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Centennial Cottage serves as the Historical Society of Ocean Grove's living history museum. Visitors to the cottage gain an understanding of life in a 19th Century Camp Meeting and seaside resort community.

Centennial Cottage was originally erected at 47 Cookman Avenue in 1879 by Elizabeth Fell. At the time it was very unusual for a married woman to own real estate, however the Camp Meeting Association permitted married women to hold property. In 1969, the last owners of the Cottage, Mr. and Mrs. Robert Skold, donated the house to the Camp Meeting Association in honor of the 100th anniversary of the founding of Ocean Grove. The house was moved to its present location on the corner of McClintock Street and Central Avenue.

The house is constructed in the Chalet style, reminiscent of Swiss and Bavarian Alpine Chalets. The Chalet style is one of the various Carpenter's or Stick styles popular in the latter half of the Nineteenth Century and Ocean Grove boasts many fine examples of this type of architecture including the Great Auditorium. The exterior of the house has been restored to it original colors as have several of the Cottage's rooms.

While no interior photographs of the Cottage exist in the Historical Society's archives, there are many of other interiors from the period and these were used in decorating the Cottage in an appropriate style.

The home has a front and back parlor, or dining room, a small wing for the kitchen and three bedrooms, two of which open onto the upper porch. A third smaller room on the second floor is of undetermined use and may have housed a tin bath tub, been used as storage or used as additional sleeping quarters during Camp Meeting week when the population of the community swells to over 15,000.

The Cottage also boasts extensive Victorian gardens with statuary, cutting gardens and herb gardens. During the 19th Century gardens were an important part of Victorian life, not only for their aesthetic value but for their practical values as well. Cut flowers were used in the household to mask the smells of every day living such as the odors of horses and livestock passing on the streets or the smells of cooking. Herbs were divided into three basic categories: cooking herbs, household herbs and medicinal herbs. Household herbs, such as lavender, a natural insect repellent, would be put in mattresses to discourage bed bugs or in dresser drawers to freshen clothes. Although there were pharmacies and apothecaries or chemists, medicinal herbs were still widely used and the Victorian housewife knew how to brew teas, make poultices or treat illnesses with many common herbs found in gardens today. 

As well as being a living history museum, the Cottage is also the site of various exhibits and events throughout the season including the Florigraphy exhibit which delves into the explanations of the Victorian symbolisms for the various flowers and plants used during the 19th Century and their religious significance. The Cottage is also host to events such as the Candlelight Tour and Garden Party and numerous children's programs.

Download the Floriography Exhibit Guide in PDF Format