Qualla: Ocean City (Maryland)

Ocean City (Maryland): Introduction

Mon, 01 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Dough4872, CC BY-SA 4.0. Eight million visitors a year, and only 6,800 people who live here in February. Ocean City is the most asymmetric city in Maryland - a place where the population grows fiftyfold on a Fourth of July weekend, where Coastal Highway moves more pedestrians than cars between Memorial Day and Labor Day, where the boardwalk french fry vendors do more business in three months than most restaurants do all year. The off-season city is a quiet residential town with a year-round economy held together by retirees, civil servants, and the people who run the hotels. The summer city is one of the busiest beach resorts on the East Coast. The two cities share an address. They share almost nothing else.

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Image: Dough4872 | CC BY-SA 4.0

Ocean City (Maryland): Ten Miles Long, Three Blocks Wide

Mon, 01 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Preservation Maryland, CC BY-SA 2.0. Ocean City runs about ten miles north to south on a barrier island, never more than a few blocks wide. The southern end is the historic downtown, with the three-mile wooden boardwalk that has been the city's signature since 1902. The downtown holds the original amusement piers, T...

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Image: Preservation Maryland | CC BY-SA 2.0

Ocean City (Maryland): The Boardwalk and the Salt-Water Taffy

Mon, 01 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Dough4872, CC BY-SA 3.0. The Ocean City Boardwalk runs about three miles along the southern end of the beach, from the Inlet north to 27th Street. It was built in 1902 and rebuilt several times after fires and storms. Today it is one of the largest wooden boardwalks on the East Coast, lined with souvenir...

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Image: Dough4872 | CC BY-SA 3.0

Ocean City (Maryland): The Inlet of 1933

Mon, 01 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit PointsofNoReturn, CC BY-SA 4.0. Ocean City's natural deepwater inlet did not exist before August 23, 1933. The Chesapeake-Potomac Hurricane, a powerful Category 1 storm, sat over the lower Eastern Shore for two days. The surge built up in Sinepuxent Bay west of the barrier island, then washed across a low secti...

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Image: PointsofNoReturn | CC BY-SA 4.0

Ocean City (Maryland): Senior Week and the Family Beach

Mon, 01 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Wallstreethotrod at English Wikipedia, Public domain. Each June, immediately after high school graduation, thousands of recently-graduated seniors from across the Mid-Atlantic descend on Ocean City for Senior Week - a tradition of late nights, beach time, and first taste of independence. The city polices it carefully but does not tr...

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Image: Wallstreethotrod at English Wikipedia | Public domain

Ocean City (Maryland): Three Ways In

Mon, 01 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit User:Dough4872, CC BY-SA 3.0. Three roads bring people to Ocean City. US 50 from the west, the Ocean Gateway, crosses Sinepuxent Bay on the Harry W. Kelley Memorial Bridge and lands at the southern downtown. Maryland 90 from the west, the Ocean City Expressway, crosses the Assawoman Bay on its own bridge and ...

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Image: User:Dough4872 | CC BY-SA 3.0