There is a spot in the West Belmar section of Wall, between Belmar and Spring Lake Heights on Route 71. Recently this street of identical bungalows on 4th Avenue sold for $2.1 million. The land is adjacent to a solar field and the Harry Rash baseball field. A clue to the origin of these little 1930s bungalows is across the highway. The street names between 18th Avenue and 1st tell the story “World Street”, “America Street”, “Camp Meeting Street”. This area of bungalows looks like the high-density homes we see in Ocean Grove.
Newark-based manufacturer of files and rasps Louis B. Heller had met James Bradley and visited the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting. After his wife died, he sold his business to his brothers in 1880 and took up evangelical religion, preaching temperance and the bible all over the US and Canada, and spending summers witnessing in Avon, Belmar and Ocean Grove.
He declared himself a “bishop” in 1898 and purchased 42 acres on either side of Rt 71 for his “World-American Camp Meeting”. The fields to the east on 5th Avenue were the location for his wood and fabric tabernacle, and he gave three sermons every Summer Sunday for over 20 years. Temperance and piety were the attractions, and affordable homesites were advertised. “No arrests, no deaths in 18 years” was the highlight of an advertisement. Bishop Heller baptized new members in the Shark River.
The following is an excerpt from an article in the Asbury Park Press Dec 04, 1909:
“An extremely Interesting article by Bishop L. B. Heller, recently appeared in the columns of the Newark Evening News. In his article, the bishop seems to have great faith In the future prosperity of this section of the New Jersey coast. In the near future, according to the bishop, the greatest city in the world will be In the territory comprising the Highlands, Seubright, Long Branch, Asbury Park, Ocean Grove, Bradley Beach, Avon, Belmar, Como, Spring I.nke, Sea Girt, Manasquan, Point Pleasant, Allaire, Allenwood, Lakewood, Freehold and Red Bank. He also predicts great prosperity for the America-World Campmeeting grounds, near Belmar, of which he is president and founder. The article In the Nov. 20th issue of the Newark News, he predicted “To be the greatest coast city in the world. Tranquillity. Peace. Prohibition. Thirty-seven million people living under Prohibition laws. The whole earth is at rest and quiet. God is not the author of confusion but of universal peace in Christ over the whole world.”
After Bishop Heller died in 1927, he left the vacant properties to his five children who sold off the parcels over the next few years. The bungalows on were all built together as a rental property. The Palmer family who owned an iron and metal shop, purchased the large tabernacle field for a scrap metal yard during the war years. The junkyard was the site of several fires and needed environmental cleanup after it was closed in the 1970s before becoming a solar energy field 30 years later. The area to the south was turned into baseball fields named for former Wall mayor, 30-year council member, and West Belmar resident Harry Rash.