For those of a certain age in this region, Grace Kelly was always a princess, long before she gave up a lucrative and storied career in motion pictures and officially became Princess Grace of Monaco in 1956.
Kelly’s Cinderella story has been told frequently but is worth recounting here. She was born to a well known and well-to-do Catholic family in the East Falls section of Philadelphia in 1929. Her father was an Olympic gold-medal winner who ran unsuccessfully—though the margin was incredibly close—for Mayor in 1935. Her mother was said to be the first woman to teach woman’s athletics at University of Pennsylvania. Given this pedigree, it’s easy to see why big things were expected of young Grace.
Drawn to drama and the theater while in a private school in the Philadelphia suburb of Chestnut Hill, Kelly enrolled at the Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York City in 1949. It was clear that she had talent. She did some modeling, made a lot of television appearances during the days when original dramas were a fixture of television, and made it to the big screen in 1951 via a tiny part in a film called “Fourteen Hours.” Starring roles followed, and in 1954 she won the Academy Award for Best Actress for her role in “The Country Girl.”
While on a trip to the Cannes film festival in 1955 she met her future husband, Prince Ranier III of Monaco. Grace Kelly retired from films at the height of her career, married Prince Ranier in April of 1956, and formally became Princess of Monaco. The wedding was televised and was reportedly viewed by 30 million people.
The Kelly family’s association with Ocean City began before Grace was born. In a 1999 piece for Atlantic City Magazine written by William Kelly (no relation), “Like many Philadelphia families, the Kellys vacationed in Ocean City. At first, the family rented a seasonal house for a few years before John Kelly built a brick house in the then popular Spanish Revival style on the northwest corner of 26th and Wesley Avenue in 1929, the year Grace was born. As it was just across the street from the ocean, the house was a retreat from active days in the water and on the beach. Family friend Marie Magee recalled, ‘Little as she was, Grace would go out in that ocean and swim through the huge waves.'”
The life-long love affair with Ocean City began.
“In their early teens, Grace and her friends Carol Macallister and Maree Rambo got jobs as waitresses at the Chatterbox restaurant on 9th Street and Central Avenue,” wrote Kelly. “That summer, Grace dressed like a beauty queen and waved to the crowd from the Chatterbox float in the annual boardwalk parade, but their waitress jobs were taken away when Maree Rambo’s mother learned they were going to work at night, past curfew, and they still weren’t allowed to date.”
What was she like in those early days? “Grace had a great personality, a good sense of humor, was bright, sharp, fun to be with, and there were no pretensions about her,” said Dick Boccelli, who dated her in Ocean City and Philadelphia for about six months.
Even after she became a Princess, Kelly continued to visit Ocean City regularly. “Prince Rainier came to Ocean City on more than one occasion, visited the Kelly family at the beach, and sat in the owner’s box at the racetrack,” wrote William Kelly. “Scrutinized by Grace’s father, Rainier was acceptable, even if a little stuffy, compared to the carefree Kellys. Even after she attained royal status, Her Serene Highness Princess Grace of Monaco returned to Ocean City on a regular basis with children Caroline, Albert and Stephanie, usually around Labor Day, to attend the annual family reunion and beach barbeque.”
Family friend Sarah Bradford believes that Ocean City was an important part of Grace’s life. “She would bring her own Grimaldi children to the shore every year,” said Bradford, “as if to remind them that this solid Middle America resort with its healthy pleasures was as much part of their heritage as the glittering life of the Cote d’ Azur. It was part of Grace’s plan that the children should remain aware of their American heritage, and they would spend part of every summer with their Kelly cousins at Ocean City.”
The only season that Kelly did not make it Ocean City was the summer of 1982. Tragically, on September 14, 1982, Grace Kelly died in an automobile accident after her car swerved off a road and went over a cliff in the south of France.
Grace Kelly is still fondly-remembered in Ocean City, and you might even say that she remains, in some fashion, very much a part of the family resort. In June, the Ocean City Historical Museum hosted its 10th annual Grace Kelly High Tea at the Flanders Hotel. Al Crescenzo, something of a Kelly scholar, hosted the event, called Grace & Her Dynasty. “Every year I found different aspects of her life to talk about,” said Crescenzo. Additionally, the Ocean City Historical Museum hosted an exhibit called “The Kelly Family: Ocean City’s Brush with Royalty.” The exhibit and display featured rare photos and memorabilia, all focused on Kelly’s many visits to Ocean City.
By all accounts, Grace Kelly simply loved Ocean City. “I do not like going to the pool,” she once said, “because I prefer the sea because it reminds me of Ocean City, the American town where I spent the summer holidays when I was living with my family.” As for the lure and the attraction of the town? The consensus of opinion among those who knew her from her many visits to the resort believe that during the years when the world saw her as a distant figure of elegance—as a movie star and as a Princess–Ocean City was where she could simply be Grace.
That says a lot about the Princess. And about Ocean City.
Bruce Klauber is the author of four books, an award-winning music journalist, concert and record producer and publicist, producer of the Warner Brothers and Hudson Music “Jazz Legends” film series, and performs both as a drummer and vocalist.
