Rockaway Beach

The American frontier did not just consist of a prairie—it alsoincluded marshes and windswept sand dunes. When the earliestsettlers arrived at Rockaway Beach on steamships in the mid-1800s, it was a narrow strip of land pocked with ponds and covered with dunes. Within 30 years, the community had grown into a wildly popular resort served by a thriving rail line. Amusement parks, hotels, taverns, and dance halls abounded, as did bungalow courts and open-air tent colonies. In the 1960s, the area was disrupted by urban development efforts and transportation infrastructure had declined. Today, Rockaway Beach is being rediscovered by a new generation of visitors and entrepreneurs as longtime residents work simultaneously to reinvigorate it. Through vintage images, Rockaway Beach chronicles the story of this beloved community and the efforts to recapture the magical success of an earlier era.