Cool Cape May 2021-22

excerpt from the first resort [35]
This page: The
Windsor Hotel
looks pristine
in this 1890s
picture – the
hotel sat on the
beachfront until
it was destroyed
by fire in 1979
National
Archives
its wide flat top, that guarded the ocean side of the
boardwalk, has been replaced by modern gas pipe.
In the past it was a convenient resting place, available
at any moment when fatigue threatened, when
one cared to linger, or felt that consuming desiring
that comes to the young, to commune, a deux, with
sea and sky.
Far back from the ocean stands Congress Hall.
The large brick buildings were for many years
neglected. The porch roof hung in scallops between
the tall square columns, one of which rested against
a wall. Part of the roof lay, a mass of debris, on the
floor. Broken window panes looked out like sad
blind eyes, and even birds hesitated to build amid
such evidence of decay. The hotel register contains
many names that have made history. Statesmen,
artists, travelers and the great of many lands sought
hospitality there, left their marks upon these “sands
of time,” and went again into the unknown. Recently
the house has been renovated and is now open to the
public. The tragic atmosphere of decay that so long
pervaded the building has been dispelled.
Visitors passing old Columbia, near the corner
of Washington Street and Ocean Avenue, lingered
to hear colored waiters sing. The crooning musical
voices of the negroes in their own weird melodies
have a strong appeal. They seem to reach out and
set a heart-string quivering with vague longing for
something yet unknown.
In 1878 a fire, which has been an active enemy of
Cape May, destroyed the then Columbia House and
made a place for its successor, the New Columbia.
Of all the old hotels the Columbia House showed