Columns
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•September 24, 2014
Goldfish Gets Brain Surgery; Bad News for Bears Everywhere
GOLDEN GEORGE LIVES ON: This could qualify as an “Only in America” story, except it took place in Australia, where arguably the world’s luckiest goldfish is comfortably recovering after delicate…
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•August 28, 2014
The Fall of the Nation’s Capital
Two hundred years ago this week, the United States suffered the ultimate humiliation at the hands of the British as Washington, D.C., fell. The U.S. Navy had scuttled its flotilla in the Potomac…
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•August 25, 2014
Reopening of Holgate End Announced
The beaches adjacent to the Forsythe Holgate Wilderness Area will see the standard reopening date of Sept. 1. That’s Labor Day Monday this year. The exact time of the reopening to buggy traffic is…
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•August 21, 2014
Britain Gets Serious About War of 1812
For Great Britain, the War of 1812 against its upstart former colonies had been little more than a backwater as it engaged in a life and death struggle with Napoleon and France. But in 1814, with a…
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•August 14, 2014
Southern Ocean County Chamber Regional Business Development Council Completes First Year
An economicslowdown that began five years ago, overwashed by Superstorm Sandy, has led area business leaders to form the Regional Business Development Council to devise a “2020 Vision” to promote…
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•July 24, 2014
Aviation Goes to War
In the years before World War I, two pioneers of aviation, Kenneth Jaquith from Chicago and Beryl Kendrick from Atlantic City, had thrilled thousands over the beaches of the Jersey Shore. Whether it…
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•July 23, 2014
Tata Bikini Top Girls Want Me; It Takes a Village to Save a Bay
A TRULY TITILLATING OFFER: Wait until you get a load of this. I was recently contacted, online, to become intimately involved with what I can only call the nipple rights movement. If I’m lyin’, I’m…
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•July 17, 2014
1916: Aerial Hunting, Sharks and Ducks
It has been said by many that the age of innocence for America ended with World War I. The summer of 1916 would be the last the Jersey Shore would enjoy. That year the war in Europe raged on both the…
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•July 16, 2014
Sunday Escape Shortcut; Your Hands Stink
SACRED LBI SECRET REVEALED: My conscience has finally gotten the better of me. I’ve seen how badly folks leaving the Island on Sundays have suffered when getting mired in traumatic traffic jams. So…
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•July 5, 2014
Curtiss Hydroplane Not Ready for Prime Time
The summer of 1914 was supposed to be one filled with the milestones of aviation. Glenn Curtiss, 36, who had first demonstrated aerial bombing on the beach at Atlantic City and set up a flying…
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•July 2, 2014
Getting Along With Great Whites; Holgate Becomes Terrapin Town
HAVE YE A HAPPY JULY 4th: It’s called the biggest weekend of the year. Lengthwise, the weekend itself is no different than any other, but add in an insane showing of the beach-huddled massesand fit…
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•June 24, 2014
Balls Out for Spaghetti and Soccer; New Hope for Great White Sharks
I’m pretty sure I’ve been watching the World Cup. I’m sorry but it’s the only sporting event where I actually snap to when commercials come on. Still, I’m the first to admit that this lengthy event…
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•June 23, 2014
Curtiss Buzzes, ‘Bombs’ the Beach
When you think of the Jersey Shore and history of aviation, your mind usually turns to blimps and dirigibles flying gracefully over the beach, but there was a time before World War I when the nation…
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•June 19, 2014
Grand Causeway Parade Opens New Era
June 20, 1914, was to be LBI’s day to shine. The day before, Tuckerton had grabbed the world’s headlines when President Woodrow Wilson sent the first transatlantic wireless message via the giant…
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•June 19, 2014
The Acoustic Cat That Loved Me; Getting a New Look at Backing Up
THE CIA SPY CAT: In lieu of the amazing YouTube tale of a cat saving a toddler from a crazed mutt (not a pit bull, as was erroneously reported), I got emailed an equally astounding saga of an…
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•June 12, 2014
Auto Causeway a Bridge to Nowhere
During an eight-day period In June 1914, several events would take place that would change life on LBI and in Southern Ocean County forever. One of these events, the linking of the Island to the…
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•June 5, 2014
The Devastation at Cold Harbor
Some historians call the 1864 battle known as Cold Harbor Robert E. Lee’s last victory. Others call it the end of Ulysses S. Grant’s Overland campaign, and others simply say it was senseless. But one…
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•May 22, 2014
NJ 9th’s Officers Imprisoned in Richmond
May 16, 1864, had been a disaster for the troops of New Jersey, and Ocean County in particular. Only a few miles away from capturing Richmond, Va., the Confederate capital, the Army of the James…
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•May 15, 2014
The 9th New Jersey Abandoned in the Fog
May 16, 1864, would be the darkest day in the military history of Ocean County since the burning of Toms River in the American Revolution. Most of the county’s men belonged to the 9th New Jersey…
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•May 8, 2014
Rumor of Success Proves Premature
In May 1864, the men of the 9th New Jersey Volunteers were about to embark on their largest expedition of the entire war. As part of Gen. Ulysses S. Grant’s grand Overland Strategy, the Army of the…
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•May 8, 2014
Pine Pollen Gets Things Poppin’; Flip-Flops Making Good Impressions
PINE POLLEN POPPERS: The yellow is here. The pine pollen is a-fallin’.
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•April 24, 2014
The Horror of the Wilderness
In May 1864, the new commander of all Union forces, Gen. Ulysses S. Grant, ordered his armies to attack on all fronts. In Virginia, the object for Grant, as it had been for the eight generals who had…
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•April 18, 2014
Toms River: Legacy of Environmental Crime
Editor’s Note:On April 14, Dan Fagin won the Pulitzer prize in the general nonfiction fiction category for his book Toms River: A Story of Science and Salvation, reviewed last August in The…
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•April 17, 2014
Letters Tell the Truth About ‘Glory’
When you study the Civil War, it’s easy to learn about the glory; politicians and generals fill pages with speeches and reports. But to find the reality for the individual soldiers is much more…
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•April 17, 2014
It’s Time to Pelt Some Seals; Bobcat Sweats Out Its Lineage
The bloody war of words and bullets related to harp seal hunting has once again ignited. This week marks the start of the 2014 seal season in Canada. Designers at Versace, Prada and Gucci are licking…
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•April 10, 2014
9th NJ on the Road to Smithfield
The Civil War was made up of months of boredom in camp, weeks of marching on dirt roads and hours of pure horror on battlefields. As the spring of 1864 began to turn Virginia green, the great Union…
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•April 10, 2014
Bobcat Rocky Is an Underground Hit; Ticks Become Outdoorsman’s Madness
COVERT BOBCATTING: A goodly few folks asked me why I had been unusually mum on the lost bobcat thing over in Manahawkin – seeing such a story was right up my oddness alley. Well, during Rocky’s great…
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•April 3, 2014
N.J. Volunteer Veterans Return to Duty
As the winter of 1864 was drawing to a close, it was becoming apparent that it might be the critical year of the bloody Civil War and that the men of New Jersey and Ocean County would be in the thick…
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•March 27, 2014
Veteran Jersey Muskrats Re-enlist
In the opinion of most historians, 1863 and the battles of Gettysburg and Vicksburg marked the turning point for the American Civil War, but we only know this 150 years later, with the knowledge of…
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•March 20, 2014
Dragged Down From Below; LBI’s Green Rocks Totally Rock
This week I feel like getting all tale-y and geology-y. Pretty soon, the fishing might just happen to happen. Yahoo. I’ll even take winter flounder fishing, which is getting pretty radical for an…
