Beginning in late 1918, the Beachwood Property Owners’ Association published and distributed this booklet outlining the first handful of years in the resort borough, detailing its progression from New York City-based newspaper land promotion to independent borough, showcasing some early recreation scenes and providing insight into its amenities and governance. Its intended readership was likely the wealthier city residents and resort property owners who had constructed a bungalow on their newspaper-purchased lots, and those who had not yet built a structure, paid taxes on the lots or even visited the area.
Photographs include a look at the clubhouse, which stood where what is now (2018) an auxiliary parking lot on the bluff across from the Mayo Park playground; the original yacht club, which was built on pilings over the riverbank approximately where the beach boardwalk entrance stands today (mid-20th century residents might recognize it as the Womens’ Club and convenience snack stand and fishing/crabbing dock from their era); a World War I-era patriotic baby parade; and William Mill Butler’s bungalow, which still stands on Bayside Avenue as the restored, historically expanded and maintained current home (2018) of the Wahlers family.
Booklet courtesy the Larry Casele Collection.
