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Lights Out (radio show)

Lights Out is an American old-time radio program devoted mostly to horror and the supernatural.

Created by Wyllis Cooper and then eventually taken over by Arch Oboler, versions of Lights Out aired on different networks, at various times, from January 3, 1934 to the summer of 1947 and the series eventually made the transition to television. Lights Out was one of the earliest radio horror programs, predating Suspense and Inner Sanctum.

The Wyllis Cooper era
In the fall of 1933, NBC writer Wyllis Cooper conceived the idea of "a midnight mystery serial to catch the attention of the listeners at the witching hour." The idea was to offer listeners a dramatic program late at night, at a time when the competition was mostly airing music. At some point, the serial concept was dropped in favor of an anthology format emphasizing crime thrillers and the supernatural. The first series of shows (each 15 minutes long) ran on a local NBC station, WENR, at midnight Wednesdays, starting in January 1934. By April, the series proved successful enough to expand to a half-hour. In January 1935, the show was discontinued in order to ease Cooper's workload (he was then writing scripts for the network's prestigious Immortal Dramas program), but was brought back by huge popular demand a few weeks later. After a successful tryout in New York City, the series was picked up by NBC in April 1935 and broadcast nationally, usually late at night and always on Wednesdays. Cooper stayed on the program until June 1936, when another Chicago writer, Arch Oboler, took over. By the time Cooper left, the series had inspired about 600 fan clubs.

Cooper's run was characterized by grisly stories spiked with dark, tongue-in-cheek humor, a sort of radio Grand Guignol. A character might be buried, eaten, or skinned alive, vaporized in a ladle of white-hot steel, absorbed by a giant slurping amoeba, have his arm torn off by a robot, or forced to endure torture, beating or decapitation—always with the appropriate blood-curdling acting and sound effects.

Though there had been efforts at horror on radio previously (notably The Witch's Tale), there does not seem to have been anything quite as explicit or outrageous as this on a regular basis. When Lights Out switched to the national network, a decision was made to tone down the gore and emphasize tamer fantasy and ghost stories.

Only one recording survives from Cooper's 1934–1936 run, but his less gruesome scripts were occasionally rebroadcast. An interesting example is his "Three Men," which became the series' annual Christmas show (a 1937 version circulates among collectors under titles like "Uninhabited" or "Christmas Story"); it has a plot typical of Cooper's gentler fantasies. On the first Christmas after World War I, three Allied officers meet by chance in a train compartment and find one another vaguely familiar. They fall asleep and share a dream in which they are the Three Wise Men searching for Jesus. But is it really a dream? In the best tradition of supernatural twist endings, Cooper has the officers wake to find a strange odor in their compartment—which turns out to be myrrh and frankincense.

In the mid-1940s, Cooper's decade-old scripts were used for three brief summertime revivals of Lights Out. The surviving recordings reveal that Cooper was experimenting with both stream of consciousness and first-person narration a few years before these techniques were popularized in American radio drama by, among others, Arch Oboler and Orson Welles. In one tale (The Haunted Cell, original broadcast date unknown, rebroadcast 7/20/1946), a murderer describes how the Chicago police try to beat a confession out of him. When that doesn't work, they put him in a jail cell haunted by the ghost of a previous occupant, a smooth gangster named Skeeter Dempsey who describes his own execution and discusses the afterlife knowledgeably. In the final twist, the narrator reveals that he has taken Skeeter's advice to commit suicide and is now himself a ghost.

Another story, originally broadcast in March 1935 as "After Five O'Clock" and revived in 1945 as "Man in the Middle," allows us to follow the thoughts of a businessman as he spends a day at the office cheating on his wife with his secretary. The amusing contrast between what the protagonist thinks to himself and what he says out loud to the other characters enlivens one of Cooper's favorite plot devices, the love triangle.

One radio critic, in reviewing a March 1935 episode that used multiple first-person narrators, said:

Technique in writing and producing this script is one of pure radio license and can't even be compared to the flashback from the movies, since characters dead at the close of the tale do considerable talking of their experiences. This feat, combined with the terse, stark sock of the drama, is probably one of the most realistic pieces radio has ever presented.

Other Cooper scripts are more routine, perhaps in part because the author's attention was divided by other projects. From the summer of 1933 until August 1935, Cooper was NBC Chicago's continuity chief, supervising a staff of writers and editing their scripts. He resigned in order to devote more time to Lights Out as well as a daily aviation adventure serial, Flying Time. At various times, he also served on NBC's Program Planning Board, wrote the soap opera Betty and Bob, and commuted weekly to produce another program in Des Moines, Iowa.

From early 1934 to mid 1936, Cooper produced close to 120 scripts for Lights Out. Some episode titles (all from 1935) include "The Mine of Lost Skulls," "Sepulzeda's Revenge," "Three Lights From a Match," "Play Without a Name," and "Lost in the Catacombs" (about a honeymoon couple in Rome who lose their way in the catacombs under the city). Typical plots included:

 * A novelist, struggling to write a locked room mystery, locks himself in his office only to be interrupted by a stranger who resembles the story's murderer.
 * A killer named "Nails" Malone has "a conference with his conscience" about the murders he's committed.
 * A scientist accidentally creates a giant amoeba that grows rapidly, eats living things (like the lab assistant's cat), and exhibits powers of mind control.

The show benefited tremendously from Chicago's considerable pool of creative talent. The city was, like New York, one of the main centers of radio production in 1930s America. Among the actors who participated regularly during the Cooper era were Sidney Ellstrom, Art Jacobson, Don Briggs, Bernardine Flynn, Betty Lou Gerson, and Betty Winkler. The sound effects technicians frequently had to perform numerous experiments to achieve the desired noises. Cooper once had them build a gallows and wasn't satisfied until one of the sound men personally dropped through the trap. The series had little music scoring save for the thirteen chime notes that opened the program (after a deep voice intoned, "Lights out, everybody!") and an ominous gong which was used to punctuate a scene and provide the transition to another.

A veteran radio dramatist, Ferrin Fraser, wrote some of the scripts.

The Arch Oboler era
When Cooper departed, his replacement—a young, eccentric and ambitious Arch Oboler—picked up where he left off, often following Cooper's general example but investing the scripts with his own concerns. Oboler made imaginative use of stream-of-consciousness narration and sometimes introduced social and political themes that reflected his commitment to antifascist liberalism.

Although in later years Lights Out would be closely associated with Oboler, he was always quick to credit Cooper as the series' creator and spoke highly of the older author, calling him "the unsung pioneer of radio dramatic techniques" and the first person Oboler knew of who understood that radio drama could be an art form.

In June 1936, Oboler's first script for Lights Out was "Burial Service," about a paralyzed girl who is buried alive. NBC was flooded with outraged letters in response. His next story, one of his most popular efforts, was the frequently repeated "Catwife," about the desperate husband of a woman who turns into a giant feline. He followed with "The Dictator," about Roman emperor Caligula. This set the pattern for Oboler's run: For every two horror episodes, he said later, he would try to write one drama on subjects that were ostensibly more serious, usually moral, social, and political issues.

