S. J. Massey
hotelier · active 1877–
Proprietor of the Seaside House at Ocean City, the resort's second hotel, in 1877. His advertisement described a first-class house "within a few feet of the Ocean" at $2 a day — fifty cents under the Atlantic's rate. At the end of the 1877 season the Eastern Shore papers reported he would enlarge the hotel before the next summer.
In the record (18)
1877
The 1877 season ends with three hotel projects announced for 1878 — and one house staying open all winter for gunners.
The Delaware weeklies' Eastern Shore columns for the first half of September 1877 read like a construction bulletin: "James Massy, proprietor of the Seaside house, Ocean City, will enlarge his hotel before the next season." "A large new hotel is talked of, to be ready by next summer. Owens will keep his house open through the winter for gunners." And a week later: "Another Hotel. T. B. Merritt, proprietor of the U.S. Hotel in Wilmington, will build a fine hotel at Ocean City next [season]," a note that also counted "four hotels on the beach besides the excursion house." The winter-gunning line is the earliest evidence found of an Ocean City business operating outside the bathing season.
Source · checked 2026-08-06
1877
The Seaside House — Ocean City's second hotel in 1877 — charged $2 a day and stood "within a few feet of the Ocean."
S. J. Massey's advertisement ran alongside Tracy's in the Daily Gazette's summer-resorts column from late July 1877: "SEASIDE HOUSE, OCEAN CITY, MD. A first-class seaside resort. The above Hotel is within a few feet of the Ocean. Terms $2 per day. S. J. MASSEY, Proprietor." For comparison the same column offered the Washington House at Rye Beach, N.H. at $7 a week. By September the Delaware papers reported that "James Massy, proprietor of the Seaside house, Ocean City, will enlarge his hotel before the next season."
Source · checked 2026-08-06
1877
What Ocean City actually was in June 1877: hotels, four cottages, a drug store, a post office, a fruit store, two ten-pin alleys, billiard rooms and three bars.
The Wilmington Daily Gazette's excursion correspondent walked the place on June 27, 1877 and counted it: "At the present time the city consists of [thr]ee hotels, the finest and largest being the Atlantic, built by the R.R. Company, and leased by John Treacy. This hotel is situated almost immediately upon the beach, and a large porch extends all the way around it… A few yards further back is situated the Sea Side Hotel, leased by S. J. Massey. Another hotel not yet named, and which has just been finished, will be opened on Monday next… The place also contains a drug store, post office, fruit store, and several other places of business. So far there has been four cottages erected, but most of the lots have been sold and a large number of cottages will be erected during the [season]. For the amusement of guests there are two ten pin alleys and billiard rooms. For the thirsty there are three bars, at two of which the Diamond State beer is sold." Two weeks later the same paper wrote that "there are now on the island five good hotels, and they are apparently doing as well as the hotels at other watering places."
Two ten-pin alleys and three bars in a town of four cottages. Ocean City's amusement-to-residence ratio was set in year three and has never really changed.
between three and six hotels were open at Ocean City in 1877 — contemporary counts differ, probably because boarding houses were counted as hotels by some papers and not others
Source · checked 2026-08-06
1878
The Seaside Hotel bills itself as "Maryland's famous watering place" with "a band of music in attendance during the season."
"SEASIDE HOTEL, OCEAN CITY, MARYLAND. Famous Watering Place. A Band of Music in attendance during the season. Send for circulars to S. J. MASSEY & CO., Proprietors." Massey — who had undersold the Atlantic at $2 a day in 1877 and told the papers he would enlarge the house before the next summer — spent his 1878 advertising budget not on a rate but on a band. By the following June the same firm was buying space in the Washington Evening Star under the headline "MARYLAND'S FAMOUS WATERING PLACE, SYNEPUXENT BEACH," promising "fine surf bathing, a dry atmosphere," a table "supplied with terrapin, crabs, fish, oysters, clams, etc.," and a band of music, and telling Washingtonians they could reach Ocean City by rail via Wilmington or by steamer from the foot of South Street, Baltimore.
