The Historic Our Lady Star of the Sea Church in Cape May

The historic Our Lady Star of the Sea Church is located in Cape May, New Jersey. You'll find this beautiful old catholic church located on 525 Washington Street with the front of the church facing the Washington Street Mall.

We enjoy looking at old historic buildings and stumbled upon the catholic church while visiting Cape May. The church was built in 1911 and was called "Old St. Mary" back in the day. Other than that, I couldn't find a lot of history on the church online.

There is a historical marker located on the front stone wall which has the following information:

Our Lady Star of the Sea Church - 1911 Has been placed on the National Register of Historic Places by the United States Department of the Interior (Old St. Mary).

It's a large catholic church that is open year round to serve the needs of the residents and visitors. It is made out of large blocks of stone with gold and brass trim. It reminds me a lot of the Victorian architecture of the oceanfront homes that are nearby. It's really tall and impressive when you see it. On the day that we were there...a wedding was taking place. What a beautiful setting for a wedding!

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Collier's Liquor Store Wall Mural in Cape May

If you've been following our travel blog for the past 9 years you'll already know that we're big fans of outdoor street art and wall murals. Every time we travel we're on the lookout for them and enjoy documenting them here on our blog. It's a great way to discover new artists that are usually local to the area that we're visiting.

While on vacation in Cape May, New Jersey, we stumbled upon this wall mural that was painted onto the side of the Collier's Liquor Store building. This liquor store is located really close to the Washington Street Mall and faces a large parking lot that shoppers like to use. It takes up the entire wall and was painted by the artist Brian DeMusz. We looked online for some information about him, but couldn't find any.

The entire wall mural is done in a liquor store theme and features wines from around the world, ice cold beer from your favorite brands, etc. The artist's name is located in the bottom left-hand corner. Overall I think it's a decent mural, but definitely could of included more items and perhaps tied-in a little bit of a Cape May or seashore theme. Just my 2 cents on that!

When photographing wall murals and street art we recommend that you take several photographs. You want to get a full shot, a close-up of the artist's signature and then close-ups of some of the designs if it's a "busier" design. This one was pretty simple, so we only opted for 2 photographs.

If you enjoy this type of outdoor street art you can visit our Street Art & Wall Murals section here on the travel blog or hop onto Pinterest to see our special board over there. Enjoy!

The Battle of Brandywine Historical Marker in Chester County

A few weeks ago we visited West Chester in Pennsylvania and stumbled upon the Battle of Brandywine historical marker. When we travel across the state we're always looking for and documenting the historical markers that we find. These important markers are passed by travelers every day and not given a second thought. We're trying to change that because these markers contain important facts & information about our country's past.

Here's some information from Wikipedia about the Battle of Brandywine:

"The Battle of Brandywine, also known as the Battle of Brandywine Creek, was fought between the American Continental Army of General George Washington and the British Army of General Sir William Howe on September 11, 1777. The "Redcoats" of the British Army defeated the American rebels in the Patriots' forces and forced them to withdraw northeast toward the American capital and largest city of Philadelphia where the Second Continental Congress had been meeting since 1775. The engagement occurred near Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania during Howe's campaign to take Philadelphia, part of the American Revolutionary War (1775-1783). More troops fought at Brandywine than any other battle of the American Revolution. It was also the longest single-day battle of the war, with continuous fighting for 11 hours."

Here is the information contained on the historical marker:

The battle ended just southwest of here at nightfall. With Howe and his troops holding the field, Washington’s force withdrew to Chester. Although he was wounded, Lafayette helped to reorganize the retreating troops, and Pulaski’s cavalry protected them from attack.

By: 1952 by Pennsylvania Historical Museum Commission.

If you're waymarking and documenting historical markers across the state, you'll find The Battle of Brandywine marker on Wilmington Pike (US Route 202) in Birmingham, Pennsylvania. It's on the right side of the road when traveling south. You can pull into the parking lot of the Italian pizza restaurant, park and get out to photograph it. Officially it's located on the border of West Chester and Birmingham in Chester County.

Note: You can find hundreds of documented historical markers here on our travel blog and over on our Pinterest board. You can double-click on the photo to have it open up in a new browsing window and in an enlarged size.