This month we are heading down to Atlantic City, New Jersey. Atlantic City has been known as a summertime resort since it was incorporated in 1854. The first hotel was the Belloe house, built in 1853, and has been home to the Miss American Pageant. The city was the inspiration for the board game Monopoly.
Many of us may know Atlantic City as a summertime resort, but did you know it also advertised itself as a winter resort for its “sanitary effect upon diseases and invalids?”
The pamphlets in our medical trade ephemera collection paint a pleasant picture for Atlantic City as a winter getaway. The city sits as an island with an inlet that brings in the air from the gulf stream along with salt water into marshes. These marshes help promote rich air that other shore locations would not have at winter. The island is also sandy and porous, making snow melt and absorb into the ground faster, leaving plenty of dry land for physical activities. In one pamphlet, it is claimed that College Fellow S. Weir Mitchell sends patients to the resorts to help treat various nervous disorders that are harder to treat in the winter months.
Today, Atlantic City still claims winter fun, but it is the indoor casino life that draws people in from the surrounding cities.
Resources:
Atlantic City, Medical Trade Ephemera Collection. Historical Medical Library of The College of Physicians of Philadelphia, Philadelphia, PA.