Coney Island Girl

"Every night she comes to take me out to dreamland. When I'm with her, I'm the richest man in the town. She's a rose, she's the pearl. She's the spin on my world. All the stars make their wishes on her eyes. She's my Coney Island Baby. She's my Coney Island Girl. She's a princess, in a red dress. She's the moon in the mist to me. She's my Coney Island Baby. She's my Coney Island Girl" Tom Waits

They are planning to put a Starbuck's on Surf Avenue. You would think that I would be FOR a decent iced coffee in July at the beach. But not this beach. The Windsor Family has Buckingham Palace. The Munsters had 1313 Mockingbird Lane. My family, for at least 3 generations, has had Coney Island.

In the early part of the 20th century my grandmother, at the tender age of 14 was "arrested" to hear my great-grandmother Anna tell it, on Coney Island. The charge? Public Indecency. Obviously the "bad to the bone" bone is hereditary. There is a photo of my grandmother and her girlfriends on that dark day in my family's history. She stands, her slim hip cocked, smirking at the camera with her arms casually flung over a girlfriend on either side. A black bathing suit with little sleeves piped in white reaches to just above her knees. A floppy sun hat sits pushed back on her head with dark curly hair escaping wildly from its confines (giving lie to her claim in later years to being "naturally blond") bloomer shorts- with matching piping and black stockings rolled just below her knees complete the look. She has on more clothing than I would wear to shovel snow in January. The indecent part, you may ask? It was not proper, or legal for that matter, that hot summer of 1919, for a young lady to roll her stockings down below the knee in public.

Truth be told the policeman didn't actually arrest Yetta, he just brought her to my great grandmother who was sitting with her friends under the shade of an umbrella. Anna didn't believe married women showed so much as an elbow in public- I can only imagine what she wore- I know it was a lot. Anna spoke very little English so when she saw my Grandmother being escorted by a burly, sweating, bear of a police officer she immediately recalled the Cossacks whom she'd left Russia to avoid. To say the least-she was perturbed- or to hear her tell it in Yiddish; varklempt- which literally translates to "choked with fear". Yetta was fluent in English and Russian and one smart cookie- I can just hear her editing in the interest of self-preservation, to beat the band as she translated the officer's explanation of the incident. Between my grandmother's blindingly quick patter and my great grandmother alternately clutching and cuffing her child, unsure as to what was actually called for in this situation, I am certain the officer was more than a little pleased to see the end of that conversation.

Though she did not get arrested, Yetta paid a price- for the rest of that summer not only were her stockings always rolled as high as they would go- she had to wear a sweater over her bathing suit. Anna wasn't quite sure which body part was actually the culprit and she wasn't taking any chances.

The kicker is, that was the summer my grandfather lifeguarded at Coney Island. Harry saw her in that get-up and picked her out of the crowd. He always said she stood out that summer on the beach- not "showy" like the other girls.

My favorite picture of my mom was taken in the summer of 1942 at the bath house which still stands under the boardwalk at 10th Avenue. She and her cousin Fran at 3 years of age stand against a whitewashed cinderblock wall, bathing suits pulled down to the waist, still dripping from having the sand washed off their tiny bodies.

Later family photos from 1948 show my dad and his friends clowning as teens; chests puffed up and stomachs sucked in, simple in those days for dad, before his stint as a cook in the Merchant Marines made that act physically impossible.

1962- There are photos of my twin sister and I seated on each of my dad's shoulders. He looked so tan. We looked so happy- two giggling cherubs just turned 2. I can still remember the view from way up there of the midway and the ocean. Funny, now more than 40 years later as I looked across the beach the memory of my dad's sun-warmed fuzzy shoulders was tickled from the back of my mind by the smells of the boardwalk, grilling hot dogs and Coppertone.

Last week as I walked through the amusements I saw many of them shuttered. The paint is peeling and graffiti covers the sign that announces that a building is the home of the Coney Island Museum. Long abandoned, its mullioned windows are hazed, broken and rusting. I realize only the soft focus of my memories make these places appear anything more than falling down & dilapidated. The B&B Carousell is empty and an "Available" sign hangs above the peeling marquis where I begged over and over for one more try to grab a brass ring. Anyone else would see just another empty building. There are 2 more bumper car attractions now that the "Bump your Ass off" cars have closed. Already falling down, Coney Island cannot survive much longer as the buildings lose their charm to a patina of rust and neglect.

The developers promise to maintain the flavor and authenticity of Coney Island. The Cyclone and Parachute Jump; known as the Eiffel Tower of Brooklyn- are protected landmarks and will remain. I wonder if they can keep their breathtaking grandness against a backdrop of a series of proposed 40-story condominiums. I do not mind so much that Nathan's doesnt serve frog's legs or chow mein on a bun anymore- as kids we called it a sneeze sandwich- because it was green and gooey and... well, you get the idea. They still sell a great hot dog- even if they won't toast the bun anymore, and the fry guys still actually dump a few extra fries in the bag when they serve you. If the price for allowing a few more little girls to get in a teeny bit of trouble on a Saturday afternoon, or fall in love or get a family sunburn is a couple of big buildings- ok. But please-I can get a coffee on the way back to Manhattan. Keep it Coney Island, a little gritty. Don't clean up TOO much. Treat it as you would an archeological dig- be careful what you take away- and how you move things, there are a lot of memories in that dust.






































:) X