Yes, The Doctor’s Inn: Bed & Breakfast Has a Clever Name & Fascinating Past
Nothing depicts history like a home. Especially one that predates the Civil War.
The Doctor’s Inn Bed & Breakfast denotes monumental time travel. Draped in the heart of Cape May Court House at 2 North Main St., this elegant 1854 Victorian mansion has been preserved, updated, renovated and showcased through the ages.
Eras of Americana weave through here, spanning nobility, surgeons, slave sympathizers in the Civil War, Broadway producers, medical technicians and motel owners stalking a different niche. There have been groundbreaking innovations for different times. And the families.
This home’s legacy comes alive with 10 guest rooms and a separate carriage house, nestled on a 1½-acre wooded parcel with the feel of a country estate. Rooms are named for prominent people connected to it.
Some lived here before Abraham Lincoln became president. Two others are more recent, and the reason it still stands. Dr. Carolyn Crawford supplied a three-story addition during the 1990s, bringing it to the modern age. Lorraine and John Nicholas performed two mammoth rehabilitation efforts, in 2005 and 2014. Crawford and the Nicholas family invested at least $2.5 million, not including their time and effort, to enhance this structure.
Here's to sweat equity and elbow grease.
“You would have no idea of what type of history exists in your own backyard,” says Lorraine Nicholas, an owner since 2005 who now will pass the torch in the wake of her husband’s death in 2014. The Doctor’s Inn was listed for sale in August.
Lorraine knows every aspect of this property.
“It was reported that this was a stop on the Underground Railroad,” she says of the pre-Civil War age when slave sympathizers housed and escorted escaped slaves toward freedom.
“When you look at the large basement, you can see that it would have been possible. This house also had the first concrete foundation in Cape May County. Dr. John Wiley [the original owner] had read about concrete, which was experimental, because in those days they built a wood foundation.”
Structural nuances include the shutters, located inside the windows, not outside. This prevented weather elements from intruding. Nicholas also noted this was the site of the county’s first indoor bathroom.
“Think of how significant that was,” she says. “Patients and clients were skeptical of having an indoor bathroom, they were afraid of getting infections. If you got any type of infection in those days, it was almost like a death sentence. Most people were more comfortable using an outhouse.”
This was more like a penthouse. It had servants, high ceilings, chandeliers, crown molding. The walls were plaster; there was no dry wall. The original hardwood floors are still in the house, straight as can be, Nicholas indicates.
“It is amazing how well the house was built,” she says.
The patriarch of its early success was John Wiley. Born in Salem, he graduated from Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia and came to Cape May Court House to buy a medical practice, which was located in the space where spare room number #0 is now.
When the Civil War broke out, this clean-shaven young doctor left Cape May Court House and became an army surgeon. When he returned home with a full beard and weary from the war, Wiley lived here until his death in 1891.
Wiley family members owned the facility until a new age dawned in the 1970s. Subsequent proprietors brought their own blueprints. Joe Pierce was going to make it an office building, but that did not materialize. He later sold to Crawford, whom Nicholas credits with much of its charm. Crawford was a neonatologist, taking care of infants at Cape Regional Medical Center, walking distance from this address.
Crawford also had an interest in architecture and revolutionized this home. When she purchased it in 1993, the building was deteriorating. Through a significant capital investment and a vision, she revived the grandeur of the Doctor’s Inn. A suite bearing her name was Crawford’s residence during her proprietorship.
Crawford created the cute Doctor’s Inn name, which conveyed the idea that physicians resided there and that the doctor was in. She envisioned this as a spa and installed an indoor lap pool in the sun room, with a current that runs through. Patients were encouraged to swim against that current for exercise. Crawford adorned the property in red and green colors, allowing flexibility for matching towels and linens.
And then the curtain rose for Broadway. Michael Iannucci, a Widener football star and Broadway producer, wanted it to be a dinner theater. His wife was a performer, Nicholas says. But she passed away after he purchased it from Crawford and that show could not go on.
In came John and Lorraine Nicholas, who propelled this home into the social-media era. Its website, doctorsinncmch.com, illustrates the property and its origins. The Doctor’s Inn is busy most summers and into the fall shoulder season. Lorraine and John were married 38 years and had four children, including triplets. Four grandchildren followed. One of Lorraine's sons teaches history.
Like her predecessors, Lorraine feels the close of an era. John died just 10 days before the Inn was to reopen after a six-month renovation in June 2014. To her, this had been his baby.
“Absolutely John’s idea,” she says of the renovation, with a laugh. “I had been looking to retire. We had a 51-room motel in Wildwood Crest and we owned the Seven Seas in Wildwood. When I saw everything associated with renovating this place, I thought we should stop working, but John wanted to do this. Coming here became a labor of love for me, too. You meet the people, you get to know them as guests in your home, and they are a great clientele. They are people who want to be in a bed and breakfast. They appreciate what it's like to be away from the hustle and bustle of the shore and come to a place with magnificent Victorian architecture.”
John was an auto mechanic who simply could fix everything, Lorraine says. He did much of the work that would have otherwise produced a prohibitive construction bill. This project not only had to upgrade the facility but match the historical look.
“He just had an eye for things,” Lorraine says, smiling.
It produced a well-appointed home. Features of the Doctor’s Inn include a complimentary American-style breakfast each morning. Private baths are provided in every guest room. Rooms also feature gas fireplaces with period-custom mantles, small beverage refrigerators, iron and ironing boards and hair dryers. Cable TV and Wi-Fi access is provided from all common rooms. Daily room service is also provided.
New Jersey Monthly magazine tabbed the Doctor’s Inn its top small bed and breakfast facility in the entire state for 2010.
And now, for Lorraine, it’s time to bring the home its next owner. She retired as a medical technician at Cape Regional on July 5. It was a great run, marked by the pleasure of walking to work. If the next owner retains the practice of naming a suite for someone prominent, Lorraine and John deserve one.
“This was a lovely place, where we brought the grandchildren,” she says. “We had wonderful Christmas celebrations here. It's bittersweet, putting this home up for sale [it is listed for sale by the Hugh Merkle team at Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices Fox & Roach, Realtors]. I would live in the carriage house if I could; heck, I would even run it for them, but being in charge of all of this is too much for one person.”
She is in good company with that sentiment. Those who have come left their mark. After they left, it stands, like a monument, to their influence.
This set of doctors had a great bedside manner.
For sale information on The Doctor’s Inn, please contact Martha “Jeannette” DiNardo at 609-231-3271.