The Atlantic sold the ocean; Massey sold the evening. Ocean City has been advertising live music on the beach since its fourth summer.
Source · checked 2026-08-06
1879
"MARYLAND'S FAMOUS WATERING PLACE": the Seaside Hotel buys space in the Washington Evening Star, and Ocean City starts selling itself to the capital.
Under SUMMER RESORTS, next to the White Sulphur and Chalybeate Springs of Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, the Star of May 29, 1879 carried: "SEASIDE HOTEL, Ocean City, Maryland. MARYLAND'S FAMOUS WATERING PLACE ... on Synepuxent Beach ... will open June [2?]. Fine surf bathing. Dry atmosphere. Table supplied with terrapin, fish, oysters, clams etc. Band of music. Ocean City is accessible from Washington and Baltimore via Wilmington, all rail route." It is the earliest Washington-market advertising this campaign has found for an Ocean City house, and the pitch has moved on from 1877's safety-and-sanitation argument to food and music. The all-rail routing through Wilmington — north to go south — is the geography of the resort's first decade in one line.
Unverified — sourced but not confirmed against a primary record.
Source · checked 2026-08-06
1880 · 1880-06-23
The Atlantic Hotel adds 100 rooms and a dancing pavilion for a 600-guest capacity, and Congress Hall opens as the beach's third big house — 1880 is the year Ocean City gets a hotel row.
Work on the Atlantic's addition was announced in early March — "the carpenters will soon be at work on the proposed addition to the Atlantic Hotel, which is to make it one of the largest and most" [complete of the resort's houses] — and by June the hotel was advertising the result across Maryland, Delaware and the District: "OPENED for the reception of guests June 23rd, with greatly increased facilities for the accommodation of pleasure seekers. The capacity of the house has been increased to 600 guests by the addition of 100 new rooms, new bath houses and a pavilion for dancing, with eminent musical talent, are among the attractive features." The Smyrna Times version put it plainly: "100 New Rooms have been added. New Bath Houses and Ball Room are among the latest improvements. THE BEST MUSIC That has ever been on the Beach is secured." Terms were $2.50 per day and $10 to $12.50 per week — the same rate card as 1877, three years and a hundred rooms later. John Tracy was still proprietor; S. C. Beckwith was chief clerk. Two days later a brand-new competitor opened: "Congress Hall, Ocean City, Worcester Co., Md. SEASON OF 1880, NOW OPEN. Commanding an Ocean view from all parts of the house. Good Fishing and Boating. An excellent Orchestra will be in attendance during the Season. The table will be supplied with all the delicacies of the season, Oysters, Fish, Crabs and Terrapins being in abundance... TERMS $12.50 and $10.00 per Week, according to location. Transient board, $2.50 per day. WM. B. R. SELBY, Proprietor. THOMAS FARLEY, Manager." The Evening Star's version of the ad dates the opening to June 25, 1880. With S. J. Massey & Co.'s Seaside Hotel opening June 15 "100 yards from the breakers," the July excursion party found three hotels to split among — and by 1881 Congress Hall, in only its second season, would be called the most popular house on the beach.
Atlantic HotelJohn TracyCol. Wm. B. R. SelbyThomas Farley
Source · checked 2026-08-06
1880 · 1880-07-14
Fifty prominent Marylanders ride a railroad agent's free special to Ocean City in July 1880 — forty miles in an hour, and dinner at Congress Hall.
