December | 2010 | Amusing the Zillion

Archive for December, 2010

Photo of the Day: Santa Spotted on Coney Island Boardwalk

Posted in Photo of the Day, tagged Bruce Handy, Coney Island, Photography, Santa Claus on December 21, 2010| 3 Comments »

Santa Claus is coming to town. December 19, 2010. Photo © Bruce Handy/Pablo 57 via flickr

Santa Claus is coming to town. Dec 19, 2010. Photo © Bruce Handy/Pablo 57 via flickr

Santa has already arrived in Coney Island! Photographer and ATZ contributor Bruce Handy spotted him on the Boardwalk on Sunday. “Not often I ask a person to pose, but hey, Santa can’t say no, that would make him a grinch,” writes Bruce. Speaking of grinches of Christmas past and present, rumor had it that Santa was holding Joe S’s piece of coal behind his back.

After attending the Salt and Sea Mission’s Christmas gathering on Stillwell Avenue, Santa returned to the North Pole to get ready for the big sleigh ride on Christmas Eve. Happy holidays, dear readers!

Displaced Queens Flea Vendors Eye Coney Island’s Vacant Lots

Posted in Real Estate, Redevelopment, tagged Aqueduct flea market, Coney Island, flea market, Thor Equities on December 20, 2010| Leave a Comment »

Tent Frames from Summer 2009's Failed Flea By The Sea. Thor Equities Vacant Lots at Stillwell in Coney Island. December 11, 2010. Photo © Jim McDonnell via smugmug

In 2011, Coney Island’s now decimated Stillwell Avenue will get a brand new amusement park called Scream Zone. Will its neighbor be one of the City’s largest flea markets? Coney Island is abuzz with the rumor that vendors from the popular Aqueduct Racetrack Flea Market, which has 1,000 vendors and lost its lease after 30 years, are collectively eyeing Thor Equities’ empty lots.

Sources tell ATZ that some of the vendors, who operate three days a week at the racetrack, were informed that negotiations were underway with Thor Equities to lease the property. When ATZ called Plain and Fancy Shows, the company that operates the flea, to confirm the story, the person who answered the phone denied any interest in coming to Coney Island. To be clear, the Coney Island Rumor Mill says it is not the operator, but individuals who helped manage the flea market and know how to run such a business, who are trying to put together the deal.

Fantasy Art: 2009 Poster for Thor Equities Failed Flea By The Sea. May 11, 2009. Photo © Tricia Vita/me-myself-i via flickr

The flea market folks are reportedly eyeing the lots on both sides of Stillwell formerly occupied by Thor’s failed Flea by the Sea. The skeletal frames of the tents have stood vacant since September 2009. The tenting became tattered and unsightly and was removed after numerous complaints. The asking price for the lease is rumored to be $300K for the season. Also said to be of interest to the flea market: The newly vacant lot at Surf Avenue and 12th Street, which was the site of the recently demolished Bank of Coney Island, across from Coney Island USA’s freak show. The corner of Surf and Stillwell, where the Shore Hotel was knocked down and the Henderson Building is currently being demolished. ATZ was told that the organizers of the new flea would place vendors of like items together to drive traffic to each location. Clothing, beauty products, household items and collectibles are among the categories of products.

Joe Sitt's Abandoned Flea By the Sea in Coney Island. October 15, 2010. Photo © Tricia Vita/me-myself-i via flickr

The lots remained vacant last season after Thor Equities failed to come to an agreement to lease the property to a number of amusement operators, including a fair producer from Tennessee. ATZ learned that some of the same amusement operators are still interested in bringing in rides, games and shows. The main hurdle to a deal is said to be Thor’s insistence on a one-year lease. One amusement operator told ATZ that he needs a two-year deal to make a profit.

In the Summer of 2009, Thor’s so-called Festival By the Sea (aka Flea by the Sea) was billed as “A Uniquely Entertaining and Amusing Flea Market in Coney Island.” In order to get a DOB permit for a “temporary fair” after the “flea market” was denied, Thor promised “tons of fun” and tried to recruit strolling entertainers via craigslist. But the only entertainment we recall seeing was a clown making balloon toys and bands playing a couple of sets on weekends.

Thor Equities Flea Market. May 22, 2009. Photo © Tricia Vita/me-myself-i via flickr

The Queens flea market has to leave the Aqueduct Race Track in Ozone Park after more than 30 years because of construction of a video slot casino. Around this time of year, vendors get tickets with their location number for next year’s flea market, which would have opened in March, after taking off January and February. Instead they got the news that December would be their last month.

