Introducing a great new book about Atlantic
City!
In the mid 1800s, Jonathan Pitney
looked out onto Absecon Island and saw nothing but potential, and today investors,
visitors and residents look at Atlantic City and see the same thing as the second
wave of the city's casino-fueled renaissance breaks on the shore line. With
nearly 500 photographs and Bill Kent's engaging narrative, America's Playground
tells the story of Atlantic City from the early days as a primitive health resort
through the rollicking times of enormous wooden and stone hotels and amusement
piers with their never-ending delights. The story looks back at the trials and
travails of a city in decline and rejoices in the present day as the Queen of
Resorts regains her throne.
Bill Kent remembers
the old Atlantic City, when, as a child growing up in South Jersey, he loved
the aroma of roasted nuts billowing out of Planters Peanuts and bought toys
at Rappaport's in the Marlborough-Blenheim Hotel. Like every visitor to Atlantic
City, he peered through the cracks in the Boardwalk and wondered what was down
there. As a reporter, he has covered the birth of the new Atlantic City, writing
for the New York Times, the Philadelphia Inquirer, and more than 40 regional
and national publications. He has taught writing and journalism at the University
of Pennsylvania, Rutgers and Temple Universities. Atlantic City was the inspiration
for his series of mystery novels, Under the Boardwalk, Down by the Sea, and
On a Blanket With My Baby. He has also written the guidebook, Fodor's Vacations
on the Jersey Shore. Bill Kent lives in Pennsylvania with his wife and son.
Robert E. Ruffolo, Jr. is the proprietor of Princeton Antiques and Books in
Atlantic City, and one of the world's foremost dealers in rare and out-of-print
books with a remarkable ability to find almost any book in the world. In his
hometown of Greensboro, NC, Mr. Ruffolo's mother, Betsy, the comptroller for
a magazine and comic book distributor, unwittingly started the young collector
in his career by filling his bedroom with every comic book in print. As a college
student in 1972, the shoobie came to Atlantic City to work in his fathers antique
business and together they expanded into rare books (including the comic variety)
Today, with sand in his sandals, he's the Chairman of the Atlantic City Historical
Museum and the one of the world's largest collectors of Atlantic City photographs
and memorabilia.
When Lauralee Dobbins and her friends from Audubon High School
took a bus to Atlantic City to tape a teen dance program called "The Steel
Pier Show," no one thought of the excursion as something that would lead
to a career. But today, Ms. Dobbins is a South Jersey writer and public relations
consultant whose work, for more than a decade, has been focused primarily on
promoting Atlantic City events and casinos. For the past two years, Ms. Dobbins
has worked as editor, photo editor and project coordinator for America's Playground,
which has occasionally required fancy footwork, but thankfully no dancing. She
is also the co-author of the 1997 Harper Collins publication, Ageless-What
Every Woman Needs to Know to Look Good and Feel Great.
To order Atlantic City - America's Playground, print, and use form
located here.