MAPL Resources on Cliffwood Beach

The Matawan Aberdeen Public Library has some interesting resources on Cliffwood Beach in its reference section.

There is a Cliffwood Beach folder of newspaper and magazine articles on the shelf with local and county history materials, along with ones on the shark attacks of 1916, the Jersey Devil, and, for some reason, the Loch Ness Monster. The articles in the Cliffwood Beach folder are:

• Let's Spend a Day on the Bay, by Helen Henderson. Postcard Collector, Feb 1996, pp 30 - 31
• Section Boomed As 1920s Resort Area: Rich Past Never Fully Reclaimed After Hurricane, by Lauren Jaeger. Part of Focus on Cliffwood Beach in The Independent, 7 July 1994, p 7 (detailed history, pictures)
  
• Content in Cliffwood Beach: Many Residents Would Not Live Anywhere Else, by Lauren Jaeger. Part of Focus on Cliffwood Beach in The Independent, 7 July 1994, p 6 (picture of Burlews family that operated former Matty's store on South Concourse; map of CB)
  
• Aberdeen Township Cleans Up, by Lauren Jaeger. Part of Focus on Cliffwood Beach in The Independent, 7 July 1994, p 8 (picture misidentified as Ross Field is actually the basketball courts at the Green Acres project by the beach)
• Water and Sewer Service Improvements Planned, by Lauren Jaeger. Part of Focus on Cliffwood Beach in The Independent, 7 July 1994, p 9 (picture of Marshall Concourse)
• Park Vandalism in Difficult to Combat, by Lauren Jaeger. Part of Focus on Cliffwood Beach in The Independent, 7 July 1994, p 10.
• Cliffwood Beach Long Past Resort Days, by Ellen Bradfield. Asbury Park Press, 4 December 1988, G1, G4. (picture of Mt Moriah Baptist Church, home on Brookside)
  
• Cliffwood Beach: A Shoreline Divided: County Line, Development Split, by Michael A. W. Ottey. Part of the Life on the Bay Series, Asbury Park Press, 18 September 1992, B1, B4. (pictures of Keyport harbor from Beach Drive, 235 Shoreland Circle)
  
• Laurence Harbor: Views Top-Notch, by Michael A. W. Ottey. Part of the Life on the Bay Series, Asbury Park Press, 18 September 1992, B4. 

Also on the history shelf is the book Township of Matawan: 1857 - 1957, compiled by Mrs Alice Tiemann and published by the Matawan  Township Centennial Celebration Commission. It has a chapter on Cliffwood Beach. You'll want to check out Cliffwood As I Knew It, the recollections of George Birch, Jr (pp 18 - 21), and The Mattesons, the recollections of Alice Tiemann (pp 21 - 24). She writes about Matty's store, which Homer Matteson built at South Concourse and Prospect in 1925 and operated as Matty's until 1947, when James Burlew acquired it and operated it as the Burlews store for many years. The Krauser's store is presently in that location.

You'll also want to check out the Matawan Journal collection, including a set of indices and articles, which can be found in the back of the reference section (shelves at the Main Street end of the reference and computer wing). The 14 December 1923 article in particular discusses the layout of the new Cliffwood Beach, which opened a couple of years later.