Bed And Breakfast

Steve and Terry Kratz, innkeepers of the Joseph Ambler Inn in Montgomeryville, don't see much of each other these days. The husband-wife team has been managing a booming business and burgeoning staff since the bed-and-breakfast received permission in November 1989 to open its restaurant doors to the public. "We went from doing 15 dinners a night to 100 a night" on weekends, said Steve Kratz. On Sunday, the Montgomery Township Historical Society will host an open house and tours of the historic inn from noon to 4 p.m. to raise money for the society.

An ordinance to make it more difficult to operate a bed-and-breakfast in the township has been introduced by the commissioners in response to a local homeowner's attempt to turn his house into a lodging place. Thomas Fitzgerald, who wants to convert his house in the 400 block of Conestoga Road into quarters for paid lodgers, has submitted an amendment to the township's zoning code. A hearing on the proposed amendment will be held Feb. 26. Fitzgerald's two-story house has been on the market for more than two years at a reported asking price of $349,000.

Twice a month, the Wedgwood Inn in New Hope hosts tea and a tour of the bed and breakfast on Bridge Street where Washington's troops camped before crossing the Delaware. Last Sunday, Carl Glassman, who owns the inn with his wife, Nadine Silnutzer, welcomed the visitors.

When guests arrive at Debbie Markowitz's stately brick Georgian home in Rosemont, they are greeted by 4-foot-tall Caesara, a handsome Great Dane; two lively 16-year-old twin boys on skateboards, and all the trappings of suburban life - a pool, a garden and wooded grounds. Not exactly the Holiday Inn. But then, visitors looking for a chain hotel would not stay at Markowitz's, one of a couple of dozen bed and breakfast homes that regularly rent out rooms in the Main Line suburbs.

Overnight guests are coming. Would you like to serve something other than the traditional breakfast foods the next morning? Try pineapple souffle and croissants instead of fried eggs and bacon. The recipe can be found in the recently published American Bed and Breakfast Cookbook, written by four women who started out five years ago searching for alternative breakfast foods. Carol Yarrow of Paoli, Sandra Fullerton of Strafford, Joanne Goins of Wayne and Sandra Barker, formerly of Devon and now of Chicago, dubbed themselves the Bed Post Writers Group and decided to compile a cookbook.

A stately Victorian home on Medford's Main Street, built more than 80 years ago for the newly wedded daughter of a prominent local family, will become the township's first bed and breakfast. But for Patty Sullivan, the owner of the 20-room, three-story house, securing the township's approval has been a long and expensive ordeal. "It has taken three years and an extra $60,000 for paperwork just to get permits," Sullivan said. Last Oct. 25, Sullivan received the permits necessary to begin renovations.

St. Peter's Village, a charming Victorian village in northern Chester County, has escaped the sheriff's auction block for the time being. Seven buildings at St. Peter's were scheduled to be sold Friday to satisfy a $335,173 mortgage debt owed by Arthur Weiler to G&B Financial Corp. of Glenside. But the sale was delayed to May 16 after Weiler and his partner paid off part of the debt. Weiler bought the village in 1989 and has twice tried to sell it himself, with no success.

People who stay at Pattye Benson's bed and breakfast in Malvern tell her they've always dreamed of owning one. Benson, who has been running the Great Valley House for more than seven years, quickly counters with, "Come live here with me for a weekend, follow me around; it's not nearly as glamorous as it looks. " Bringing home the reality of bed-and-breakfast ownership to such dreamers was the focus of the first day of a two-day seminar, "Starting a Bed & Breakfast," on Tuesday at Pennsylvania State University's Great Valley Campus.

It appears to be a very unlikely place for a dream house. But the narrow and busy main street of Pemberton Borough is the wrong turn that led Marian Michaels to find the house at 31 Hanover St. that she will renovate into a bed-and-breakfast hotel filled with antiques. "It's been my dream for years, since we took our first trip to Ireland, to open a bed and breakfast," said Michaels, 46, who will operate the hotel with her husband, Dan, who is retired. "We never would have received the welcome we got at the bed and breakfasts in a hotel.

We would like to open a few bedrooms in our very large house to bed-and- breakfast guests. Can you tell us where we can find out everything we have to know about getting started on this project? We would also appreciate finding out how to make our place known to the public. It's true that there's a little more to opening a bed-and-breakfast establishment than spreading a new comforter on the bed and putting out the welcome mat. But fortunately, there are several books on the market that outline all the hurdles - covering everything from legal, zoning and insurance matters to making sure the beds don't sag and publicizing your new venture.

