W. O. Beckenbaugh
manager, Congress Hall · active 1894–1895
Manager of Congress Hall at Ocean City in the season of 1894, when the house advertised in the Washington Evening Star as 'NOW OPEN; capacity 300 guests; directly on the beach.' On 14 August 1894 he and his wife Margaret L. Beckenbaugh executed a mortgage on Ocean City real estate and hotel property in favour of Benjamin P. Selby, agent of the heirs of W. B. R. Selby, recorded among the Worcester County land records in Liber F. H. P. No. 5, folios 280–282. Through the winter of 1894–95 the Democratic Messenger carried the mortgagee's advertisement of a sale of that property. By the summer of 1895 Congress Hall was being run by James Z. Powell. — 1896 FULL PASS, 2026-08-11: Add where he came from and what he advertised. The Wheeling Daily Intelligencer of 9 July 1894: 'West Virginians who know Mr. W. O. Beckenbaugh as an auctioneer may be glad to make his acquaintance as manager of Congress Hall, Ocean City, Maryland, where he has a well equipped house of three hund[red]...' — he was a Wheeling auctioneer, and Congress Hall's standing 1894 advertisement ran in his home-town daily through July and August: 'THE QUEEN CITY BY THE SEA, CAPACITY 300 GUESTS... Terms $2.50 per day, $10 to $15 per week. Fine Fishing, Gunning, Bathing and Sailing. No mosquitoes. No malaria.' That is the source of the campaign's first 1894 Ocean City room rate.
In the record (1)
1894
"CONGRESS HALL, OCEAN CITY, MD., THE QUEEN CITY BY THE SEA, CAPACITY 300 GUESTS" — $2.50 a day, $10 to $15 a week, no mosquitoes, no malaria.
The 1894 pass closed with the town's room rates unfound: the county paper printed none, and "the terms are reasonable" was all Congress Hall would say. They were being advertised all summer, six hundred miles away. The Wheeling Daily Intelligencer of West Virginia carried the following standing advertisement through July and August 1894, on fourteen separate pages: "CONGRESS HALL, OCEAN CITY, MD., THE QUEEN CITY BY THE SEA, CAPACITY 300 GUESTS, NOW OPEN. Fronts directly on the Beach. Terms $2.50 per day, $10 to $15 per week. Fine Fishing, Gunning, Bathing and Sailing. No mosquitoes. No malaria. W. O. BECKENBAUGH, Manager." The Washington Evening Star ran a shorter form of the same card from mid-July — "NOW OPEN; capacity 300 guests; directly on the beach. W. O. BECKENBAUGH, Manager. Send for descriptive circulars, terms, &c." — and on 27 June its resort column recommended "a charming seaside resort, convenient to Washingtonians... Congress Hall Hotel, Ocean City, Md. The house is situated directly on the beach, and will accommodate three hundred." Why Wheeling: the Intelligencer of 9 July 1894 explains that "West Virginians who know Mr. W. O. Beckenbaugh as an auctioneer may be glad to make his acquaintance as manager of Congress Hall, Ocean City, Maryland, where he has a well equipped house of three hund[red]..." Congress Hall's 1894 manager was a Wheeling auctioneer advertising to his own home town. Ten dollars a week is the same floor Congress Hall would advertise in the Evening Star in 1895 [fact:1895-congress-hall-rates]; the 1894 card sets the ceiling three dollars higher and adds a day rate and a capacity the 1895 card does not.
Source · checked 2026-08-11