Things to Do in Ventnor City

A Boardwalk That Walks You Straight Into Atlantic City

Ventnor City occupies Absecon Island alongside Atlantic City, Margate City, and Longport, and its boardwalk is the clearest expression of that shared geography: it runs 1.7 miles and connects directly to the Atlantic City Boardwalk, with no gap and no detour required. That means a morning that starts on Ventnor's beach -- generally quieter and more residential than Atlantic City's -- can turn into an afternoon among Atlantic City's casinos, restaurants, and boardwalk entertainment simply by continuing to walk north.

The city itself is compact: 3.52 square miles total, but only 1.96 square miles of that is land, with the rest -- a striking 44.52% -- water. Ventnor was incorporated as a city on March 17, 1903, carved from portions of Egg Harbor Township, and its first official city meeting was held that April 20 at the Carisbrooke Inn, a name that, as it turns out, is not a coincidence.

A City Named After an English Seaside Resort

Ventnor did not invent its own name -- it borrowed it, deliberately, from England. In January 1889, S. Bartram Richards, wife of the Camden and Atlantic Land Company's secretary-treasurer, suggested the name after visiting the English seaside resort of Ventnor on the Isle of Wight. The name stuck, and it explains an otherwise puzzling detail of local history: the city's first official meeting, in 1903, was held at the Carisbrooke Inn -- Carisbrooke Castle being a real, well-known landmark on that same Isle of Wight, just a few miles from the English Ventnor that inspired this one. Two English seaside place names, imported wholesale onto a New Jersey barrier island, more than a century ago.

2012: The Day Justin Williams Brought the Stanley Cup Home

Every summer, the NHL lets each player and staff member on the championship team spend a day alone with the Stanley Cup. In 2012, after the Los Angeles Kings won the Cup, that day belonged to Justin Williams, a Ventnor native, and he brought hockey's oldest trophy home to Ventnor for what became one of the sport's most warmly documented Cup days.

It started at his Ventnor home, low-key and domestic: Williams, his wife Kelly, and their two young children ate Cheerios out of the Stanley Cup that morning, while extended family gathered for photos. From there the day moved onto the water -- the group loaded the Cup onto a pontoon boat docked behind the house and took it on a cruise around the bay, with the Atlantic City skyline visible in the background the whole way, a genuinely striking image of hockey's most storied trophy floating past a New Jersey shore town.

Later that day, Williams and friends organized a full road-hockey game on a public tennis court, with the Stanley Cup itself as the prize. Williams played goal. His team won, 8-4.

A Real Proposal, Poured From the Cup

The day's most personal moment came when Williams' brother-in-law, Pat, proposed marriage to his girlfriend, Dana, on camera, pouring champagne and orange juice from the Stanley Cup itself to mark the moment, after six years together. She said yes. Williams later put the moment in context: "We're a part of the story they're going to tell forever."

The day closed with a visit to Ventnor City Hall, where Williams and the Cup posed for photos with local officials and residents, before he carried the celebration onward to public events at Caesar's Atlantic City that evening. It is a small-town hockey story with no asterisks -- a Ventnor guy, hockey's biggest trophy, his own kitchen table, his own backyard dock, a public tennis court, and a genuine proposal, all in one day in 2012. As with any single-day snapshot from over a decade ago, treat it as history -- a wonderful moment Ventnor can rightly claim, not a description of who lives in the city today.

Ventnor Today: A Small, Year-Round Residential Beach City

Ventnor's 2020 census population was 9,210, down from 10,650 in 2010 and 12,910 in 2000 -- a longer-term decline worth knowing about if you're comparing it to livelier neighboring beach towns. The median age is 51.7, and the city skews notably older, with 26.8% of residents 65 or above against 14.3% under 18. Housing stock reflects a shore town with a large seasonal component: of 7,897 housing units counted in 2020, 45.6% were vacant (largely seasonal or vacation homes), with 4,296 occupied households.

Ventnor runs under a Commission form of government adopted under the Walsh Act in 1968: three commissioners elected at-large to four-year terms who choose one of their own to serve as mayor. As of 2025, that was Mayor Tim Kriebel (Commissioner of Public Safety), alongside Lance B. Landgraf Jr. (Public Works and Code Enforcement) and Maria Mento (Revenue and Finance) -- confirm the current roster with the city directly, since commission seats can turn over. Younger residents attend Ventnor City School District's two PreK-8 schools before moving on to Atlantic City High School under a sending arrangement dating to 1920.

Lower Ventnor Heights: A Named Flood-Resiliency Effort

Not every part of Ventnor sits on equal footing against the water that surrounds it. Lower Ventnor Heights is a suburban section of the city built on a former marsh island, concentrated near the Dorset Avenue drawbridge, and the city's own published materials describe it in blunt terms: an area facing "a constant threat...from sea level rise, coastal flooding, Nor'easters and tropical-borne storm activity," characterized by repetitive-loss properties, low elevation, and older, year-round housing stock rather than seasonal rentals.

The city states that its resiliency effort "continues to improve annually with the implementation of improvements, new technologies and...assistance from outside public agencies." Our research did not turn up a specific funding figure, project timeline, or named officials driving this work, so treat it as an ongoing municipal initiative rather than a dated, fully funded project -- and check with Ventnor City directly, or FEMA's Flood Map Service Center, for current flood-zone status on any specific property.

Notable Ventnor Connections and What This Page Does Not Invent

Ventnor's notable-people list includes actress Anne Heche (1969-2022), Walter Evans Edge (1873-1956), who served as New Jersey governor in two separate stretches (1917-1919 and 1944-1947), U.S. Army general and aviation pioneer Benjamin Foulois (1879-1967), and former U.S. Congressman Frank LoBiondo (born 1946).

This page is built around what our research confirmed: Ventnor's location on Absecon Island, its 1.7-mile boardwalk connecting directly to Atlantic City's, its March 17, 1903 incorporation and first city meeting at the Carisbrooke Inn, the 1889 English-seaside origin of its name via S. Bartram Richards, its 2020 census figures, its Commission form of government and 2025 commissioner roster, its school district structure, the Lower Ventnor Heights Resiliency Project as described in the city's own materials, and the full, NHL.com-documented 2012 Justin Williams Stanley Cup day. It does not state Justin Williams as a current Ventnor resident -- the 2012 story is presented as history. It does not invent current median home prices, current property tax rates, specific current flood-zone designations for individual parcels, or the names of specific present-day shops or restaurants. New Jersey has its own state sales tax and its own property-tax structure, genuinely different from other states' systems -- confirm current tax figures directly with Atlantic County, Ventnor City's own finance office, or the State of New Jersey rather than relying on outdated numbers.