Evelene Hinckley Dohan, 84, a former teacher at the Agnes Irwin School in Bryn Mawr, and later the owner of a Delaware County bed and breakfast, died of a lung blood clot Monday, April 2, at her home in Hershey's Mill, the retirement community near West Chester. When her husband, David, died in 1970, their three daughters were already students at Agnes Irwin, her son, Andrew, said in a Wednesday interview. So Mrs. Dohan asked a neighbor and friend, who was an official at the school, for a job. From 1970 until the mid-1980s, Mrs. Dohan taught English there, mostly to Irwin's high school classes.

DEAR ABBY: Please remind parents and teenagers that it is "cool" to wear a helmet when riding bikes and skateboards. A child in our town died recently after suffering a head injury, and we have just received word that the son of a close friend (age 23) has started having seizures because of a head injury he suffered as a teen after falling from a skateboard. I had my grandson decorate his helmet. All his friends thought it looked great, and that made it "cool" to wear it. With summer here and kids outside, wearing a helmet cannot be stressed enough.

In its storied history, this venerable beach town has weathered hurricanes, floods, fires and the wrecking ball. More than 30 years ago, when what some, at the time, called progress by bulldozing old buildings threatened to destroy the core of this historic city, a rallying of preservationists created a bed-and-breakfast "capital" that today is the envy of most other Jersey Shore towns. And it may again be time for a sea change, as a shaky economy, varying vacation habits, and the retirement dreams of some innkeepers alter the landscape once more.

Surrounded by autumn colors and colonial ambience, the Centre Bridge Inn couldn't have looked more inviting. Now there's something to be said for pretty wrapping, but when it comes to restaurants, a view can only do so much. I arrived, ready to be romanced, by both handsome companion and luscious bounty. The first came through. The latter stood me up. The Centre Bridge Inn, also a 10-room bed and breakfast, has a history of calamities. After its original construction in 1705, as the Centre Bridge House, it was flooded in 1930 and then destroyed by fires in 1932 and 1954.

IT WAS LOVE at first sight. The boldly painted gingerbread houses, the clip-clop of horses drawing carriages, the endless succulent seafood options on menus of five-star restaurants, and the refreshing unpretentiousness of both locals and visitors, who were obviously more in love with life and salt water taffy than designer logos and vacationing with the "in" crowd, all made this Brooklyn, New Yorker, a complete goner for Cape May, N.J. I...

Bed-and-breakfast guest houses could soon be popping up in this staid Delaware County borough of tree-lined thoroughfares and fine Victorian mansions. After years of community discussion and more mixed feelings than outright opposition, the Borough Council this week authorized the advertising of an ordinance that would permit B&Bs. Although the proposal sets strict limits on their operation and signage, guest houses could become a reality in Swarthmore by next year. The ordinance comes up for final approval in November.

The once sleepy intersection of Routes 30 and 10 in Parkesburg, Pa., near the Route 30 bypass, is booming, but the projected growth won't come soon enough for the proprietors of the nearby LaineKenns Antique Shop and Bed and Breakfast, which after only two years of operation is going out of business. Beginning at 9 a.m. Saturday, Barr/Davis Auctioneers will sell LaineKenns' antiques, collectibles, furniture, glassware, restaurant and bed and breakfast equipment and supplies. It promises to be quite a sale.

In God we trust; all others pay cash. That seems to be the unofficial motto of Cashtown, Pa., a much-needed corrective for the American addiction to living beyond our means. "Like I've said before, I just don't go for spending money we haven't earned to buy things we don't need to impress people we don't like," harrumphed Ed Dietz, proprietor of the Cashtown Garage, where credit cards are most definitely not welcomed. Refreshing. And a sentiment he's shared repeatedly since July 31, when Cashtown hosted the Great American Credit Card Swipeout and briefly became the focus of a flurry of national media attention.

Indifference stops meaningful change Addressing a standing-room only crowd at Bryn Mawr Presbyterian Church recently, Harvard professor Cornel West charged each of us to grapple with the following questions in order to derive a personal definition of racism: "What does it really mean to be human? What kind of person are you, really?" These questions are intrinsically linked to observations I've made of racism in my profession (teaching). I believe racism is institutionalized and individualized indifference to the fundamental truth that we are all human beings.

A Conshohocken developer with a reputation for creative reuse of old buildings plans to breathe life back into the former Strawbridge & Clothier headquarters in Center City. The space above the six-floor store, still called Strawbridge's, has been dark since soon after the family company was sold in 1996 to May Department Stores Co., of St. Louis. Michael O'Neill's Preferred Real Estate Investments Inc., of Conshohocken, has purchased floors 7 through 13 over the store at Eighth and Market Streets from May. The space has the eerie feel of a ghost town rapidly abandoned.