The opening of the Royal Pine Hotel

The hotel and resort

The Spanish-influenced brick-and-white-stone building extended 240 feet along the west shore of artificial Crystal Lake. Its brick graduated from lighter red at the base to darker tones above. A villa containing lounges, sunrooms, and a dance floor stood between hotel and lake, connected by two promenades. Guest rooms were arranged in differently colored suites with matching bathrooms; the dining room used Russian-inspired decoration, and concealed lighting illuminated hand-painted lobby work. Concrete mattresses supported the building’s columns to address shifting soil.

Sangor had begun promoting a resort city about five years earlier. By the opening, Pinewald reportedly had about 100 homes, a golf course, bathing facilities, lit boulevards, and company holdings along Barnegat Bay. A well was planned, apparently to supplement the lake or water system.

Invited guests included Senator Thomas A. Mathis, former senator Harry T. Hagaman, Lewis T. McFadden, Count and Countess Morner, Dr. and Mrs. R. W. Mitz, and Rose Guggenheim Quick. Invitations also went to mayors Harry Mackey of Philadelphia, James J. Walker of New York, and Harry Bacharach of Atlantic City. A three-day program offered golf, horseback riding, tennis, and other outdoor activities; Rolls-Royce cars carried guests between the hotel and trains before the public opening.

What happened afterward

The resort failed quickly during the Depression and sold at auction in 1932 for about $21,000. Dr. Edward Hazard converted it into a hospital in 1935; patients from the Hindenburg disaster were treated there in 1937. It later operated as Dennis Memorial Hospital, Pinehaven Sanitarium, and Bayview before becoming a long-term-care facility. These successive uses explain why the major Pinewald landmark survived after Sangor’s resort plan collapsed.

Local historians reject the frequently repeated claim that Al Capone owned or regularly used the hotel; no supporting contemporary record has been found.

The tunnels and the records that disagree

In a February 2026 interview, Berkeley Township Historical Society president Gerry Morey distinguished the hotel’s service tunnels from the Prohibition stories attached to them. He described routes used to carry food and linen between the hotel basement and Villa Miramar. He rejected the much more elaborate claims of gangster passages beneath the woods or a lake trapdoor. The same reporting describes Sunday excursion trains and buses that brought prospective lot buyers for lunch, a promotional film, and a sales pitch. Chris Lundy’s interview and historical account.

The opening date needs a source warning. An Ocean County trail panel prints November 1, 1930 in its timeline but November 18, 1929 in its narrative. The account above follows the source collection and the 2026 interview’s November 18, 1930. The panel also records several sheriff’s sales between 1932 and 1934, making it unsafe to treat every reported auction price as the same transaction. Original opening advertisements and deeds should settle these discrepancies. Ocean County Royal Pines interpretive panel.