"An excursion to Ocean City was given to a number of gentlemen from Maryland and Delaware this week by I. N. Mills, Esq., superintendent of the Delaware division of the Philadelphia, Wilmington & Baltimore Railroad. The company was composed of about fifty gentlemen," among them Congressman Stevenson Archer, Judge J. D. Watters, Major Wm. H. Dallam, Col. Otho S. Lee, Hon. Murray Vandiver, Thos. G. Hayes and a working press contingent from the Harford Republican and the Baltimore Herald. The party left Baltimore about eight in the morning and reached Ocean City at 2:30 in the afternoon "after a run of 237 miles from this city"; the Ocean City correspondent of a Wilmington paper reported that "the train which brought the delegation here made the quick time of forty miles in an hour." On arrival the excursionists split among the three hotels — "the Atlantic Hotel, John Tracy, proprietor; Seaside Hotel, S. J. Massey & Co., proprietors; and Congress Hall, Wm. B. R. Selby, proprietor" — dined together at Congress Hall on Thursday, and held a meeting in the parlors of the Seaside afterwards. The same correspondent: "Crowds are daily arriving, and the season promises to be a remunerative one for the capitalists who have invested their money in Ocean City."
Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore RailroadI. N. MillsJohn TracyCol. Wm. B. R. Selby
Source · checked 2026-08-06
1880 · 1880-08-05
The Seaside Hotel throws a masquerade ball and the proprietor's prize for the best mask goes to a Baltimore girl dressed as "Topsy."
"[A masquerade ball was] held at the Seaside Hotel, Ocean City, on Thursday night of last week, when Miss Lottie Nicolai, daughter of Chas. H. Nicolai, Esq., was awarded the prize offered by the proprietor for the best mask. She appeared in the character of 'Topsy.'" The evening is the earliest documented costume party at Ocean City this campaign has found, and the winning costume — the enslaved child from *Uncle Tom's Cabin*, played in blackface on every American stage of the period — is a plain reminder of what "amusement" meant at a white Maryland resort in 1880. The Seaside was S. J. Massey & Co.'s house, opened for the season on June 15, "situated 100 yards from the breakers."
Source · checked 2026-08-06
1881
Massey's Seaside House sells itself on terrapin, crab pens and dryness — $2.00 a day — and offers horses, carriages, phaetons, boats, fishing tackle and bathing suits.
The Seaside House's 1881 advertisement: "OCEAN CITY, MARYLAND. NOW OPEN FOR THE SEASON. The magnificent surf bathing is unsurpassed on the Atlantic Coast, while the remarkable dryness of the atmosphere makes it pleasant and beneficial for invalids. Having erected Terrapin, Hard and Soft Crab Pens, and Fresh Fish, Oysters, Clams, &c. being in abundance, our table will always be kept well supplied... Wines, Imported Cigars, Liquors, Burton Ale, &c. Horses, Carriages, Phaetons, Boats, Fishing Tackle, Bathing suits, &c., always on hand. Board per Day, $2.00. Board per Week, $10.00 to $12.00, according to location and number in room. S. J. MASSEY, Proprietor." The house had been "renovated from top to bottom" for the season; Thomas Savage left the Atlantic Hotel at Berlin to clerk there.
Source · checked 2026-08-11
1881 · 1881-03-08
In March, S. J. Massey advertises his Ocean City hotel for sale in the Washington Evening Star — then opens it for the season anyway.
Classified in the Evening Star of 8, 11 March and again on 1 April 1881: "FOR SALE — Elegant first class HOTEL at Ocean City, Worcester County, Md., containing bedrooms for 360 guests; substantial frame building, first class cottage furniture for a watering place; well furnished in every respect. Terms one-third cash; the rest can be made satisfactory to the purchaser. For further particulars apply to S. J. MASSEY, Ocean City, Md." No sale followed: Massey opened the Seaside House himself in June and ran it all season. It is the earliest Ocean City hotel-for-sale advertisement the campaign has found, and it shows the capital city as the market the beach was pitching to.
Source · checked 2026-08-11
1882 · 1882-08-25
"Three hotels, some cottages, a life-saving station and livery stables comprise the city" — a visitor's inventory of Ocean City in 1882.
