by Anne Motto, F.M. Kirby Curator of Collections
March 25, 2025
In 1925, while Budd Lake was transforming from a popular campground to a thriving summer resort, one of the hottest night spots around debuted on its shores. From the beginning, the famous Wigwam offered dining and dancing on “six thousand feet of floor space,” and over 40 years, annually welcomed bands from around the country to entertain droves of summer visitors.
Situated on what is today Route 46, the “dance pavilion” was first known as Cabin Grove, but after extensive renovation in the off-season of 1928, changed its name to the Wigwam. Its advertisements from that summer boasted of a ballroom, dining room, and lounge that offered “something really different.” Just a few years later, it added a bathing beach which it promised would be unsurpassed by any in NJ. Large parties and beauty contests were regular occurrences and a carnival night in 1933 was said to have brought in 800 guests. Free hotdogs were given out to dancers on Mondays (apparently this required the preparation of 300 hotdogs) and, not to be deterred by Prohibition, beer on draft was advertised a good six months before repeal. Naturally, the manager applied for a liquor license within two days of it becoming legal.
Its greatest draw, of course, was the music. Kicking off the summer each May, a new touring band would be booked for the season, some of whom rose to fame and great acclaim. Jack Wardlaw’s orchestra proved so popular in 1934 that they were brought back for an encore that September. Less than two years later, they were touring the South with Peggy Lee. In 1939, Les Brown and his orchestra, who had earlier that year gone toe-to-toe with Duke Ellington’s, held court at the Wigwam. Throughout the decades that followed, they performed with dozens of big-name stars on the radio, tv, and movies. However, Les Brown was outdone in 1941, as local newspapers pointedly noted, when Bob Astor, the “West Coast swing maestro” and his 13-piece band turned their two-week engagement into a summer-long contract, breaking an all-time attendance record at the Wigwam by performing for 1,400 people.
It wasn’t until 1945 that the building was enclosed and heating added, allowing the ballroom to remain open year-round. One of the Wigwam’s last great bands was led by Al Lombardy, formerly of the Glenn Miller Orchestra. They were such a big hit in 1946, that they were brought back the following year. However, in the 1950s and 60s, as Budd Lake’s popularity as a summer destination waned, the ads for the Wigwam which were once plentiful in newspapers from Hackettstown to Newark grew less frequent. The final death knell came in 1964 when the building was lost in a fire, and its former site is now home to a 7-Eleven. Through the records that remain though, the soundtrack of Budd Lake’s summer past can still be heard today.
For more on the Wigwam, as well as a young Jackie Gleason’s summer as an MC at the nearby Oasis, don’t miss our current exhibit, Fermenting a Communal Spirit: Morris County Taverns, Speakeasies & Social Clubs.
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