cape May Cape May consists of a peninsula and barrier island system in the U.S. state of New Jersey. It is roughly coterminous with Cape May County and runs southwards from the New Jersey mainland, separating Delaware Bay from the Atlantic Ocean. The so ...

Cape May County Cape May County is the southernmost county in the U.S. state of New Jersey. Much of the county is located on Cape May bound by Delaware Bay to its west and the Atlantic Ocean to its south and east. Adjacent to the Atlantic coastline are fi ...

New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...

. The city claims to be America's first seaside resort and has numerous buildings in the Late Victorian style, including the Eclectic,

Stick Stick or the stick may refer to: Thin elongated objects * Twig * The weapon used in stick fighting * Walking stick, a device to facilitate balancing while walking * Shepherd's crook * Swagger stick * Digging stick * Swizzle stick, used to stir ...

, and Shingle styles, as well as the later Bungalow style, many with

gingerbread trim Gingerbread is an architectural style that consists of elaborately detailed embellishment known as gingerbread trim. It is more specifically used to describe the detailed decorative work of American designers in the late 1860s and 1870s, which w ...

. According to

National Park Service The National Park Service (NPS) is an agency of the United States federal government within the U.S. Department of the Interior that manages all national parks, most national monuments, and other natural, historical, and recreational propertie ...

architectural historian Carolyn Pitts, "Cape May has one of the largest collections of late 19th century frame buildings left in the United States... that give it a homogeneous architectural character, a kind of textbook of vernacular American building."

Geography

The City of Cape May sits at the south end of

Cape May Peninsula Cape May consists of a peninsula and barrier island system in the U.S. state of New Jersey. It is roughly coterminous with Cape May County and runs southwards from the New Jersey mainland, separating Delaware Bay from the Atlantic Ocean. The so ...

which divides the

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth#Surface, Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the "Old World" of Afr ...

from the

Delaware Bay Delaware Bay is the estuary outlet of the Delaware River on the northeast seaboard of the United States. It is approximately in area, the bay's freshwater mixes for many miles with the saltwater of the Atlantic Ocean. The bay is bordered inland ...

. Cape May Point, about two miles west of the City of Cape May, borders the Bay, while Cape May City borders the Ocean. Cape Island Creek, a tidal "creek" and marsh, originally divided the site of the city from the rest of Cape May, but its southern end has long been covered with landfill. The Cape May Canal, built in 1942, now divides both Cape May City and Cape May Point from the rest of the peninsula.

History of Cape May

Cape May was first discovered by Europeans by

Henry Hudson Henry Hudson ( 1565 – disappeared 23 June 1611) was an English sea explorer and navigator during the early 17th century, best known for his explorations of present-day Canada and parts of the northeastern United States. In 1607 and 16 ...

on August 28, 1609. He landed on the shore of Delaware Bay a few miles north of Cape May Point before returning to the Atlantic Ocean. Cornelius Mey explored the area further in 1621 for the

Dutch West India Company The Dutch West India Company ( nl, Geoctrooieerde Westindische Compagnie, ''WIC'' or ''GWC''; ; en, Chartered West India Company) was a chartered company of Dutch merchants as well as foreign investors. Among its founders was Willem Usselincx ...

and by May, 1630 Samuel Godyn and Samuel Blommaert bought land for the Dutch from Native Americans covering the southern four miles of the Cape. In 1632 the Dutch established a fishing and whaling settlement in the area, but by 1638 colonists from New England had moved in. By the 1660s the English gained control and Daniel Coxe, a London Quaker, organized a government in 1687. Early settlers worked in the lumber, shipbuilding, whaling, fishing and shellfish industries. A road along the coast built in 1796 helped establish the hamlet of Cape May. The early emergence of Cape May as a summer resort was due to easy transport by water from Philadelphia to the Atlantic Ocean. Early Cape May vacationers were carried to the town on

sloop A sloop is a sailboat with a single mast typically having only one headsail in front of the mast and one mainsail aft of (behind) the mast. Such an arrangement is called a fore-and-aft rig, and can be rigged as a Bermuda rig with triangular s ...

s from Philadelphia, and water transport was also easy from New York, Baltimore, Washington, D.C. and points south. Southerners later became a large proportion of summer vacationers.Dorwart, Ch. 5, The Railroad and the Civil War, pp 93-140. The resort business in Cape May began to thrive when regular steamboat traffic on the Delaware River began after the

War of 1812 The War of 1812 (18 June 1812 – 17 February 1815) was fought by the United States, United States of America and its Indigenous peoples of the Americas, indigenous allies against the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, United Kingdom ...

