Ocean Grove

Ocean Grove — The Queen of Religious Resorts

Ocean Grove was founded in 1869 as a Methodist camp meeting ground and by 1920 had evolved into a remarkable Victorian city unlike anything else on the Jersey Shore. The 1920 aerial shows the radiating street pattern that fans outward from the Great Auditorium — every tent and cottage has a path to the central meeting ground. The famous Victorian cottages, some of the best-preserved in America, line the lanes in a dense grid. The 1933 view shows the community largely unchanged — Ocean Grove's strict controls on development meant it changed slowly — but the beach face shows erosion from the summer hurricane.