Atlantic City Revisited. This item is unavailable.Atlantic City Revisited

In 1854, a group of engineers and railroad businessmen drew a straight line from Philadelphia to the New Jersey coast, built a railroad along the line, and created Atlantic City. From the 1850s to the 1950s, the city attracted the creme of American society and the working class alike and gave birth to the beauty pageant, rolling chair, boardwalk, saltwater taffy, jitney, and the successful Monopoly board game. But the onset of air travel in the 1950s and the aging grand hotels brought Atlantic City to its knees. The opening of Resorts International in 1978 and the prosperous gaming business that followed in its wake helped the city rise from its own ashes, and a year-round tourism industry exploded. Garish and opulent casino hotels replaced many of the boardwalk dowagers, and new palaces transformed the once desolate marina section into a vibrant destination.

As a journalist and staff writer for the Courier-Post in Cherry Hill, William H. Sokolic attends events, interviews important characters, and covers casinos, tourism, real estate, restaurants, and clubs in and around Atlantic City. Robert E. Ruffolo Jr. is the chairman of the Atlantic City Historical Museum and owner of Princeton Antiques Bookshop in Atlantic City since 1966. He supplied most of the images from his extensive collection.