ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, March 17, 1996 TAG: 9603150095
SECTION: TRAVEL PAGE: G-8 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: OCEAN GROVE, N.J
SOURCE: RANDY KRAFT THE ALLENTOWN MORNING CALL
``I just want to rock and let his spirit roll,'' sang Promises, ``Jesus is the one, y'know, who died for me.''
People of all ages sat inside the open air pavilion along the Atlantic Ocean to enjoy the free evening performance by the contemporary Christian music trio.
Others strolling, jogging, biking and skating by stopped to watch and listen. A young mother danced with her baby on the boardwalk. Overhead, a long-tailed kite also seemed to dance with the music.
As a full moon rose over the ocean last summer, children played freeze tag on the beach. A few blocks directly west, at the far end of a wide commons called Ocean Pathway, the sun set over the Great Auditorium - where a white cross glowed on the highest steeple.
``Would you please read something I wrote?'' asked a man, as he handed out tracts that questioned if we are spiritually prepared for the possibility of imminent death. That somber message did little to detract from the feel-good moment.
In a number about Ocean Grove, Jeff Dingsor of Promises sang: ``God's Square Mile is the place to be, when you want to feel the calm of the deep blue sea.''
Whether you're looking for spiritual renewal or just a few quiet days at the beach, Ocean Grove certainly has many attributes.
Passing through the brick gateways of this tiny Victorian seaside community, you immediately may sense that you have arrived at a special place.
This seems like the kind of place developers would try to create as a tourist attraction, if it didn't already exist. This National Historic District is an authentic, lived-in community.
There also is a sense of sanctuary about Ocean Grove. People living here say it's like a small, safe neighborhood.
Most of its homes are Victorian and most of them are immaculate - with turrets, upper level porches, striped canvas awnings, flower boxes and American flags.
Ocean Grove's sloping beach is nice, not too narrow and not too crowded. But beach passes must be purchased to use it.
One of the most amazing things about this community is that many people spend their summers living in a tidy neighborhood of 114 tent structures surrounding Great Auditorium, Ocean Grove's most prominent landmark.
While Ocean Grove has been popular with older folks, it also is becoming popular with younger couples and parents with small children.
``Young people are discovering this Victorian treasure,'' said Alyn Heim, president of the Ocean Grove Chamber of Commerce. ``They just love it.''
Bulletin boards on the boardwalk promote upcoming gospel concerts, performances by Christian rock groups and worship services in Great Auditorium. One notice even advises when you can ``exercise to Christian and inspirational music.''
Watching children in activities outside the auditorium brings back memories of vacation Bible school. Children of summer visitors are encouraged to participate. In fact, anyone can participate in Ocean Grove's services, concerts and other religious programs - offered daily in summer. But there's no soul-saving hard sell.
Some just come here for the Victorian charm. Even pay phones are in pseudo-Victorian boxes.
Most of its structures aren't as grand and ornate as hotels and houses in Cape May at New Jersey's southern tip. But Carolyn McNeil, the Chamber of Commerce vice president, calls Ocean Grove ``New Jersey's other Victorian showplace.''(Begin optional
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Ocean Grove is ``dry'' - no bars or nightclubs, no alcohol served in restaurants.
Not a noisy, tacky, honky-tonk, hard-partying beach town, it is so quiet and peaceful that even a loud car radio seems inappropriate.
No highways rumble through the community, which has no traffic lights or parking meters. You can park your car for free, right along the boardwalk in mid-July, and leave it there until you go home.
Easily walkable Ocean Grove covers less than one square mile, but seems spacious. One reason is Ocean Pathway, a wide lawn between the boardwalk and the Great Auditorium.
Much about Ocean Grove makes you feel you've gone back in time - maybe not 100 years, but certainly 30 or 40 - from the old-fashioned Sampler Cafeteria, to Days Ice Cream Parlor, to the huge interior of Great Auditorium, to tiny hotel rooms with no air-conditioning and shared baths.
Ocean Grove was created in 1869 as ``a Christian seaside resort'' - a place Methodists could go for summer religious revivals, called camp meetings, without the ``secular influences'' of other 19th-century beach communities.
Weeklong camp meetings still are held here, although now they are interdenominational.
Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association still owns all the land here, but not all the buildings on it.
Not everyone in Ocean Grove is Methodist, Protestant or even Christian. The ``doors are open'' to anyone who wants to visit or live here, said Dr. Anna Nichols, a camp meeting association trustee. She noted 25 percent of the association's trustees are not Methodists.
The Methodist church doesn't support the association, said Martha Rakita, past president of Ocean Grove Historical Society. ``We have a strong Methodist tradition, but we are not a Methodist church.''
Old photos in the camp meeting association office show Ocean Grove's boardwalk area has changed little since the 1920s.
Gift shops are along Main Avenue, not on the boardwalk, which also has no rides or amusements.
The only structures on the boardwalk are the pavilion, a ``members only'' fishing pier and a north end building that houses a restaurant and a couple of stores.(End optional
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No chain restaurants, hotels or stores are in town. With less than 10,000 year-round residents, Nichols said there isn't enough business to support them. There is a family-owned supermarket, a pharmacy, one Methodist church, a few banks and several restaurants.
Ocean Grove isn't for everyone. The biggest drawback is that most rooms in its more than two dozen old Victorian hotels and guest houses don't have private baths, air-conditioning, phones or TVs.
But there are exceptions. One is Ocean Plaza, recently renovated for $800,000. Its 18 rooms have private baths, phones, TVs and central air-conditioning.
Great Auditorium is the heart of Ocean Grove. The massive pumpkin-colored building with burgundy trim seats about 6,500. Billy Sunday, Billy Graham, Norman Vincent Peale and Richard Nixon are among the many famous people who spoke here.
Clergymen of various denominations conduct Sunday services. Saturday night summer programs, not all religious, also are held inside.
The wooden building isn't air-conditioned, but its many doors open so air can circulate.
Tents around the auditorium are leased seasonally, often to the same families for decades.
The front of each structure is canvas, the back (which contains plumbing) is wood. Tents are set up in mid-May and taken down in mid-September. There is a 7- to 10-year waiting list to get a tent, said Suzanne Zadik, who works in the camp meeting association office. (Optional add
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Just north of Ocean Grove is Asbury Park, a once-bustling seaside resort that's fallen on hard times. Its boardwalk is nearly deserted, with almost all the buildings along it boarded up and deteriorating.
Folks in Ocean Grove can walk to Asbury Park's boardwalk, through the shell of a leaky building marked ``Casino.'' Nearby, Asbury Park's magnificent carousel building still stands, but the carousel was sold years ago. Now it houses a flea market.
Heim, the chamber president, said that, except for a few spots, people can walk south on boardwalks from Ocean Grove through Bradley Beach, Avon and Belmar to Spring Lake.
When leaving Ocean Grove, you pass a sign bidding you farewell: ``God be with you till we meet again.''
LENGTH: Long : 155 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: RANDY CRAFT/Allentown Morning Call. 1. Immaculateby CNBVictorian homes with their turrets, porches and awnings line the
streets of Ocean Grove. 2. The Great Auditorium (left) is the focal
point of life in Ocean Grove. 3. Tents around the Great Auditorium
(below) are leased seasonally, often to the same families for
decades. The front of each is canvas, the back is wood. Tents are
set up in mid-May and taken down in mid-September. 4. Ocean Grove's
sloping beach is fairly wide and not often crowded, but visitors
must purchase passes to go there. color.