“A kind heart is a fountain of gladness, making everything in its vicinity freshen into smiles.” ~Washington Irving
CARE FOR YOUR SMILE... Call Dr. Feldman’s office today! You’ll be glad you did... And so will the people you smile at!
LOUIS J. FELDMAN, D.D.S., FAGD 741 Washington Street • Cape May, NJ 08204
(609) 884-4260 exit zero
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A few years ago, one of the former general managers was making a rather disparaging remark about Mrs McConnell’s portrait. That very evening, the same large oil in its heavy Victorian frame lifted off the wall and crashed to the ceiling. No one was near it. Lesson here: ghosts can hear us. has a ghostly couple watching over the place. Should you decide to have dinner in the fabulous Ebbitt Room, you will notice two large portraits on the far wall of the dining room. I believe these are the McConnells, the couple who built Ebbitt House (the original name for the Virginia) in 1879. Little is known about the McConnells. What I can tell you is that I have sensed both a male and female presence in the hotel. A few years ago, one of the former general managers was making a rather disparaging remark about Mrs McConnell’s portrait. That very evening, the same large oil in its heavy Victorian frame lifted off the wall and crashed to the ceiling. No one was near it and no one could figure out how the wire could have lifted off the heavy hook in the wall. Lesson here: ghosts can hear us. Watch what you say about them. In The Ghosts of Cape May Book I, I talk about the ghost of the Windward House and the Saltwood House being that of a Catherine Campbell. Catherine and Charles Campbell built their home at 26 Jackson Street in 1906, a short time after they had married. Charles Campbell was a local real estate agent and a lifelong resident of Cape May. They moved into their new home where they raised two daughters, Elizabeth and Catherine. Somewhere along the line, Catherine the elder seems to have died and become a ghost, however, the Campbells had long since moved to another house on Ocean Street. Guests at the Saltwood House B&B, as the Campbell homestead is now known, have encountered a woman who they say gives the name Catherine, and then promptly vanishes. october
2012
Catherine does not seem to be content roaming her old haunt. She is also thought to haunt the Windward House just next door! There is an old story on Jackson Street hat has been passed down over the last century, about Catherine being disloyal to her new husband. Old timers have called the Saltwood House, The Mistress’s House and have passed down stories that point a guilty finger at Catherine for having an affair with her neighbor, banker George Baum. Baum built the house next door that is today Windward House. Has Catherine Campbell returned to her earlier amorous abode, or is it the energy of Jackson Street that has pulled her back and kept her tethered to her old stomping grounds? Campbell’s last home on Ocean Street was demolished in the late 1960s after she died. Has she returned to her original home because of this? The spot on which Windward, Saltwood, the Red Cottage and the Puffin sit is a highly charged piece of real estate. After the Great Fire of 1878 destroyed the previous dwellings, a new luxury hotel was built in 1879 called the New Columbia. The vast building stretched from Jackson Street to Perry Street in a showy display of avant-garde Queen Anne style architecture with turrets at every corner. It was not well received by the neighbors who chose a more plain and scaled down style of shore architecture. The New Columbia was truly a showplace and thrived at the foot of Jackson Street with a panoramic view of the sands and surf. The Seven Sisters Houses at the foot of Jackson Street were not yet built so nothing obstructed the ocean view. Then on Septem-