, carrying passengers from

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Since ...

and

New Castle, Delaware New Castle is a city in New Castle County, Delaware, United States. The city is located six miles (10 km) south of Wilmington and is situated on the Delaware River. As of the 2010 census, the city's population was 5,285. History New Castl ...

. Commodore

Stephen Decatur Stephen Decatur Jr. (; January 5, 1779 – March 22, 1820) was an American naval officer and commodore. He was born on the eastern shore of Maryland in Worcester County. His father, Stephen Decatur Sr., was a commodore in the Unite ...

made his summer home at the Atlantic Hotel about this time. The predecessor of the Congress Hall Hotel was opened in 1816 by

Thomas Hughes Thomas Hughes (20 October 182222 March 1896) was an English lawyer, judge, politician and author. He is most famous for his novel ''Tom Brown's School Days'' (1857), a semi-autobiographical work set at Rugby School, which Hughes had attended. ...

. It took its current name in 1828, when Hughes was elected to Congress. In 1830 a visitor wrote that Alfred Jacob Miller - Beach at Cape May - Walters 372675

Alfred Jacob Miller - Beach at Cape May - Walters 372675

Early visitors included

Henry Clay Henry Clay Sr. (April 12, 1777June 29, 1852) was an American attorney and statesman who represented Kentucky in both the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives. He was the seventh House speaker as well as the ninth secretary of state, al ...

in 1847, and possibly

Abraham Lincoln Abraham Lincoln ( ; February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was an American lawyer, politician, and statesman who served as the 16th president of the United States from 1861 until his assassination in 1865. Lincoln led the nation throu ...

in 1849. Serving Presidents who visited included

Franklin Pierce Franklin Pierce (November 23, 1804October 8, 1869) was the 14th president of the United States, serving from 1853 to 1857. He was a northern Democrat who believed that the abolitionist movement was a fundamental threat to the nation's unit ...

(1855),

James Buchanan James Buchanan Jr. ( ; April 23, 1791June 1, 1868) was an American lawyer, diplomat and politician who served as the 15th president of the United States from 1857 to 1861. He previously served as secretary of state from 1845 to 1849 and repr ...

(1858),

Ulysses Grant Ulysses S. Grant (born Hiram Ulysses Grant ; April 27, 1822July 23, 1885) was an American military officer and politician who served as the 18th president of the United States from 1869 to 1877. As Commanding General, he led the Union A ...

(1873), Chester Arthur (1883), and

Benjamin Harrison Benjamin Harrison (August 20, 1833March 13, 1901) was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 23rd president of the United States from 1889 to 1893. He was a member of the Harrison family of Virginia–a grandson of the ninth pre ...

(1889). Harrison made Congress Hall his

Summer White House Listed below are the private residences of the various presidents of the United States. For a list of official residences, see President of the United States § Residence. Private homes of the presidents This is a list of homes where ...

. From the 1850s through the 1880s up to 3,000 visitors arrived each day during the summer season.

Newport, Rhode Island Newport is an American seaside city on Aquidneck Island in Newport County, Rhode Island. It is located in Narragansett Bay, approximately southeast of Providence, south of Fall River, Massachusetts, south of Boston, and northeast of New Y ...

Saratoga Springs, New York Saratoga Springs is a city in Saratoga County, New York, United States. The population was 28,491 at the 2020 census. The name reflects the presence of mineral springs in the area, which has made Saratoga a popular resort destination for over ...

and

Long Branch, New Jersey Long Branch is a beachside city in Monmouth County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. As of the 2010 U.S. census, the city's population was 30,719, During the 1850s summer cottages were first built and the construction of large hotels continued.

Thomas U. Walter Thomas Ustick Walter (September 4, 1804 – October 30, 1887) was an American architect of German descent, the dean of American architecture between the 1820 death of Benjamin Latrobe and the emergence of H.H. Richardson in the 1870s. He was ...

, the

Architect of the Capitol The Architect of the Capitol (AOC) is the federal agency responsible for the maintenance, operation, development, and preservation of the United States Capitol Complex. It is an agency of the legislative branch of the federal government and is ...

, designed an addition to the Columbia Hotel. The Mount Vernon Hotel, which was designed to be the largest hotel in the world burned down in 1856, however, before its completion. Competition from

Atlantic City Atlantic City, often known by its initials A.C., is a coastal resort city in Atlantic County, New Jersey, United States. The city is known for its casinos, boardwalk, and beaches. In 2020, the city had a population of 38,497.

appeared in 1854 with the construction of the

Camden and Atlantic Railroad The West Jersey and Seashore Railroad (WJ&S) was a Pennsylvania Railroad subsidiary in the U.S. state of New Jersey with a connection to Philadelphia. It was formed through the merger of several smaller roads in May 1896. At the end of 1925 it ...