Like Cooper, Oboler was much in demand and highly prolific. While working on Lights Out, he wrote numerous dramatic sketches for variety shows (The Chase and Sanborn Hour, Rudy Vallee's programs), anthologies (Grand Hotel, The First Nighter Program, The Irene Rich Show) and specials. In August 1936, singer Vallee, then the dean of variety show hosts, claimed that Lights Out was his favorite series. Oboler occasionally redrafted his Lights Out scripts for use on Vallee's and other variety hours. A version of Oboler's "Prelude to Murder" starring Peter Lorre and Olivia de Havilland was scheduled to air on a November 1936 Vallee broadcast. Other Lights Out plays that turned up on various late 1930s variety programs included "Danse Macabre" (with Boris Karloff), "Alter Ego" (with Bette Davis) and "The Harp."

Oboler met the demand by adopting an unusual scripting procedure: He would lie in bed at night, smoke cigarettes, and improvise into a Dictaphone, acting out every line of the play. In this way, he was able to complete a script quickly, sometimes in as little as 30 minutes, though he might take as long as three or four hours. In the morning, a stenographer would type up the recording for Oboler's revisions. Years later, Rod Serling, who counted radio fantasists like Cooper, Oboler, and Norman Corwin among his inspirations, would use a similar process to churn out his many teleplays for The Twilight Zone, a series that in many respects was to television what Lights Out was to radio.

Despite acclaim for Oboler's dramas, NBC announced it was canceling the series in the summer of 1937—"just to see whether listeners are still faithful to it," according to one press report but also, it seems, to allow the hard-working author a vacation. Another outcry from fans led to the program's return that September for another season.

In the spring of 1938, the series earned a good deal of publicity for its fourth anniversary as a half-hour show when actor Boris Karloff, the star of many a Hollywood horror film, traveled to Chicago to appear in five consecutive episodes. Among his roles: an accused murderer haunted by an unearthly woman-like demonic creature (played by Templeton Fox) urging him to "kill...kill...kill" in "The Dream"; the desperate husband in a rebroadcast of "Catwife"; and a mad, violin-playing hermit who imprisons a pair of women, threatening to murder one and marry the other, in "Valse Triste."

Oboler left in the summer of 1938 to pursue other projects, writing and directing several critically acclaimed dramatic anthology series: Arch Oboler's Plays, Everyman's Theatre, and Plays for Americans. A variety of NBC staff writers and freelancers filled in until Lights Out was canceled in 1939. NBC Chicago continuity editor Ken Robinson supervised some of the writing. Regular contributors included William Fifield and Hobart Donovan. A recording of the fifth anniversary show survives from this season. Donovan's "The Devil's Due," about criminals haunted by a mysterious stranger, is in keeping with the formula laid down by Cooper.

In 1942, Oboler, needing money, revived the series for a year on CBS. Airing in prime time instead of late at night, the program was sponsored by the makers of Ironized Yeast. Most of the Lights Out recordings that exist today come from this version of the show. For this revival, each episode began with an ominously tolling bell over which Oboler read the cryptic tagline: "It...is...later...than...you...think." This was followed by a dour "warning" to listeners to turn off their radios if they felt their constitutions were too delicate to handle the frightening tale that was about to unfold.

Directing and hosting the 1942–43 broadcasts, mostly from New York and Hollywood, Oboler not only reused scripts from his 1936–38 run but also revived some of the more fantasy-oriented plays from his other, more recent anthology series. Some episodes had originally aired on the author's groundbreaking, critically acclaimed 1939–1940 program Arch Oboler's Plays, among them:

 * "The Ugliest Man in the World," a sentimental tale of a hideously deformed man seeking love in a cruel world, inspired by Boris Karloff's typecasting in horror roles.
 * "Bathysphere," a political thriller about a scientist and a dictator sharing a deep sea diving bell.
 * "Visitor from Hades," about a bickering married couple trapped in their apartment by a doppelgänger.

Another unusual script, "Execution," about a mysterious French woman who bedevils the Nazis trying to hang her, had previously aired on Oboler's wartime propaganda series Plays for Americans.

Like Cooper, Oboler made effective use of atmospheric sound effects, perhaps most memorably in his legendary "Chicken Heart," a script that debuted in 1937 and was rebroadcast in 1938 and 1942. It features the simple but effective "thump-thump" of an ever-growing, ever-beating chicken heart which, thanks to a scientific experiment gone wrong, threatens to engulf the entire world. Although the story bears similarities to an earlier Cooper episode (about an ever-growing amoeba that makes an ominous "slurp! slurp!" sound), Oboler's unique choice of monster was inspired by a Chicago Tribune article announcing that scientists had succeeded in keeping a chicken heart alive for a considerable period of time after its having been removed from the chicken. Recordings of the original radio broadcasts are lost or unavailable, although Oboler later recreated this episode for a record album in 1962. Part of the episode's notoriety stems from a popular standup routine by comedian Bill Cosby (on his 1966 album Wonderfulness), an account of his staying up late as a child to listen to scary radio shows against his parents' wishes and being terrified by the chicken heart. Cosby also referenced the episode in a camping episode of Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids.

Other well-remembered Oboler tales, many of them written in the 1930s and rebroadcast in the '40s, include:

 * "Come to the Bank," in which a man learns to walk through walls but gets stuck when he tries to rob a vault.
 * "Oxychloride X," about a chemist who invents a substance that can eat through anything (and releases monsters when it eats all the way through the Earth's crust.)
 * "Murder Castle," based on the real-life case of H. H. Holmes, Chicago's notorious serial killer.
 * "Profits Unlimited," a still-relevant allegory on the promises and dangers of capitalism.
 * "Spider," in which two men attempt to capture a giant arachnid.
 * "The Flame," a weird exercise in supernatural pyromania.
 * "Sub-Basement," which finds yet another husband and wife in peril—this time trapped far beneath a department store in the subterranean railway of the Chicago Tunnel Company.

Lights Out often featured metafictional humor. Perhaps inspired by Cooper's "The Coffin in Studio B," in which actors rehearsing an episode of Lights Out are interrupted by a mysterious coffin salesman peddling his wares, Oboler wrote stories like "Murder in the Script Department," in which two Lights Out script typists become trapped in their building after hours as frightening, unexplained events occur. In "The Author and the Thing," Oboler even plays himself pitted against one of his own monstrous creations.

After the 1942–43 Lights Out, Oboler continued to work in radio (Everything for the Boys and revivals of Arch Oboler's Plays) and pursued a second career in filmmaking, first in the Hollywood mainstream and then as an independent producer, writing and directing a number of offbeat, low-budget films, including Five, about survivors of a nuclear war, The Twonky, a satire of television, and the 3-D film Bwana Devil, which made a huge profit on a small investment. He dabbled in live television (a six-episode 1949 anthology series, Arch Oboler Comedy Theater), playwriting (Night of the Auk), and fiction (House on Fire). In 1962, he produced a spoken-word album entitled Drop Dead! (Capitol T/ST-1763), which recreated abbreviated versions of his Lights Out thrillers, including "Chicken Heart" and "The Dark," about a mysterious creeping mist that turns people inside-out. In 1971–1972, Oboler produced a syndicated radio series, The Devil and Mr. O (he liked for people to call him "Mr. O"), which featured vintage recordings from Lights Out and his other series with newly recorded introductions by Mr. O himself.

