Ethel Kelley
hotel proprietor · active 1937
Ocean City hotel proprietor. The council granted her a permit on 8 February 1937 for an addition to her hotel measuring 34 by 62 feet, and the Democratic Messenger reported in February that Mrs. Ethel Kelley had let a contract for a boardwalk hotel annex. The 19 January boardwalk assessment charged an Ethel Kelly $515.66 on a hundred feet of ocean front, and the 1937 assessment book carries a personal assessment of $2,000 against 'Royalton (Kelly)'.
In the record (5)
1937 · 1937-02-08
Ocean City granted at least twenty building permits in 1937, and the first seven of them came in February
On 8 February 1937 the council granted permits to Curtis W. Long (Block 24, dwelling, 30 by 42), Ethel Kelly (addition to hotel, 34 by 62), Chas. S. Powell (apartment, 28 by 40), Sam Ayers (two buildings, 13 by 27), E. H. Benson (apartment, 36 by 42), Ed Lee Carey (dwelling) and Ada Cox (addition, 18 by 28). More followed through the year: Ella E. Dennis's two apartments and a 46-by-96 three-storey Curtis property with a restaurant on the ground floor taken under consideration on 31 March; J. M. Mumford, John H. Price, the C & D Garage and Rudolph Dolle in March; Violet C. Davis, Mrs. P. C. Dennis and Mrs. Bedowick in May; Herman Parsons and E. E. Dennis in April; and on 9 November Wm. Gibbs (apartment on Philadelphia Avenue between Second and Third), C. S. Powell (two apartments at the corner of Third), Calvin Pruitt (apartment and rooming house on Ninth Street) and John B. Lynch (a dwelling back of his hotel in Block 54). Two applications were refused or withdrawn - B. D. Mason's on 16 June, after his neighbours objected, and J. D. Showell's application to close a porch at the Oceanic on 7 September.
Rudolph DolleJohn M. MumfordJohn B. LynchWilliam E. GibbsCurtis W. Long
Source · checked 2026-08-11
1937 · 1937-04-15
The Rideau, a boardwalk hotel, sold for about $5,000 in 1937
'The Rideau Hotel, well known boardwalk hostelry,' was sold to James Jarman for around $5,000 through the agent J. Edward White; Jarman had formerly managed the Breakers with his brother-in-law Chas. H. Timmons. In February Mrs. Ethel Kelley let a contract for a boardwalk hotel annex — the '34 x 62 addition to hotel' the council had permitted her on 8 February. In September real estate on Caroline and North Division Streets conveyed for $5,300. Four years after the hurricane and eight after the crash, a whole boardwalk hotel changed hands for about what a building lot on the same street was worth.
Source · checked 2026-08-11
1937 · 1937-07-13
Ocean City held its tax rate at a dollar on the hundred for a fourth straight year, and exactly one taxpayer turned up to complain
On 29 June 1937 the council listed the year's new and increased assessments and sent notice to every owner on it of a meeting on 13 July 'for to hear any complaints of why the property should not be assessed as listed for year of 1937 taxes'. Among them: Wallace & Jarman, improvements on restaurant and apartments, $3,000; S. Dodd Shuster, bungalow and garage, $4,000; Clarence Carey, dance hall, $1,000; Samuel and Belle Adams, house, $4,800; John Lambros, personal, $8,000 - the largest personal assessment on the page; W. C. Pool, floating houses on lots, $100 each, $600 in all; 'Royalton (Kelly)', personal, $2,000; Rudolph Dolle, body shop, $650; Harry J. Cropper, work shop, $1,000; and Elizabeth Hufford's apartments raised from $3,000 to $4,800. A shorter list of property 'marked off for 1937' cut the Jester, Kelly, Magel, Mumford and Massey books. On 13 July, 'Sam Ayers was only one appeared asking for reduction of 100 on personal in small house and reduction was made.' The council then made 'tax levy for 1937 ... 10.00 Thousand' - one dollar on the hundred, unanimously, the same rate it had held in 1934, 1935 and 1936. — 1938 FULL PASS, 2026-08-11 [confirmed]: And then it did not. The run of four years at a dollar on the hundred ended on 21 June 1938, when the Ocean City council passed the 1938 levy at 85 cents per $100 on Dr. Townsend's motion seconded by Preston Laws - a cut of fifteen per cent, after a discussion on 31 May of cutting twenty that reached no decision.
W. Preston LawsWilliam H. ScottJohn LambrosHarry J. CropperRudolph DolleW. C. PoolClarence Carey
Source · checked 2026-08-11
1938 · 1938-05-10
Ocean City's new assessments for 1938 ran from $400 for a house on an alley to $25,000 for John Lambros's building at South and Atlantic
On 10 May 1938 the council ordered notices of new assessment sent to twenty-six owners for the 1938 levy, and the clerk wrote the list into the book. The largest were John Lambros, $25,000, for a building at South and Atlantic Avenue; Harry and Ethel Kelly, $11,000, for an addition to the Royalton; C. H. and Mary F. Benson, $11,000, for an apartment on Ninth Street; Bay Heights Development Co., $10,000; and C. Parker Smith, $10,000 for an apartment and its furniture. In the middle: Mrs. J. Ada Beardsworth's bungalow on Tenth at $5,000, John A. Price's apartment at $5,000, Mr. and Mrs. Edwin Johnson's house on Sixth at $7,500, Curtis W. Long at $4,500, Carroll H. and Marion Mumford at $3,600, three Baltimore Avenue houses in the Dennis and Carroll families at $3,000 to $3,500, Chas. Arthur Holloway at $2,800, Capt. Elisha V. Bunting's bungalow at $1,000. The smallest was Sam and Della Ayres, $400, 'House on alley'. A second and shorter list followed on 21 June, and five assessments were 'marked off' - R. R. Dennis $2,000 of personal stock, Davis & Lynch $1,000, Howard Truitt $1,000, J. D. Jarman $900 personal, and the R. C. Quillen estate.
John LambrosElisha Victor BuntingJames D. JarmanC. Parker Smith
Source · checked 2026-08-11
1938 · 1938-05-10
The Royalton was Harry and Ethel Kelley's hotel, and in 1938 they added eleven thousand dollars to it
The 1937 pass could get no further than a parenthesis: Ocean City's assessment book of 29 June 1937 carried $2,000 of personal property against 'Royalton (Kelly)', and a Mrs. Ethel Kelley had taken a permit in February 1937 for a 34-by-62 addition to her hotel. Whether the two were the same thing was recorded as an inference and left open. The new-assessment list of 10 May 1938 closes it in one line: 'Harry & Ethel Kelly - add. to Royalton - 11000.00.' Two names, the hotel named outright, and an addition assessed at eleven thousand dollars - the second-largest new assessment in the town that year, and roughly five times what a boardwalk hotel like the Rideau had changed hands for the year before.
Source · checked 2026-08-11