WILDWOOD CREST, N.J. — Paul and Alethea Pawloski aren’t kidding when they describe the side-by-side motels their respective families have run for decades in the Crest as family resorts.
From two motels — the Stefanide/Roy clan running things at the V.I.P. (Visitors in Paradise), the Pawlowskis in charge at the Compass — they created a new family.
For proof, there’s Juliana, the baby, born just days after Labor Day 2021, who’s now got the run of both places, their own Eloise in a Jersey Shore motel, living atop the Compass office, a daughter they call Little Miss 6500, as in the 6500 block of Atlantic Avenue, where both motels sit.
She’s heir to both thrones: queen of the concrete safari animals over at the Compass; captain of the wooden pirate ship over at the V.I.P.
Even the families that return every summer to the concrete and steel mid-century havens a block from the beach are beaming.
“That baby is absolutely beautiful,” says Luann Rogers, whose family fills eight rooms at the V.I.P., and has every summer since 1981. “And here’s Alethea — three generations running the same motel. I remember seeing her growing up, and her brother.”
In fact, Alethea, 34, is the fourth generation of the same family at the V.I.P., and Juliana will be the fifth. Alethea’s great-grandmother, Katherine Hammond Stefanide, and grandparents built the motel in 1964, opening in 1965. Back then it was beachfront, before an entire block, Ocean Avenue, was filled in and developed.
The families that run Jersey Shore motels are a tight-knit community, running on three months of shared adrenaline and crises, close with one another and close to their longtime guests.
“There are no secrets,” says Paul, 36. “Everybody has a website. We are the furthest thing from competitors. If we hear Imperial 500 is having an issue, we’ll go and give them a hand. We’ll share maids even if that’s what it takes to help out.”
Alethea added: “Pillowcases.”
“A case of towels,” says Paul. “We’ll exchange with one another.”
Typically, the back-of-the-house kids spend their summers playing with the children of guests who rotate in.
Over at the V.I.P., they placed a plaque this year in room 206 in memory of Helen Dunn, who stayed there for all but a few of the 57 years the motel has been open, said Melissa Roy, Alethea’s mom.
“I always said my summer started when I heard Mrs. Dunn’s voice,” Roy recalled.
It’s that kind of place.
Alethea says she would write to her summer friends over the off-season and check the calendar of bookings to see which friends were expected next. She’d be working, too, cleaning rooms as a teenager to save up to get wristbands to go to Morey’s Piers.
But it was Paul Pawlowski, who arrived as a teenager with his family at the height of the 2000 season when the Pawlowskis unexpectedly bought the Compass next door, who caught Alethea’s eye once and for all.
The spark was kindled in the off-season
The spark was kindled in the off-season. They’d known each other casually, Alethea’s brother playing poker with Paul and his brother over at the V.I.P. office, Alethea coming in the next morning to find the beer cans as evidence.
They were all friends as teenagers. In the off-season, the Pawlowskis returned to their home in North Jersey, while Alethea stayed in Cape May County.
In December 2007, Alethea’s nana, Joanne Stefanide, died at age 71, after a tree in her backyard fell on her. Originally from Pennsylvania Dutch country, she’d been the heart and soul of the V.I.P., marrying into the Stefanide family and running the place with her daughter, Melissa, and later her granddaughter, Alethea.
“During that time of grieving, I thought of Paul,” Alethea said. “I don’t know why. I reached out to him.”
His family, it turned out, had also suffered a loss, his uncle.
Their first date was at the Menz Restaurant out in Rio Grande.
Their second was the traveling bodies exhibit, in Atlantic City. Before long, they had scratched their names in the concrete in front of the motels: Paul + Alethea.
“We were very cautious,” Alethea said. “We didn’t want to get too emotionally involved and have something end badly.”
Turns out, the familiarity of the families had prepared them all for their love story, waiting like a freshly cleaned room with southern exposure (at the V.I.P) or one that gets the afternoon shade (the Compass, facing north).
“I always had a feeling it was going to happen one day,” said Irene Pawlowski, Paul’s mom, and one of Juliana’s many motel babysitters. “They’re so happy together.”
Over on the pool deck at the V.I.P., which with just two stories and 30 rooms is already 80% booked for next year, the Rogers family is figuring out dinner. As usual, they will cook at one of the grills near the pool.
They can’t say enough about the place, about Alethea, who they watched grow up, and 10-month-old Juliana.
The Rogers family has seen its own milestones at the V.I.P., including one grandchild who took her first steps in one of the rooms.
They are lovely places to create a family, or to nurture one, so many memories baked into every square foot, family at the heart. As so many motels become condos, these families at the heart of Wildwood Crest summers are moving on.
But not at the V.I.P and Compass.
Emerging halfway out of the pool pit, doing repairs, is Alethea’s dad, Roland Roy, a former Wildwood detective who married into the Stefanide family.
“My son grew up playing with their son, which was nice,” said Roy. “Alethea and Paul are a good team.”
He thinks Juliana will grow up to be the fifth generation at the V.I.P., a place anchored by its strong matriarchal line.
He also thinks there is logic in combining the properties eventually, though for now Alethea is running things with her mom over at the V.I.P., and Paul and his brother oversee the Compass.
“My suggestion there would be to knock down both places and build a mega resort,” he said.
Roy grew up in Wildwood and remembers the neon lights when his dad would bring him downtown. He met Alethea’s mom when she worked at City Hall. True love is never too far away for these locals.
The shared values of running the summer motels, the hard work, the loyalty, devotion to guests, to cleanliness, and to good humor above all, is as good a foundation as any for a marriage, he said.
“The values are the same,” he said. “Absolutely.”
Sometime soon, Paul, Alethea, and Juliana will be making the big move from above the Compass to brand-new residence quarters over at the V.I.P., said Alethea’s mom, Melissa. And she and Roland will also be moving onto the island to live full-time at the V.I.P.
Like the sign says, a family motel.
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