Later revivals
The success of Oboler's 1942–1943 Lights Out revival was part of a trend in 1940s American radio toward more horror. Genre series like Inner Sanctum, Suspense and others drew increasingly large ratings. Perhaps with this in mind, NBC broadcast another Lights Out revival series from New York in the summer of 1945, using seven of Wyllis Cooper's original 1930s scripts. Like Oboler's, this revival aired in the early evening and not late at night, and because of this, it was reported, "only those Cooper scripts which stressed fantasy rather than horror" were broadcast. These included a bloodless ghost story about a man who accidentally condemns his dead wife to haunt a nearby cemetery and "The Rocket Ship", science fiction involving interstellar travel. Cooper, then an advertising executive at New York's Compton Agency, may have had little or nothing to do with the actual broadcasts other than allowing his scripts to be performed.

This was followed by an eight-episode revival in the summer of 1946, from NBC Chicago, although at least one of the scripts is not by Cooper (an adaptation of Charles Dickens' "The Signal-Man"). This series also avoided the use of outright gore. In fact, a review in Variety complained that the premiere episode, "The Seven Plovers", was "a little too serious in content for a thriller" since it included "religious background, philosophical discussion and dream diagnosis ..."

A third series of eight vintage Cooper scripts was scheduled to run in the summer of 1947 as well. Broadcast from Hollywood over ABC Radio, it starred Boris Karloff and was sponsored by Eversharp, whose company president canceled the series after the third episode, apparently unhappy with the gruesome subject matter. The premiere, "Death Robbery", featured Karloff as a scientist who brings his wife back from the dead, only to find she's become a gibbering homicidal maniac. An uncredited Lurene Tuttle plays the wife. This episode is one of the few surviving examples of Cooper's Lights Out work that reflects the sort of explicit horror that characterized the original series. Eversharp paid off Cooper for his five unused scripts and Lights Out ended its long run on network radio.

From 1936 to 1939, Cooper pursued a screenwriting career in Hollywood (his major credits are the screenplay for Universal's 1939 Son of Frankenstein and contributions to the Mr. Moto mystery series starring Peter Lorre) but continued to work in radio, advertising and, later, television. By 1940, he had changed the spelling of his name from "Willis" to "Wyllis" (to satisfy "his wife's numerological inclinations") and lived mainly in the New York City area where he worked on a number of radio programs, the most important of which was probably Edward M. Kirby's popular and acclaimed government propaganda series, The Army Hour, which Cooper wrote, produced and directed for its first year.

In 1947, Cooper created Quiet, Please, another radio program dealing with the supernatural, which he wrote and directed until 1949, occasionally borrowing ideas from his Lights Out stories while creating wholly new scripts that were often more sophisticated than his 1930s originals. In 1949 and 1950, he produced (and contributed scripts to) three live TV series that frequently dealt with the supernatural: Volume One, Escape and Stage 13.

Television
In 1946, NBC Television brought Lights Out to TV in a series of four specials, broadcast live and produced by Fred Coe, who also contributed three of the scripts. NBC asked Cooper to write the script for the premiere, "First Person Singular", which is told entirely from the point of view of an unseen murderer who kills his obnoxious wife and winds up being executed. Variety gave this first episode a rave review ("undoubtedly one of the best dramatic shows yet seen on a television screen"), but Lights Out did not become a regular NBC-TV series until 1949.

Coe initially produced this second series but, for much of its run, the live 1949–1952 program was sponsored by appliance maker Admiral, produced by Herbert Bayard Swope, Jr., directed by Laurence Schwab, Jr., and hosted by Frank Gallop. Critical response was mixed but the program was successful for several seasons (sometimes appearing in the weekly lists of the ten most watched network shows) until competition from the massively popular sitcom I Love Lucy on CBS helped to kill it off.

The 1949–1952 series featured scripts by a variety of authors, including a young Ira Levin. In 1951, producer Swope even bought a few stories from Cooper and Oboler. "Dead Man's Coat," starring Basil Rathbone, was adapted from one of Cooper's 1930s plays (and not to be confused with his Quiet, Please episode "Wear the Dead Man's Coat" with which it shares a similar premise). Oboler's "And Adam Begot," adapted by Ernest Kinoy from a radio play, starred Kent Smith. Among the young actors employed was Leslie Nielsen, who appeared in several episodes including "The Lost Will of Dr. Rant," based on "The Tractate Middoth", an M. R. James story. These and many others are available on DVD.

Other notable guest stars included Anne Bancroft, Grace Kelly, Eva Marie Saint, Lee J. Cobb, Anthony Quinn, Jessica Tandy, Veronica Lake, John Forsythe, Boris Karloff, Beatrice Straight, Eli Wallach, Vincent Price, Jane Wyatt, Felicia Montealegre Bernstein and Jack Palance.

Notable directors included Delbert Mann and Fred Coe.

Later versions
In 1972, NBC aired yet another TV incarnation of Lights Out, a TV movie pilot which was not well received. In fact, Oboler (who was then syndicating his The Devil and Mr. O radio show) announced publicly that he had nothing to do with it.

Despite its modest television success, radio historian John Dunning suggested that the legend of Lights Out is firmly rooted in radio.

Influence

 * "What the Devil" (1942), about two motorists menaced by a truck whose driver they cannot see, was similar in plot to Steven Spielberg's TV movie Duel, adapted by Richard Matheson from his own short story. Oboler, feeling his copyright had been infringed, claimed in an interview that he "reached for a lawyer and got paid off by Universal Studios."

Listen to

 * Theater of the Ears: Lights Out
 * Lights Out, radio series; 86 episodes available for download at the Internet Archive

title: Lights Out (radio show)


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Jerichower Land

Jerichower Land is a district (Kreis) in the north-east of Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. Its neighbouring administrative units are (clockwise from the south): the districts of Anhalt-Bitterfeld, Salzlandkreis, the city of Magdeburg, the districts of Börde, Stendal, Havelland and Potsdam-Mittelmark in Brandenburg.

History
In 1816, the area of the district became part of the Prussian province of Saxony, and was split administratively into three districts, Jerichow I, Jerichow II and Ziesar. The district of Ziesar was added into Jerichow I in 1826.

After World War II, the districts were rearranged. Some areas of the two districts were added to the neighbouring districts of Havelberg, Rathenow, Brandenburg, Loburg and Zerbst. The two districts were also renamed after their administrative seats, thus Jerichow I became District Burg, and Jerichow II became District Genthin. In 1952, the district of Burg was split into two parts. However, in 1957, the district of Loburg was recombined with the district of Burg.

