Jersey Shore Magazine

j e r s e y s h o r e • S P R I N G 2 0 2 3 39 perch, and pike fishing, as well as cranberry bogs. Immediately after the Canal's opening to navigation in 1926, the strong currents that have plagued the Canal ever since began causing serious problems. In less than six months, the Canal's banks, which were not bulkheaded, had eroded, creating shoaling and nearly closing it. In time, due to the shifting sands, the two bridges began to be under- mined as well. The Closing of Manasquan Inlet Soon a larger disaster struck the maritime communities of Point Pleasant Beach and vicinity. Several months after the Canal opened, Manasquan Inlet began to shoal and closed completely. Soon sand had built up behind the beach for several hundred yards. Boaters blamed the diversion of river water down the Canal—water from the Manasquan River started running through the Canal and into Barnegat Bay, rather than down river and through the Inlet to the ocean. For most of the time from early 1926 into 1931, the Inlet was closed. All inlets naturally move, shoal, close, and reopen and Manasquan Inlet was no different. It had always been shallow, shifting, and hard for large boats to navigate. There were no jetties and no dredging prior to the 1926 closing. A detail from an 1879 Army Corps of Engineers map (shown to the right) illustrates the Manasquan Inlet making a sharp, hooking turn northward for about one thousand feet. Toward the top, it shows that in 1868, the Inlet had been a couple of thousand yards farther north along the Manasquan beach, near the now historic Coast Guard Station Squan Beach (also known as Squan Beach Life-saving Station #9) at 124 Ocean Avenue in Manasquan. In this map, the Corps of Engineers was proposing to straighten out the Inlet and sta- bilize it at what became its current, modern location. That project did not take place until 1931 and was forced upon the people by the Inlet's disastrous and total closing—so total that people could walk between Point Pleasant Beach and Manasquan with- out getting their feet wet. For the next few years after the 1926 closing, efforts to reopen the Inlet were made with varying degrees of success. At one time, the National Guard and local firemen used high pressure hoses and managed to blast a narrow channel through, but it was a losing battle. There were also several attempts to control the Inlet with bulkheads and jetty stone but they were totally inadequate and ulti- mately failed as well. The Inlet was completely closed, and all the com- munities along the river were out of business as ports from 1926 through 1931. The closed Inlet from the Manasquan side looking east. continued on page 40 courtesy of the Point Pleasant Historical Society courtesy of the Point Pleasant Historical Society Detail from an 1879 Army Corps of Engineers map of Manasquan Inlet. The map shows the Inlet making a sharp, hooking turn northward for about one thousand feet. A few thousand yards further north, it also shows the location of the Inlet in 1868. The two lines near the Inlet's opening illustrate their proposal to straighten it out at what is now its current location.

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