The Shore has been a traditon in my family, I think, since everyone came from Ellis Island about 100 years ago, seeming to make a beeline for this area upon their arrival.  My father grew up in Deal and my mother had her summers in Ocean Grove and both had told me many stories about Asbury Park while they were growing up here.  My mother was a very small child when the Morro Castle drifted on the beach, totally gutted and burned.  She said it was the creepiest thing she had ever seen.   My father recalled the Great Hurricane of 1944, saying that the ocean waves had come up as far as Kingsley Street and the boardwalk was totally destroyed.  I could never imagine the boardwalk totally destroyed because I always loved it so much!

When I was a little girl, we came to Asbury Park for special occassions.  Sometimes my mother took me downtown and we would go shopping at Steinbach's and Lerners.  We went to see a movie at the Paramount or the Mayfair or St James, but my favorite was the Mayfair because the sidewalk sparkled and the inside of the theatre was so beautiful.   I think every Friday we went to Horner's in the Summer, my parents loved their barbeque sandwiches and I loved their orange shakes.   Only once a year did we get to spend the evening at the boardwalk, except for the annual pilgramage for fireworks.   On that night, we went to the Palace and the Casino, and then we would start from the South end of the boardwalk and walk our way North, stopping for every ride, game, and miniature golf course along the way.  It was an enormous cacaphony of the senses between the crowds, the rides, the games, the lights...I still vividly remember the smell of fresh roasted peanuts from the Planters store mingled in with the salt air, the woody smell of the boardwalk and the petunias that were planted at the miniature golf courses and out by the sidewalk next to Ocean Avenue.   And as for food..well, there's nothing better than the taste of a hot dog or a slice of pizza on the boardwalk!

Whenever we came to the boardwalk every Summer, the first thing I remember seeing was the face of Tillie while my father drove up Kingsley Street..it used to creep me out watching Tillie with his cheshire cat grin, winking and blinking away in neon glory.  Later on, I just had to laugh to think I could be scared of anything that was so silly looking...he was an icon exclusive to this area.

About twenty years later, my then-boyfriend and I decided to work in Asbury.  He took a job at the Palace.  He started with the Shooting Gallery (I can still hear that old ragtime music now)and he also did rides and eventually became a mechanic.  We lived across the street from the Fast Lane for a little while.  I worked on the boardwalk that year, and the year following that, at Promenade Park.  I could run most of the games there, the ticket booth and the rides..even the bumper cars, if needed.  They nicknamed me "Trish the Dish" there and it kind of stuck.  We worked very long hours in the Summer, sometimes 6 or 7 days a week. My boyfriend and I would often take lunch at the same time, often spending it in Mr. Fitzwillie's little deli inside the hotel across from Promenade Park.  He made the most wonderful sandwiches, in our opinion.   After work, everyone who worked on the "boards" or at the Palace would come to the Golddigger  for some beer and some of Denny's wonderful pizza.  I got pretty good at playing pool in the back then and I wasn't half bad at pinball either

Those were great days..the kind of days when time seemed to stand still and you thought it couldn't get any better, although there were times when things got a little crazy.  Aside from the Digger, I loved going to Mrs. Jays and the Pony to hear the local bands and also Park Place, to hear Yasgur's Farm.  I didn't get much sleep then because the bars were open until 3 and I often had to be at work by 9 or 10 in the morning.

Almost a decade later, I came with my young son and a camera and I took pictures of all the wonderful architecture still left in Asbury.  Since all my son could see were rotting old buildings, he thought I was crazy to even be standing there, much less taking any pictures.  How much I wish he could have seen the glory his father and I had seen, or his grandparents.  How much I wished I could have taken him on the kiddie rides I had loved so much or the Olympic Bob or treated him to a caramel apple at Jonathan's which I enjoyed for so many years or seen a movie at the Mayfair.  If not for the talents of Mr. Edelman, he would have had no idea what it once was like.  I hope someday Asbury Park may find it's "glory days" once again...what joy it has given so many people from so many places!