In 1994, the two districts of Burg and Genthin were merged, and re-adopted the historical name of Jerichow. In 2007, 6 municipalities from the former district of Anhalt-Zerbst (Hobeck, Lohburg, Lübs, Prödel, Rosian and Schweinitz) were added to Jerichower Land District.

The name of the district derives from the city of Jerichow, the name of which is related to that of an early Slavic tribal grouping. It is not related to the name for the city of Jericho in the Middle East.

Geography
The area of the district is 1578.2 km2. Main water bodies in the district are the rivers Elbe, Ehle, Ihle and Nuthe as well as the Elbe-Havel canal.

Coat of arms
The vertical bars in the left half of the coat of arms symbolize the Elbe-Havel canal, while the crane in the right symbolizes the nature in the district. Cranes are common birds in the district.

Towns and municipalities
The district Jerichower Land consists of the following subdivisions:

Economy
The LFD Holding has its headquarters and several production plants in the district.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Jerichower Land


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Seaside resort

A seaside resort is a city, town, village, or hotel that serves as a vacation resort and is located on a coast. Sometimes the concept includes an aspect of official accreditation based on the satisfaction of certain requirements, such as in the German Seebad. Where a beach is the primary focus for tourists, it may be called a beach resort.

History
Seaside resorts have existed since antiquity. In Roman times, the town of Baiae, by the Tyrrhenian Sea in Italy, was a resort for those who were sufficiently prosperous. Barcola in northern Italy, with its Roman luxury villas, is considered a special example of ancient leisure culture by the sea. Mersea Island, in Essex, England was a seaside holiday destination for wealthy Romans living in Colchester.

The development of the beach as a popular leisure resort from the mid-19th century was the first manifestation of what is now the global tourist industry. The first seaside resorts were opened in the 18th century for the aristocracy, who began to frequent the seaside as well as the then fashionable spa towns, for recreation and health. One of the earliest such seaside resorts was Scarborough in Yorkshire during the 1720s; it had been a popular spa town since a stream of acidic water was discovered running from one of the cliffs to the south of the town in the 17th century. The first rolling bathing machines were introduced by 1735.

In 1793, Heiligendamm in Mecklenburg, Germany was founded as the first seaside resort of the European continent, which successfully attracted Europe's aristocracy to the Baltic Sea.

The opening of the resort in Brighton and its reception of royal patronage from King George IV extended the seaside as a resort for health and pleasure to the much larger London market, and the beach became a centre for upper-class pleasure and frivolity. This trend was praised and artistically elevated by the new romantic ideal of the picturesque landscape; Jane Austen's unfinished novel Sanditon is an example of that. Later, Queen Victoria's long-standing patronage of the Isle of Wight and Ramsgate in Kent ensured that a seaside residence was considered as a highly fashionable possession for those wealthy enough to afford more than one home.

Seaside resorts for the middle and working classes
The extension of this form of leisure to the middle and working classes began with the development of the railways in the 1840s; they offered cheap travel to fast-growing resort towns. In particular, the branch line to the small seaside town of Blackpool from Poulton-le-Fylde led to a sustained economic and demographic boom. A sudden influx of visitors arriving by rail motivated entrepreneurs to build accommodation and create new attractions, leading to more visitors and rapid growth throughout the 1850s and 1860s.

The growth was intensified by the practice among the Lancashire cotton mill owners of closing the factories for a week every year to service and repair machinery. These became known as wakes weeks. Each town's mills would close for a different week, allowing Blackpool to manage a steady and reliable stream of visitors over a prolonged period in the summer. A prominent feature of the resort was the promenade and the pleasure piers, where an eclectic variety of performances vied for the people's attention. In 1863, the North Pier in Blackpool was completed, rapidly becoming a centre of attraction for elite visitors. Central Pier was completed in 1868, with a theatre and a large open-air dance floor.

Many popular beach resorts were equipped with bathing machines, because even the all-covering beachwear of the period was considered immodest.

By the end of the century the English coastline had over 100 large resort towns, some with populations exceeding 50,000.

Expansion around the world
The development of the seaside resort abroad was stimulated by the well-developed English love of the beach. The French Riviera on the Mediterranean Sea had already become a destination for the British upper class by the end of the 18th century. In 1864, the first railway to Nice was completed, making the Riviera accessible to visitors from all over Europe. By 1874, foreign residents in Nice, mostly British, numbered 25,000. The coastline became renowned for attracting the royalty of Europe, including Queen Victoria and King Edward VII.

In the United States, early seaside resorts in the late 1800s catered to the wealthy, including city businessmen. Cape May, New Jersey became one of the first coastal resorts in the United States, when regular steamboat traffic on the Delaware River began after the War of 1812. Early visitors to Cape May included Henry Clay in 1847, and Abraham Lincoln in 1849. By 1880, Henry Flagler had extended several rail lines southward down the US Atlantic coastline, enticing northern upper-class families south to subtropical Florida. The Florida East Coast Railway brought northern tourists to St. Augustine in greater numbers, and by 1887 Flagler began to build two large ornate hotels in St. Augustine, the 540-room Ponce de Leon Hotel and the Hotel Alcazar, and bought the Casa Monica Hotel the next year.

Continental European attitudes towards gambling and nudity tended to be more lax than in Britain, and British and French entrepreneurs were quick to exploit the possibilities. In 1863, the Prince of Monaco, Charles III and François Blanc, a French businessman, arranged for steamships and carriages to take visitors from Nice to Monaco, where large luxury hotels, gardens and casinos were built. The place was renamed Monte Carlo. Commercial seabathing also spread to other areas of the United States and parts of the British Empire such as Australia, where surfing became popular in the early 20th century. By the 1970s cheap and affordable air travel was the catalyst for the growth of a global tourism market.

Since the late 20th century, recreational fishing and leisure boat pursuits have become very lucrative, and traditional fishing villages are often well positioned to take advantage of this. Destin, Florida, for instance, has evolved from an artisanal fishing village into a seaside resort dedicated to tourism with a large fishing fleet of recreational charter boats.

Australia
• Gold Coast (Surfers Paradise)

• Sunshine Coast

• Jervis Bay (Hyams Beach)

• Tangalooma

• Queenscliff, Victoria

• Agnes Water

• St Kilda Beach

• Glenelg

• Byron Bay

• Central Coast (The Entrance, Newcastle and Ettalong Beach)

• Batemans Bay

• Port Douglas

• Port Macquarie

• Ballina, New South Wales

• Fitzroy Island

• Sydney (Bondi Beach, Manly Beach, Brighton-Le-Sands, Palm Beach)

• Wollongong

• Noosa Heads

• Coffs Harbour

• Margaret River

• Palm Cove

• Nelson

• Nelson Bay

• South West Rocks

• Yamba

• Lizard Island National Park

• Cairns

• Airlie Beach

• Kiama

• Forster

• Culburra Beach

• Tweed Heads

Belgium
Seaside resorts on the Flemish coast of West-Vlaanderen exist at the famous Knokke, Ostend and also De Panne and coastal towns along the North Sea served by the coastal tramway Kusttram run by De Lijn.

