Tales of South Jersey: Profiles and Personalities

by Jim Waltzer, Tom Wilk

Overview

There's much more to southern New Jersey than the Pine Barrens and the Jersey Devil, and this collection by journalists Jim Waltzer and Tom Wilk tells readers all about it. Oceanside and bayside towns offer a box seat from which to observe the regions rich history and the summery lore of the wonders of nature. Landlocked towns boast their own homespun and hell-raising traditions and idiosyncrasies.

Waltzer and Wilk have compiled almost fifty stories about the state's southernmost counties. Although the focus is on Atlantic City and its remarkable people, outsize structures, and quirky events, the storytelling ranges across the wider region to provide an insiders look at history as it was being made. You'll encounter gangsters and gamblers, baseball hitters and hurricanes, famous piers and hotels, landmark theaters and eateries, splashy events and unheralded oddities—in sum, a cross-section of the regions character and characters.

The authors divide their book into six sections: entertainment, famous and infamous events, innovations and innovators, leisure and recreation, room and board, and sports legends. Within each section are the rich and varied stories Waltzer and Wilk have collected for New Jerseyans reading pleasure.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780813530079
Publisher:	Rutgers University Press
Publication date:	08/01/2001
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	230
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.50(d)

About the Author

Jim Waltzer is a journalist who has written for Atlantic City magazine, Delaware Today, the SandPaper, and New Jersey Monthly.

Tom Wilk is a copy editor for the Courier-Post in Cherry Hill and coauthor, with Harry Armstrong, of New Jersey Firsts: The Famous, Infamous, and Quirky of the Garden State. He has also written for Atlantic City magazine and New Jersey Monthly, and is a contributing writer for No Depression magazine.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Entertainment - 
The Broadway Theatre
Diving Duos
The Apollo Theatre
Club Harlem
Peg Leg Bates
The Crooner and the Comic
Bill Haley: Rockin' around South Jersey
The Voice of the Shore
The Atlantic City Pop Festival
The King of Marvin Gardens
Famous/Infamous Events - 
Tale of the Timbers
Woodbury's Rebel General
The Wildwood Boardwalk
Surf and Turf
The Reluctant Miss America
War at the Shore
The Hurricane of'44
Innovations & Innovators -
The Father of Atlantic City
Colonel McKee
Signs of the Times
Sara Spencer Washington
Seabrook Farms
Seashore Architect: Vivian Smith
The Blue Comet
Teflon Changes the World
Leisure & Recreation -
Point in Time
Before Gambling Was Legal
The Big Wheel
Steeplechase Pier
Garden Pier
The Anglers Club
Skee-Ball
Ocean City Music Pier
The Cowtown Rodeo
Room & Board -
The Shelburne
The Marlborough-Blenheim Hotel
A Resort with a Historical View
Captain Starn's
Sports -
The Black Honus Wagner
Indoor Bowling: Football Variety
Goose Goslin
Spring Training at the Shore
Clamshell Pitching: One Singular Sand-sation
Bridgeton at Bat
Bibliography
Index

Editorial Reviews

In a New Jersey that seems to believe that south of New Brunswick only dragons and bumpkins roam, Tom Wilk and Jim Waltzer's tales are refreshing, delightful, and corrective. 

Newark Star-Ledger, winner of the 1985 Pulitzer Prize for editorial writing - Richard Aregood