Late Night Heroes: Meet the Overnight Workers Who Keep LBI Going Until Dawn

By Jon Coen | on August 03, 2023

NIGHTLY GO-TO: ‘I’m always a coffee guy.’ Brian Gorman, who works four overnight shifts a week at the Chicken or the Egg, shows off his prized coffee mug. (Photo by Jack Reynolds)

There’s one mug at the popular Chicken or the Egg restaurant in Beach Haven that looks different from the rest, emblazoned with different insults taken from the works of William Shakespeare.

That mug belongs to Brian Gorman, 37, of Holgate.

Gorman has worked overnights at the Chicken or the Egg every summer since 2015. Coffee keeps him going. And whereas he was always misplacing his mug, now it’s easy to find. It was a gift from his 26-year-old co-worker, Matt Ernst, who also has worked the 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. shift.

“Coffee. I’m always a coffee guy,” said Gorman.

The Chegg is famous in New Jersey for two things: its wings and the fact that it stays open 24 hours from Thursday to Sunday each week.

The ebb and flow of the late night have a lot to do with the throngs of partiers in Beach Haven. (Photo by Jack Reynolds)

Ernst and Gorman have found that weekend nights at “The Chegg” have a certain flow. On nights that local bars host teen night, there’s a massive rush of teens around 11 p.m. By the time that ebbs, the Chegg fills with the 20-something crowd as the bars let out. And finally, around 3 or 4 a.m. the bartenders and bar security crews come in.

“It’s a staple of Beach Haven. During those late-night shifts when you’re serving tables, you have to kind of assume a lot when you’re taking their order. And then when you bring it out, they don’t even remember what they ordered,” said Ernst, laughing.

He explains that some of that crowd just forgets to tip, but when the bartenders and servers come in from different restaurants, they tip really well, so things even out. There are late-night regulars like local “Milkshake Mike,” who comes in every night around 2 a.m.

“The crowd is a little rambunctious, but we can play different music after the families and dinner crowd are gone. We can play A Tribe Called Quest, The Descendants, The Beastie Boys or NOFX.”

Gorman echoes Ernst’s sentiments that folks may not always be articulate in ordering.

“Sometimes, after a while, you just say, ‘I think you want chicken fingers with bee-sting sauce’ so they don’t order a crazy hot sauce. Or sometimes they just tell me they need food for 10 people to go. I just ask what their budget is and send them out with a bag of food they’re probably going to like.”

Hugh Shields, 19, second lieutenant of the Barnegat Light First Aid Squad.

Gorman says his training to stay up all night bleeds into the other days of the week.

“I’m awake until 6 a.m. into the fall,” he added.

Emergency Response:

Some 15.5 miles from the Chegg, the overnights are quieter. Barnegat Light, once home to the lively Rick’s American Café, no longer has any bars open late night.

“It’s really quiet up in BL. It’s so quiet that if we have a call, we don’t even turn on the sirens or the lights of the emergency vehicle sometimes because we don’t want to wake anyone up,” admits 19-year-old Hugh Shields, second lieutenant of the Barnegat Light First Aid Squad.

Overall, there are plenty of calls that come through in the Island’s most northern borough that include beach and bay incidents, or sometimes aiding the Coast Guard, which has a station there. Shields is also a member of the Barnegat Light Beach Patrol and Volunteer Fire Co./Water Rescue.

This summer, he has initiated a new system to distribute the load among volunteers that ensures someone is always on the midnight to 6 a.m. shift. He says most of the overnight calls they respond to are medical, respiratory or heart pains. Occasionally, they will respond to emergencies as far south as Surf City, as part of their mutual aid agreement.

Cleaning the Bars:

A Sea of Cans and Cups

Ricky Davies of Manahawkin is the first to see the aftermath of every big party night in the summer. He is the owner of Distinctly Davies, a local cleaning service. Among his biggest clients are the bars and clubs.

“When I come into a club, the bartenders are just wrapping up for the night. They turn the lights on and you just see it all,” he said. “You never know what you’re walking into. You can get lost in a sea of cans and cups.”

Five years ago, Davies was commuting between New York City and LBI. He saw that there was a need for an overnight cleaning business and launched his company in 2019, cleaning Bird & Betty’s in Beach Haven. It allowed him to stop driving to the city for work.