Bulgaria
• Sunny Beach

• Sozopol

• Golden Sands

• Constantine and Helena

• Sveti Vlas

• Albena

• Obzor

• Kranevo

• Ravda

• Pomorie

• Dyuni

• Balchik

• Kavarna

• Ahtopol

• Kavarna

• Tsarevo

• Rusalka

• Holiday Club Riviera

• Nesebar

• Kamchia (resort)

• Byala

• Primorsko

• Kiten

• Lozenets

• Tsarevo

• Sinemorets

• Varna

Croatia
There are many seaside resorts on the jagged coastline of Croatia and its several islands, including:

 * Biograd na Moru
 * Cres
 * Jablanac
 * Krk
 * Lopar
 * Omiš
 * Omišalj
 * Opatija
 * Porec
 * Šibenik
 * Trogir

Cyprus

 * Ayia Napa
 * Coral Bay
 * Larnaca
 * Latchi
 * Limassol
 * Paphos
 * Pissouri
 * Polis
 * Protaras

Denmark

 * Blåvand
 * Hornbæk
 * Marielyst
 * Skagen
 * Tisvildeleje

Estonia

 * Haapsalu
 * Kuressaare
 * Narva-Jõesuu
 * Pärnu

Finland

 * Hailuoto
 * Hanko
 * Kalajoki
 * Mariehamn
 * Naantali
 * Oulu
 * Yyteri

France
With three long coastlines, France has many seaside resorts on its various coasts; for specific towns in each region, see the following articles:

 * Côte Bleue on the Mediterranean Sea
 * Côte d'Argent on the Bay of Biscay
 * Côte de Lumière on the Bay of Biscay
 * Côte des Landes, a section of the Côte d'Argent
 * Côte d'Opale on the English Channel
 * Côte Fleurie on the English Channel
 * French Riviera (Côte d'Azur) on the Mediterranean

Georgia

 * Batumi
 * Gagra
 * Kobuleti
 * Kvariati
 * New Athos
 * Pitsunda
 * Sukhumi

Germany
Germany is known for its traditional seaside resorts on the Baltic Sea and the North Sea coasts, mainly established in the 19th century. In German they are called Seebad ("Sea Spa") or Seeheilbad, sometimes with Ostsee- or Nordsee- as prefixes for the respective coastline.

The most prestigious resorts can be found along the Baltic coastline, including the islands of Rugia and Usedom. They often feature a unique architectural style called resort architecture. The coast of Mecklenburg and Western Pomerania alone has an overall length of 2000 km and is nicknamed German Riviera. Heiligendamm in Mecklenburg, established in 1793, is the oldest seaside resort in Germany and continental Europe.

Most important coastal areas with seaside resorts in Germany:
 * Baltic Sea: islands of Fehmarn, Hiddensee, Rügen, Usedom; Mecklenburg coast, Rostock, peninsula of Fischland, Darss and Zingst
 * North Sea: East Frisian Islands and North Frisian Islands

Selection of German seaside resorts along the Baltic Sea coastline: • Ahrenshoop

• Laboe

• Mecklenburg:

• * Boltenhagen

• * Graal-Müritz

• * Heiligendamm

• * Kühlungsborn

• * Warnemünde

• Rugia Island:

• * Baabe

• * Binz

• * Göhren

• * Sassnitz

• * Sellin

• Timmendorfer Strand

• Travemünde

• Usedom Island:

• * Amber Spas

• * Kaiserbad Heringsdorf with Ahlbeck and Bansin

• * Zinnowitz

• Zingst At the North Sea coastline: • Cuxhaven

• Norderney

• St. Peter-Ording

• Spiekeroog

• Wangerooge

• Wyk auf Föhr

• Sylt Island:

• * Kampen

• * Wenningstedt

• * Westerland

Greece
Greece, renowned as a summer destination, features a large amount of seaside resorts. Some of them include: • Agia Pelagia

• Agia Triada

• Agioi Theodoroi

• Asprovalta

• Chalkidiki, a peninsula with a variety of coastal villages that are considered resorts such as: Afytos, Chaniotis, Nea Poteidaia, Neos Marmaras, Nikiti, Sarti and others.

• Ermioni

• Eretria

• Glyfada, Phocis

• Kamena Vourla

• Karystos

• Nea Kallikrateia

• Katakolo

• Kavos

• Kineta

• Kyllini, Elis

• Kymi

• Laganas

• Leptokarya

• Loutraki

• Malia

• Matala

• Naousa (Paros)

• Nafpaktos

• Neoi Poroi

• Olympiaki Akti

• Parga

• Platamon

• Porto Cheli

• Porto Rafti

• Preveza

• Pythagoreio

• Stavros

• Syvota

India
India has a long coastline and hence has numerous beaches and resort towns. Beaches were already a popular tourist destination for the kings and the masses alike especially in South India where the Dravidian Empires built large temples near the seashore. Beaches are also associated with Hindu rituals where pilgrims from different parts of India go for worshipping rituals. The sun rise and Sunset are also associated with Hindu traditions which are considered sacred my many Hindu communities and there are festivals to celebrate the sunset and sunrise. A major example of such festivals is Chhath Puja. The British Raj also contributed in the development of Beach Resorts where Europeans used to visit during the harsh and cold winter of Europe.

The archipelago of Andaman and Nicobar Islands and Lakshadweep are also famous for beach resorts. Other beach resorts in India includes:
 * Digha
 * Bakkhali
 * Sagar Island
 * Kovalam
 * Kollam
 * Calangute
 * Canacona
 * Juhu
 * Puri
 * Visakhapatnam
 * Karaikal
 * Chirala

Iceland

 * Nauthólsvík

Indonesia

 * Nusa Dua
 * Nusa Penida
 * Kuta
 * Legian
 * Seminyak
 * Belitung
 * Canggu
 * Lombok
 * Labuan Bajo
 * Manado
 * Sabang
 * Mentawai
 * Parangtritis
 * Bulukumba
 * Gunungkidul
 * Sumba
 * Wakatobi

Ireland
The 'Irish Riviera' on the South Coast of Ireland features the seaside resorts of Youghal, Ardmore, Dungarvan, Cóbh and Ballycotton, all set close to the south coast of Ireland. Youghal has been a favoured holiday destination for over 100 years, situated on the banks of the River Blackwater as it reaches the sea. Dungarvan is a seaside market town beneath the mountains in the centre of the Irish south coast. Kinsale is often described as a food lover's and yachting town, with a diverse range of restaurants, as well as a large and active creative community with numerous art galleries and record and book shops.

Seaside resorts in the East of Ireland developed after the introduction of rail travel. The Dublin and Kingstown Railway introduced day-trippers from Dublin to Kingstown (now Dún Laoghaire) in South Dublin, and the coastal town became Ireland's first seaside resort. Other South Dublin towns and villages such as Sandycove, Dalkey and Killiney grew as seaside resorts when the rail network was expanded. Since the opening of Bray Daly Station in 1852, the County Wicklow coastal town of Bray has become the largest seaside resort on the East Coast of Ireland. The town of Greystones, five miles south of Bray, also grew as a seaside resort when the railway line was extended in 1855. Other seaside resorts include Courtown and Rosslare Strand in County Wexford.

