Congress Hall (Cape May hotel)

Congress Hall is a historic hotel in Cape May, Cape May County, New Jersey, United States, occupying a city block bordered on the south by Beach Avenue and on the east by Washington Street Mall.

It burned to the ground in Cape May's Great Fire of 1878, but within a year, its owners had rebuilt the hotel in brick in an effort to convince leery prospective guests that the building was fireproof.

[4] While serving as President of the United States, Franklin Pierce, James Buchanan, Ulysses S. Grant and Benjamin Harrison vacationed at Congress Hall, and Harrison made Congress Hall his official Summer White House, becoming the center of state business for several months each year.

[9] With the decline of the Bible Conference, Congress Hall fell into a state of disrepair,[10] with the hotel closing in 1992, though retail space in the building remained in use.

Bashaw supplies the hotel and many of its restaurants with pork, eggs and vegetables from his 73-acre (30 ha) Beach Plum Farm in West Cape May, New Jersey.

A Stroll along Beach Avenue, Cape May, New Jersey video (3:35)