Lucy the Elephant on the New Jersey Shore
by Marianne Campolongo
Title
Lucy the Elephant on the New Jersey Shore
Artist
Marianne Campolongo
Medium
Photograph - Fine Art Photograph
Description
Lucy the Elephant, a historic landmark in Margate, New Jersey.
Land speculator James Vincent de Paul Lafferty, Jr. came up with the idea of building a giant wooden elephant as a tourist attraction and to lure property buyers to his holdings on Absecon Island on the Jersey shore. In the early 1880s Lafferty hired architect William Free to build the giant pachyderm, which soon became known as Lucy. She had her first brush with fame when a young sailor on watch on a ship headed into New York harbor saw the giant animal from the sea and alerted his captain, who reported the incident upon arrival in New York. The press came out the next day. In 1897 the area was incorporated South Atlantic City; in 1909 it was changed to Margate.
Uploaded
January 14th, 2020
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