Ulster has a number of seaside resorts, such as Portrush, situated on the north coast, with its two beaches and a world-famous golf course, Royal Portrush Golf Club. Other Ulster seaside resorts are Newcastle, located on the east coast at the foot of the Mourne Mountains; Ballycastle; Portstewart; Rathmullan; Bundoran and Bangor. Bangor Marina is one of the largest in Ireland and the marina has on occasion been awarded the Blue Flag for attention to environmental issues.

The main seaside towns in the west of Ireland are in County Clare; the largest are Lahinch and Kilkee. Lahinch is a popular surfing location.

Like British resorts, many seaside towns in Ireland have turned to other entertainment industries. Larger resorts such as Bray or Portrush host air shows, while most resorts host summer festivals.

Israel
Israel is a major tourist area. Tourism in Israel is one of the major sources of income, with beautiful beaches, such as those found on the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea. Most tourists come from the United States and European countries. Other resorts include:
 * Ashdod
 * Ashkelon
 * Eilat
 * Ein Bokek
 * Herzliya
 * Tel Aviv

Italy
Italy is known for its seaside resorts, visited both by Italian and North European tourists. Many of these resorts have a history of tourism which dates back to the 19th century.

Resorts include (among many others): • Alassio

• Alba Adriatica

• Alghero

• Agropoli

• Amalfi

• Anzio

• Bibione

• Capri

• Castellabate

• Castellamare di Stabia

• Cattolica

• Caorle

• Cefalù

• Cervia

• Cesenatico

• Follonica

• Forte dei Marmi

• Finale Ligure

• Fregene

• Gaeta

• Gallipoli, Apulia

• Giulianova

• Grottammare

• Jesolo

• Lignano Sabbiadoro

• Livorno

• Maratea

• Manfredonia

• Minturno

• Nettuno

• Numana

• Orbetello

• Ostia

• Ostuni

• Policoro

• Portofino

• Positano

• Riccione

• Rimini

• Sabaudia

• San Benedetto del Tronto

• San Remo

• San Vito Lo Capo

• Santa Maria di Leuca

• Senigallia

• Sestri Levante

• Silvi

• Sorrento

• Soverato

• Sperlonga

• Stintino

• Taormina

• Termoli

• Terracina

• Tropea

• Viareggio

• Vieste

• Villasimius

Japan
There are seaside resorts in Honshu, Shikoku, and Kyushu, but Okinawa is particularly known for its beaches.

Jordan
All seaside resorts in Jordan are located in Aqaba, the only seaport in Jordan. Seaside resorts of Aqaba include Ayla Oasis and Marsa Zayed in the Tala Bay region.

South Korea
Many seaside resorts are located in Gyeongsang, Jeolla, Chungcheong, Gangwon, Gyeonggi, Incheon, Ulsan and Busan.

Latvia

 * Jūrmala
 * Liepāja
 * Ventspils

Lithuania

 * Juodkrantė
 * Nida
 * Palanga
 * Pervalka
 * Preila
 * Šventoji

Malaysia

 * Langkawi
 * Batu Ferringhi
 * Pangkor
 * Port Dickson
 * Desaru
 * Cherating
 * Kuala Terengganu
 * Kapas
 * Perhentian Islands
 * Redang
 * Tioman
 * Tanjung Aru
 * Gaya
 * Mabul
 * Manukan
 * Sipadan

Malta
The following are the main resort towns in Malta:
 * Northern towns of Mellieħa, St. Paul's Bay, Buġibba and Qawra
 * Central towns of Sliema, St. Julian's and Paceville
 * Southern towns of Birżebbuġa and Marsascala
 * Village of Marsalforn in Gozo
 * Parts of the island of Comino

Mexico
Mexican resorts are popular with many North American residents, with Mexico being the second most visited country in the Americas. Notable resorts on the mainland and the Baja Gold Coast and Peninsula include:
 * Acapulco
 * Baja Mar
 * Cabo San Lucas
 * Cancún
 * Ensenada
 * Guaymas
 * Ixtapa
 * Manzanillo
 * Mazatlán
 * Playa del Carmen
 * Puerto Peñasco
 * Puerto Vallarta
 * Rosarito Beach
 * Tijuana (Playas de Tijuana)
 * Veracruz

Netherlands
There are many seaside resorts on the Dutch coast, chiefly in the provinces of North Holland, South Holland and Zeeland, as well as on the West Frisian Islands.

A selection includes:
 * Bergen, North Holland
 * Domburg
 * Katwijk
 * Monster, South Holland
 * Noordwijk
 * Scheveningen
 * Zandvoort

New Zealand

 * Kaiteriteri
 * Māpua
 * Mārahau
 * Tāhunanui
 * Mount Maunganui

Norway

 * Kristiansand
 * Bystranda
 * Sola
 * Fevik
 * Risør

Poland
Poland's coast on the Baltic Sea includes many traditional seaside resorts established throughout the 18th-20th centuries. In the past the resorts have received mostly domestic tourism, however, since the 1990s, following the opening of Polish borders, the international tourism has grown considerably. Notable resorts include:
 * Świnoujście
 * Międzyzdroje
 * Dziwnów
 * Kołobrzeg
 * Mielno
 * Darłowo
 * Ustka
 * Władysławowo
 * Chłapowo
 * Jastarnia
 * Hel
 * Sopot

Portugal
Many European and world tourists visit Portuguese resorts, particularly those on the Algarve and Madeira. Notable resorts include:

 * Albufeira
 * Cascais
 * Estoril
 * Faro
 * Figueira da Foz
 * Funchal
 * Lagos
 * Póvoa de Varzim
 * Praia da Luz
 * Quarteira

Romania
The Romanian Black Sea resorts stretch from the Danube Delta in the north down to the Romanian-Bulgarian border in the south, along 275 kilometers of coastline.
 * 2 Mai
 * Constanța
 * Costinești
 * Mamaia
 * Mangalia
 * Năvodari
 * Neptun, Romania
 * Vama Veche
 * Venus, Romania
 * Sulina

Russia

 * Anapa
 * Gelendzhik
 * Lazurnaya Bay
 * Sestroretsk
 * Sochi, including previously separate settlements Adler, Lazarevskoye, and Dagomys
 * Svetlogorsk
 * Yantarny
 * Zelenogradsk