A traveller writing "Ocean City and Vicinity" for the Bel Air Aegis & Intelligencer, August 25, 1882, gave the most complete surviving description of the town in its eighth season. On the naming: "A peculiar custom prevails in that section. They call all the new towns cities, and seem to imagine the more dignified name compensates the deficiency in extent and population. A stranger is rather surprised on his arrival at Ocean City to find that three hotels, some cottages, a life-saving station and livery stables comprise the city, which the habit of putting a literal meaning on words of that character had led him to expect." He named the three houses — the Atlantic under Tracy, Congress Hall under Rennert & Co., Massey's Seaside — placed the town "on the Isle of Wight" between Synepuxent Bay and the ocean, dated the hotels to "about seven years ago," and put Berlin, the junction town, at about a thousand people.
The whole city, in one sentence, by a man who expected more. Three hotels, a few cottages, the surfmen, and somewhere to hire a horse.
Atlantic HotelOcean City Life-Saving Station MuseumJohn Tracy
Source · checked 2026-08-06
1882 · 1882-09-30
F. Joseph Miller moves his family to the beach and keeps the Seaside Hotel open all winter — the first documented year-round hotel at Ocean City.
Berlin Items, Democratic Messenger, September 30, 1882: "Mr. F. Jos. Miller has removed his family to Ocean City, and will keep the Seaside hotel open during the winter." Every previous season had ended with the last excursion train and the shuttering of the beach; the Life-Saving Station keeper and his winter crew had been the island's only reliable off-season population. Miller, a Berlin merchant, was simultaneously negotiating the sale of his Berlin business stand to C. Mumford & Co. The Seaside had opened for the summer in early July under its proprietor S. J. Massey, assisted by Robert J. Henry, Jr.
The first person to look at Ocean City in October and decide to stay open anyway.
Unverified — sourced but not confirmed against a primary record.
Source · checked 2026-08-06
1886
The Seaside Hotel advertises board at $10 and $12 a week for the 1886 season.
"SEASIDE HOTEL, Ocean City, Md. Is now open for the reception of guests. Board $10 and $12 per week. S. J. MASSEY, prop." The advertisement began in the Evening Star on July 6, 1886 and ran through early August. S. J. Massey had kept the Seaside since at least 1882, when a Berlin merchant announced he would keep it open through the winter.
Source · checked 2026-08-06
1887 · 1887-07-01
The Seaside Hotel reopens July 1, 1887 under S. J. Massey — ten years after he first advertised it, and the answer to a question the 1884 pass left open.
"SEASIDE HOTEL, OCEAN CITY, MD., will be open for the reception of guests on July 1st. S. J. MASSEY, Proprietor" ran in the Evening Star from June 28 through late July, and on July 9 the Star's own resort notes confirmed it: "The Seaside Hotel, at Ocean City, Md., is now open for guests under the management of S. J. Massey." The 1884 pass could find no proprietor for the Sea Side and listed the question as still open; this is the answer, and it puts Massey at the house across at least the 1877–1887 span.
Two hotels advertising in Washington in 1887 against the Atlantic's lonely one in 1884. Whatever the Smyrna Times thought in 1884, the town was not finished.
Source · checked 2026-08-06
1887 · 1887-11-01
J. Emory Massey, the Ocean City hotelkeeper's son, marries Sadie Hudson across the Virginia line — and a Accomack paper calls his father the Atlantic's proprietor.
The Peninsula Enterprise of Accomac, Virginia, November 5, 1887: "Mr. J. Emory Massey, son of the proprietor of Atlantic hotel, Ocean City, Md., and Miss Sadie Hudson, niece of Mr. D. J. Whealton, of this place, were married at the bride's residence, on the 1st inst., Rev. Mr. Watkins officiating. After a tour of several weeks in the northern cities, they propose to make their home with us." The Massey the Enterprise means is S. J. Massey — but Massey kept the Seaside Hotel in 1887, not the Atlantic, which was John Tracy's under lease until January 1, 1888. Either the Virginia weekly used the wrong hotel or the Massey family's Ocean City position was larger than the advertisements show.