. Cape May was not connected to Philadelphia by rail until the completion of the Cape May & Millville Railroad in the mid-1860s. Architect

Stephen Decatur Button Stephen Decatur Button (June 15, 1813, in Preston, Connecticut – January 7, 1897, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) was an American architect and a pioneer in the use of metal-frame construction for masonry buildings. He designed commercial buildin ...

began designing buildings in Cape May in 1863 when he remodeled and expanded the Columbia Hotel. During the next thirty years he designed over forty buildings in the town. His best known buildings there include the John McCreary House (1869–70), Jackson's Clubhouse (1872), the Stockton Cottages (1872), the Windsor Hotel (1879) and the Atlantic Terrace Houses (1891–92). Plans for the George Allen House are believed to have been taken from a pattern book by Samuel Sloan. Architect

Frank Furness Frank Heyling Furness (November 12, 1839 - June 27, 1912) was an American architect of the Victorian era. He designed more than 600 buildings, most in the Philadelphia area, and is remembered for his diverse, muscular, often unordinarily scaled b ...

is believed to have designed the

Emlen Physick Estate The Emlen Physick Estate is a Victorian house museum in Cape May, New Jersey. The estate is located at 1048 Washington Street. History The 18-room mansion, designed by American architect Frank Furness, was built in 1879 for Dr. Emlen Physick Jr ...

, but may have otherwise visited Cape May only as a vacationer. Otherwise most of the buildings were built and designed by local builders in the

vernacular A vernacular or vernacular language is in contrast with a "standard language". It refers to the language or dialect that is spoken by people that are inhabiting a particular country or region. The vernacular is typically the native language, n ...

style, borrowing from older buildings, pattern books and fashionable architects alike. Cape may pink victorian

Several fires destroyed portions of the town and the mostly wooden, frame-built houses. The fire of 1878 destroyed about half the town, but many buildings were quickly rebuilt. This fire gave a particular boost to Button's career, and many of the local builders appear to have copied Button's style at this time. These newer buildings were built with

gable A gable is the generally triangular portion of a wall between the edges of intersecting roof pitches. The shape of the gable and how it is detailed depends on the structural system used, which reflects climate, material availability, and aest ...

s and turrets. From about 1900-1920 larger bungalows and mansions were built, especially on Beach Avenue on the eastern end of town. Having lost its transportation advantage with the coming of the railroad and the automobile, Cape May fell out of fashion as a popular resort. Atlantic City became the popular New Jersey beach resort in the 1920s and in the 1950s and 1960s the automobile-oriented Wildwoods, just north of Cape May, became a strong competitor, with its own distinctive architecture. The district was added to the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic ...

in 1970, and then listed as a

National Historic Landmark A National Historic Landmark (NHL) is a building, district, object, site, or structure that is officially recognized by the United States government for its outstanding historical significance. Only some 2,500 (~3%) of over 90,000 places listed ...

District in 1976. The NRHP nomination form does not include an inventory of the buildings in the district, but rather refers to about 20 buildings that were documented by drawings or photographs by the

Historic American Buildings Survey Heritage Documentation Programs (HDP) is a division of the U.S. National Park Service (NPS) responsible for administering the Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS), Historic American Engineering Record (HAER), and Historic American Landscapes ...

(HABS). HABS now lists about 70 buildings in the district.HABS geographical listings
from this page search first for "New Jersey" then for "Cape May County" and finally for "Cape May." Some of the buildings listed are outside the Historic District. Architectural historians George E. Thomas and Carl Doebley list 100 significant buildings in their 1976 book ''Cape May, Queen of the Seaside Resorts: Its History and Architecture''.

Selected contributing properties

Contributing properties In the law regulating historic districts in the United States, a contributing property or contributing resource is any building, object, or structure which adds to the historical integrity or architectural qualities that make the historic distric ...

in the district include the following. Construction dates may be approximate. T&D reference gives the reference number from George E. Thomas and Carl Doebley's book with Roman numerals indicating the more significant buildings, and Arabic numerals the less significant buildings. Both lists are ordered by approximate date of construction. HABS reference links to the building's page in the Historic American Buildings Survey at the Library of Congress.

References

Sources

* * * *

External links