South Africa
• Alexander Bay

• Alkanstrand, Richards Bay

• Amanzimtoti

• Arniston

• Ballito

• Betty's Bay

• Bloubergstrand

• Boknesstrand

• Brenton-on-Sea

• Buffelsbaai

• Bushman's River Mouth

• Cape St Francis

• Cape Town

• Cape Vidal

• Cannon Rocks

• Chintsa

• Coffee Bay

• De Kelders

• Durban

• East London

• Elands Bay

• eMdloti

• Fish Hoek

• Franskraalstrand

• Gansbaai

• Gordon's Bay

• Gonubie

• Great Brak River

• Haga Haga

• Hamburg

• Hawston

• Hermanus

• Herolds Bay

• Hibberdene

• Hondeklip Bay

• Jacobsbaai

• Jeffreys Bay

• Kenton-on-Sea

• Keurboomstrand

• Kidd's Beach

• Kleinmond

• Kleinzee

• Knysna

• Kommetjie

• Kosi Bay

• L'Agulhas

• Lambert's Bay

• Langebaan

• Llandudno

• Margate

• Mazeppa Bay

• Mtunzini

• Muizenberg

• Morgans Bay

• Mossel Bay

• Nahoon

• Nature's Valley

• Noordhoek

• Onrus

• Paternoster

• Pearly Beach

• Pennington

• Plettenberg Bay

• Port Alfred

• Port Elizabeth

• Port Nolloth

• Port St Johns

• Pringle Bay

• Qolora Mouth

• Ramsgate

• Salt Rock

• Sardinia Bay

• Schoenmakerskop

• Scottburgh

• Sedgefield

• Shaka's Rock

• Simon's Town

• Sodwana Bay

• Southbroom

• St Francis Bay

• St Helena Bay

• St Lucia

• Stilbaai

• Stormsrivier

• Strand

• Strandfontein

• Struisbaai

• Tergniet

• Thukela Mouth

• uMhlanga

• Umzumbe

• Uvongo

• Victoria Bay

• Warner Beach, Kingsburgh

• Wilderness

• Witsand

• Yzerfontein

• Zinkwazi Beach

South America
Notable seaside resorts in South America include Búzios, Camboriú, Florianópolis, Fortaleza, Recife and Salvador in Brazil; Mar del Plata in Argentina; Punta del Este and Piriapolis in Uruguay; Viña del Mar in Chile; Cartagena in Colombia; and Salinas in Ecuador.

Spain
Spanish resorts are popular with many European and world residents. Notable resorts on the mainland and islands include:

• Algeciras area

• Altea

• Barcelona area, with the best urban beaches in the world

• Benidorm

• Blanes

• Cadaqués

• Calpe

• Castell-Platja d'Aro

• Costa de la Luz

• Costa Tropical

• Dénia

• Empuriabrava

• Gandía

• Lanzarote

• Lloret de Mar

• Las Palmas area and other towns in the Canary Islands

• Málaga area and other suburbs on the Costa del Sol

• Nerja

• Palamós

• Palma, Majorca area and Ibiza and other towns in the Balearic Islands

• Peñíscola

• Roses

• Salou area and other towns on the Costa Dorada

• Sant Feliu de Guíxols

• San Javier

• San Sebastián

• Sitges

• Tenerife

• Tossa de Mar

• Villajoyosa

• Vinaròs

Sweden

 * Helsingborg
 * Kullaberg
 * Falsterbo
 * Malmö

Ukraine
Some examples of Ukrainian seaside resort towns are:
 * Crimea: Alupka, Alushta, Yevpatoria, Feodosiya, Foros, Gurzuf, Koktebel, Saky, Sudak, Yalta
 * Kherson Oblast: Skadovsk
 * Mykolaiv Oblast: Ochakov
 * Odesa Oblast: Odesa

United Kingdom
The United Kingdom saw the popularisation of seaside resorts, and nowhere was this more seen than in Blackpool. Blackpool catered for workers from across industrial Northern England, who packed its beaches and promenade. Other northern seaside towns (for example Bridlington, Cleethorpes, Morecambe, Scarborough, Skegness, and Southport) shared in the success of this new concept, especially from trade during wakes weeks. The concept spread rapidly to other British coastal towns, including several on the coast of North Wales, notably Rhyl, and Llandudno, the largest resort in Wales and known as "The Queen of the Welsh Resorts", from as early as 1864. As the 19th century progressed, British working class day-trippers travelled on organised trips such as railway excursions, or by steamer, for which long piers were erected so that the ships bringing the trade could berth.

Another area notable for its seaside resorts was (and is) the Firth of Clyde, outside Glasgow. Glaswegians would take a ferry "doon the watter" from the city, down the River Clyde, to the Firth's islands and peninsulas and beyond, such as Cowal, Bute, Arran, and Kintyre. Resorts include Rothesay, Lamlash, Whiting Bay, Dunoon, Tighnabruaich, Carrick Castle, Helensburgh, Largs, Millport and Campbeltown. In contrast to many resorts, some on the Firth of Clyde have continued to prosper as middle-class commuter towns.

Some resorts, especially those more southerly such as Hastings, Worthing, Eastbourne, Bournemouth, and Brighton were built as new towns or extended by local landowners to appeal to wealthier holidaymakers. Others came about due to their proximity to large urban areas of population, such as Southend-on-Sea, which became increasingly popular with residents of London once rail links were established to it allowing day trips from London. The sunshine and sea air were seen by Victorians as beneficial for health, and resorts such as Ventnor owed their growth to a visit being considered as treatment for chest complaints. Owing to its generally better climate, the south coast has many seaside towns, the most being in Sussex.

In the later 20th century, the popularity of the British seaside resort declined for the same reason that it first flourished: advances in transport. The greater accessibility of foreign holiday destinations, through package holidays and, more recently, European low-cost airlines, makes it easier to holiday abroad. Despite the loyalty of returning holidaymakers, resorts such as Blackpool have struggled to compete against the hotter weather of Southern Europe and the sunbelt in the United States. Now, many symbols of the traditional British resort (holiday camps, end-of-the-pier shows and saucy postcards) are regarded by some as drab and outdated; the skies are imagined to be overcast and the beach windswept. This is not always true; for example Broadstairs in Kent has retained much of its old world charm with Punch and Judy and donkey rides and still remains popular, being only one hour from the M25. Brighton has also seen a fall in visitor numbers in recent years. The city has also experienced a rise in homelessness, especially noticeable on the city streets and in green spaces where tents have been erected.

Many people can now afford "second holidays" and short breaks, resulting in increased tourism in British seaside towns. Many seaside towns have large shopping centres which also attract people from a wide area. Day trippers still come to the coastal towns, but on a more local scale than during the 19th century.

Many coastal towns are also popular retirement hotspots where older people reside permanently or take short breaks in the autumn months. Other English coastal towns have successfully sought to project a sense of their unique character. In particular, Southwold on the Suffolk coast is an active yet peaceful retirement haven with an emphasis on calmness, quiet countryside and jazz. Weymouth, Dorset offers itself as "the gateway to the Jurassic Coast", Britain's only natural World Heritage Site. Newquay in Cornwall offers itself as the 'surfing capital of Britain', hosting international surfing events on its shores.

Torbay in South Devon is known is also known as the English Riviera. Consisting of the towns of Torquay, Paignton with its pier and Brixham, the bay has 20 beaches and coves along its 22 mi coastline, ranging from small secluded coves to the larger promenade-style seafronts of Torquay's Torre Abbey Sands and Paignton Sands.