the Massey family kept a hotel at Ocean City in 1887 — the Seaside by their own advertising, the Atlantic according to a Virginia weekly
Source · checked 2026-08-06
1888 · 1888-07-01
S. J. Massey & Son open the Sea Side Hotel on July 1 — "finest bathing on the Atlantic coast."
The Sea Side Hotel's own card ran in the Democratic Messenger all summer: "SEASIDE HOTEL, Ocean City, Md. S. J. MASSEY & SON, Proprietors. Will open for the season of 1888, on July 1st. This hotel is noted near and far for its excellent table and bath-houses. Terms moderate. Finest bathing on the Atlantic coast." The family shows through the county columns: Samuel J. Massey's daughter Annie married William Quillen at Berlin in April, the notice identifying her father as "proprietor of the Seaside Hotel, Ocean City"; the Accomac paper noted in May that "J. E. Massey, Sr., not the Lt. Governor, but the proprietor of the Seaside hotel at Ocean City, is visiting his sick son," and in June that J. E. Massey had resigned a clerkship at Accomac "to accept the position of bookkeeper at Seaside hotel"; and the Messenger's Taylorville column reported a guest staying at "the Seaside Hotel, which is owned by her father and run by Emory Massey." With the Atlantic, it was one of only two hotels open in 1888.
Source · checked 2026-08-06
1897 · 1897-07-19
The Gables, Ocean City: board at $6, $7 and $10 a week — the resort's cheapest documented 1897 rate.
A one-line advertisement in the Evening Star's Seashore column: "The Gables, Ocean City, Md. Terms, $6, $7, $10 per week. — Mrs. Massey, formerly of [the] Colonial." It ran alongside Piney Point, Md. at $6 a week and the Walnut Point Hotel on the Coan River, Va. at $1.25 a day, $6 and $8 a week — so Ocean City's cheapest board was priced level with the Potomac steamboat resorts and its best room a couple of dollars above them.
Three tiers in one line: six dollars for a room you take what you get, ten for the one facing the ocean. Twenty years earlier S. J. Massey had advertised the Seaside House at $2 a day; the surname is still on the beach.
Source · checked 2026-08-06
1902 · 1902-07-05
The 1902 season's hotel roster, from the county paper's standing "Ocean City Hotels" block: nine houses, an orchestra, artesian water and a sun parlor.
Running weekly from early July: the Hotel Brighton, "first class in every respect, about 100 yards from surf, excellent table, sanitary system, annex attached," R. C. Quillin, Prop.; The Mt. Pleasant, "centrally located, directly on the beach, sun parlor, perfect sanitary system, first-class table," Mrs. W. E. Buell, Prop.; Neptune Villa, "now open, right on the sea front"; THE DENNIS, "home comforts, unobstructed view of ocean and bay, excellent table; terms $6 to $10 per week," Mrs. E. J. Dennis, Prop.; The Plimhimmon, "one whole block ocean front, newly decorated, Hollywood Mandolin Orchestra, capacity 200, artesian spring water," Mrs. R. T. Shreve; The Hamilton, "beautifully situated, directly facing the ocean ... one of the finest hotels on the beach," Mrs. Massey; and the Atlantic Hotel, "thoroughly renovated, many newly [furnished] rooms, rooms single and en suite." Congress Hall (John Kelley part owner) and the Colonial appear elsewhere in the same issues, and Rayne's Hotel is named in the surf-rescue reports. Joseph Shaefer, "The Baker and Ice Cream Manufacturer," advertised that he was "again at Ocean City for the season." FIGURE RECOVERED 2026-08-06: the Dennis's terms, printed as "[$—] to $10 per week" from the Messenger's damaged OCR, are $6 TO $10 PER WEEK — read off the Evening Star's Ocean City advertising block of 14 June 1902 at the page image.
Source · checked 2026-08-06