Ricky Davies. Late nights turn to early mornings as he cleans the bars around the Island. Photo by Jack Reynolds.

He started cleaning completely solo, seven days a week from 2:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. His business has grown by word of mouth and now he now has eight full-time employees and three seasonal visa workers.

As he drives from job to job, he sees bar crowd stragglers who want to keep the party going. Some of them struggle to ride bicycles. He sees sports cars racing down the Boulevard and occasional vandalism.

Late nights in Beach Haven. (Photo by Jack Reynolds)

He says the Beach Haven Police Department night shift is constantly waving to him. The Long Beach Township PD all know his vehicles by now and the Ship Bottom PD will actually pop in his jobs from time to time, just to make sure he’s OK, late night.

He often works seven days a week from April to November. During the summer, he cleans the Tide Table group’s restaurants/bars, Joe Pop’s, Black-Eyed Susans, Dune 18, the Hudson House, Neptune Market and Holiday Snack Bar. He has contracts with Jetty buildings year ’round, as well as LBI National Golf & Resort (formerly Sea Oaks Country Club).

“I used to keep the doors open to some of these venues, but then I would have people just wander into the building,” he recalled.

It was often someone inebriated or someone who lost something earlier in the night. He’s proud to say that he has returned many wallets and even a wedding ring. He and his staff occasionally find cash.

“I give all the change to my son, Zephyr. He keeps it in a piggy bank. If I find cash, we go out for ice cream,” he added.

Kellsey Hogan, 35, bartends closing shifts at the Port Hole Café in Ship Bottom. It is tough on the mother of two.

“I’m up until 4 a.m. five nights a week. We’re exhausted 24/7, but it’s summer on LBI. We all know that we have to hustle to make that money for the off-season. This nocturnal lifestyle definitely isn’t for everyone. By Labor Day you feel like your body starts to shut down and you become so sleep deprived, so it definitely takes its toll.”

Her husband, Brian, is a waiter at the Black Whale and they try to get Thursdays off to spend as a family. Most mornings, Brian wakes up first and takes the kids to the beach. Kellsey sleeps later and meets them on the beach.

“The Port Hole is the last stop for people who just want one more drink. But sometimes they don’t need one more drink. That’s the one that puts them over the edge. Late-night bartending comes with the good, bad and the ugly. Whether it’s friends out celebrating a special event or a newly 21-year-old drunk, you see it all,” she said.

Kellsey Hogan says long hours and late nights are just an accepted way of life for locals in the summer. Photo by Jack Reynolds.

Like the Chegg, the night goes in waves. Hogan explains that the Port Hole is a family spot and has affordable food. They often get a crowd waiting for a table at one of the other nearby Ship Bottom restaurants or for an after-dinner cocktail.

Then there’s the late-night party crowd.

“They’re doing shots and dancing at one of the clubs. They come in for that last drink and they bring the rowdiness with them,” Hogan added.

Jess Hayden, who also works closing shifts at the Port Hole and worked at the Gateway prior, says she has been working late nights “too many years.”

“It’s such a wide array of people really. Like the Hudson House in Beach Haven, we’re where a lot of locals who work in restaurants come to wind down after they get off. We get the people who don’t want to pay the cover charge at a club, or the after-wedding parties who have just been at an open bar for five hours,” she said.

Hayden notes that the Port Hole’s kitchen closes at 10 p.m. Bars don’t offer late-night food the way they did just a few years ago because kitchen staff is already hard to find and already overworked.

“They work even longer hours than we do,” she said. “So when people are looking for food, we send them to Wawa.”

Both Island Wawas are, in fact, very busy through the nights though the late-shift managers were unable to comment for this story because of company policy.

On late nights, Hayden will see people starting their early running or biking on the Island. She’s often coming in the door as her husband, who works on the McGuire Air Force Base, is leaving for work.

The Port Hole usually gives a last call by 1:30 a.m., but by the time Hogan or Hayden has closed and cleaned up, it’s the time when activity for the new day is starting.

“At first, you see a lot of Ubers out or people driving down the Boulevard, blasting music,” said Hogan. “Then, as it becomes early morning, you see the Island recouping – bread trucks coming onto the Island to make deliveries, people just waking up to start to start the whole process over again. It’s a continuous clock here on LBI during the summer.”

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