However, British seaside resorts have faced increasingly stiff competition from sunnier resorts overseas since the 1970s. Largely due to the falling price of air travel under the Conservative government of Margaret Thatcher (elected in 1979), the number of British families who took holidays abroad rose significantly in the 1980s. The decline of British seaside resorts was discussed in the Morrissey song "Everyday Is Like Sunday" where daily life in the resort is likened to the emptiness of streets once associated with the shop closures on Sunday.

United States
With 3,800 miles (6100 km) of coastline, the US mainland has hundreds of seaside resorts on three coasts, Atlantic Ocean, Gulf of Mexico, and Pacific Ocean. Unlike in many smaller countries, the seaside resorts in the US are located in various climate zones, with great differences in topography and environment. Many American seaside resorts are popular destination across the world, known for their climates, culture, and entertainment opportunities.

Seaside resorts in the United States first developed near the nation's largest industrial cities on the upper East Coast, including New York City, Philadelphia, and Boston. Cape May, New Jersey, part of the Philadelphia metropolitan area, and Provincetown, Massachusetts, part of the Boston metropolitan area were two of the nation's first seaside resorts, developed in the 19th century and catering to city workers. Cape May is often called Americas "first seaside resort". The early emergence of Cape May as a summer resort was due to easy transport by water from Philadelphia to the Atlantic Ocean. Early Cape May vacationers were carried to the town on sloops from Philadelphia, and water transport was also easy from New York, Baltimore, Washington, D.C., and points south. The resort business in Cape May began to thrive when regular steamboat traffic on the Delaware River began after the War of 1812. Early visitors to Cape May included Henry Clay in 1847, and Abraham Lincoln in 1849. Today, the Cape May Historic District is one of the largest and well preserved examples of Victorian architecture in the United States.

On the southern Atlantic coast, Henry Flagler had the idea to make St. Augustine, Florida a winter resort. He built several rail lines south, and combined them with existing lines to create the Florida East Coast Railway in 1885. He built a railroad bridge over the St. Johns River in 1888, opening up the Atlantic coast of Florida to development. In 1887 Flagler began construction of two large ornate hotels in St. Augustine, the 540-room Ponce de Leon Hotel and the Hotel Alcazar, and bought the Casa Monica Hotel the next year.

In Miami, Florida, the community of Cocoanut (now Coconut) Grove began development as a resort town in the 1880s with the building of the Bayview House (aka Peacock Inn) which closed in 1902. Visitors to the greater Miami area then flocked to Camp Biscayne (in Coconut Grove), the Royal Palm Hotel in Downtown Miami, and other resort hotels in Miami, as well as in smaller numbers to the Florida Keys. In 1894, the lavish Royal Poinciana Hotel opened in Palm Beach, Florida, with rave reviews from wealthy New York tourists who picked oranges in January to their delight. On the Gulf of Mexico, the City of Galveston was emerging as a booming city, and in 1882, architect Nicholas J. Clayton designed the Beach Hotel. By 1888, Galveston, TX was a wealthy city and booming seaside playground for wealthy New Orleans businessmen.

On the Pacific coast in California, in April 1886, Babcock and Story created the Coronado Beach Company, which sought to develop Coronado as a seaside resort. In the mid-1880s, the San Diego region was in the midst of one of its first real estate booms. The Hotel del Coronado was built in March 1887, with Babcock's visions for the hotel built around a courtyard of tropical trees, shrubs and flowers, with a dining wing to give full value to the view of the ocean, bay and city. By 1915, more hotels were built along the Los Angeles coastline to serve the wealthy tourists and Hollywood film makers. In May 1926, brothers E.A. "Jack" Harter and T.D. "Til" Harter built the Hotel Casa del Mar in Santa Monica, at a cost of $2 million, creating one of the most successful beach clubs in Southern California, popular with socialites and Hollywood celebrities.

In the 1920s, Carl Fisher was the main promoter of Miami Beach, and helped to develop the city as a seaside resort. To accommodate the wealthy tourists, several grand hotels were built, among them the Flamingo Hotel. In 1926, the massive The Breakers hotel in Palm Beach had been rebuilt, and there was a large northern tourist industry in coastal southern Florida. By the 1950s with increasing auto travel, more seaside resorts grew along the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, while small, declining industrial ports were being rebuilt. In 1954, the Fontainebleau Miami Beach, and was considered, (at that time) the most lavish seaside hotel in the world.

In the modern era, hundreds of seaside resorts now string the Gulf, Atlantic, and Pacific coasts of the United States. Many Americans move with the seasons when they visit seaside resorts, vacationing in northern seaside areas in the warm season (April through October), and then moving to southern areas in the cold season (November through March). Many seaside resorts in Florida and California however, see travelers all year.

Some examples of well-known and sought-after American coastal resort towns are: • Gulf Shores, Alabama

• Orange Beach, Alabama

• Dauphin Island, Alabama

• Carlsbad, California

• Corona Del Mar, California

• Coronado, California

• Dana Point, California

• Laguna Beach, California

• Los Angeles, California (Venice district)

• Malibu, California

• Montecito, California

• Newport Beach, California

• Pebble Beach, California

• San Diego, California (La Jolla, Pacific Beach, Mission Beach and Ocean Beach neighborhoods)

• Santa Monica, California

• Mystic, Connecticut

• Bethany Beach, Delaware

• Rehoboth Beach, Delaware

• Clearwater, Florida

• Daytona Beach, Florida

• Fort Lauderdale, Florida

• Key West, Florida

• Marco Island, Florida

• Miami Beach, Florida

• Palm Beach, Florida

• Panama City, Florida

• Panama City Beach, Florida

• Pensacola Beach, Florida

• St. Augustine, Florida

• Saint Petersburg, Florida

• Siesta Key, Florida

• Tampa, Florida

• Sea Island, Georgia

• Tybee Island, Georgia

• Lahaina, Maui, Hawaii

• Kennebunkport, Maine

• Ocean City, Maryland

• Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts

• Nantucket, Massachusetts

• Provincetown, Massachusetts

• Allenhurst, New Jersey

• Asbury Park, New Jersey

• Atlantic City, New Jersey

• Cape May, New Jersey

• Deal, New Jersey

• Elberon, New Jersey

• Loch Arbour, New Jersey

• Long Beach Island, New Jersey

• Long Branch, New Jersey

• Ocean City, New Jersey

• Point Pleasant, New Jersey

• Sea Isle City, New Jersey

• Seaside Heights, New Jersey

• Wildwood, New Jersey

• Fire Island, New York

• The Hamptons, New York

• Bald Head Island, North Carolina

• Figure Eight Island, North Carolina

• Nags Head, North Carolina

• Oak Island, North Carolina

• Ocean Isle Beach, North Carolina

• Wrightsville Beach, North Carolina

• Seaside, Oregon

• Newport, Rhode Island

• Folly Beach, South Carolina

• Hilton Head, South Carolina

• Isle of Palms, South Carolina

• Myrtle Beach, South Carolina

• Galveston, Texas

• South Padre Island, Texas

• Virginia Beach, Virginia

title: Seaside resort