According to an article in last Thursday’s New York Times, Betty Braton, the chairwoman of the Ozone Park neighborhood’s Community Board 10, said: “The casino operation is an attempt to go upscale, and a flea market is by nature sort of downscale. We’re looking forward to the economic development that is going to come from the casino operation.”

Would the Bloomberg administration, whose plan for the revitalization of Coney Island includes allowing Mom & Pop businesses to be evicted from City-owned property on the Boardwalk to make way for upscale eateries, approve a permit for a flea market? It is after all made up of hundreds of Mom & Pops. We’ll see. Or maybe we won’t.

If a flea market or amusement rides (or some combination of the two) are going to be Scream Zone’s neighbors on Stillwell in 2011, the biggest challenge will be signing a lease agreement with Thor Equities. When Joe Sitt acquired the property in 2006, he promptly evicted the batting cages, go karts and miniature golf, and turned Stillwell into what blogger Bob Guskind of Gowanus Lounge called “Thor Equities Corridors of Blight.” Alas, not much has changed on Stillwell since Bob wrote those words in May 2007.

We were not amused by auto supplies at Thor Equities Flea Market in Coney Island. May 31, 2009. Photo © Tricia Vita/me-myself-i via flickr

Rare & Vintage: Original Coney Island Motordrome Bike

Posted in Artifacts, history, tagged Antique Motorcycle, Coney Island, Indian Scout, Jim Babchak, Motordrome, Wall of Death on December 19, 2010| 10 Comments »

1924 Indian Scout, 30.50 cu in, original Coney Island Motordrome bike! Runs excellent! Jim Babchak Collection. $22,900

This photo of an antique motorcycle offered for sale on Kiwi Bike’s blog caught our eye because of its Coney Island provenance. “1924 Indian Scout; 30.50 cu in, original Coney Island Motodrome bike! Same owner last 30 years. Runs excellent! Gone thru by George Yarocki, noted Indian Scout expert. Own a piece of classic American History 22,999.00”

If the bike could speak, what would it say? ATZ talked with the bike’s owner, Jim Babchak, who happens to be the Classics Editor at American Iron Magazine and a longtime member of the Antique Motorcycle Club of America. Turns out he acquired this rare souvenir of the Coney Island Motordrome in the early ’80s. “I was bartending downtown when I saw an ad in the newspaper for an Indian motorcycle,” says Babchak. In order to beat out the competition, he made an appointment to meet the owner at 3 a.m. As soon as the bar closed, he rushed to Avenue U in Brooklyn. Babchak says the seller was an old guy, though not a motordrome rider. He remained mysterious about how he came by the two Indian Scouts he’d kept in his basement for more than 25 years! “I bought one,” recalls Babchak. “He allowed me to buy the second one a few years later.”

Wall of Death: Indian Scout--The Most Popular Motocycle in the World. Location Unknown. Photo via The Selvedge Yard

Babchak brought the bike to master mechanic George Yarocki who got it running for the first time in decades. Condition report: “The frame is reinforced. It had crashed many times. The handlebars have been broken and repaired. Tires are skinned on one side. And the Indian gas tanks are squared.” Babchak says he owns a half-dozen bikes and usually rides a 1941 Harley Davidson three-wheeler, but occasionally takes the Indian for a spin in his neighborhood. He isn’t especially eager to sell it either. He just wanted to put it out there for people to see.

“Indian Scouts were New York City police bikes,” explains Babchak. The story goes that the reason Indians have a left-hand throttle was so that the motor cop could draw a pistol with his right hand. Harleys have a right-hand throttle, says Babchak, who thinks the Indian probably had a first life as a New York City police bike and was later acquired by the motordrome.

Curly Lou Cody Riding the Wall of Death. Photo via Thrillarena.com

Where was the Coney Island Motordrome? ATZ did a little research on the web about motordromes in Coney Island. Not surprisingly, there have been a number of them over the years. Perhaps the bike came from the motordrome built in 1937 in Luna Park by Curly Lee Cody and his brother Cyclone Jack. The two men had a Wall of Death show with touring carnivals and had motor dromes built to their specifications. A reminiscence by one of their crew is posted on Sam Morgan’s marvelous Thrillarena site…

My job was to gun the engine of a display machine without a muffler and rear wheel to bring people in from all over Luna Park to see the show. I still remember stretching to reach the grips while gunning the engine. Cyclone Jake married a gal with brilliant red hair. Red actually got into the show. The 3 of them would ride the wall together criss-crossing and do amazing stunts. The one that I remember very vividly is when another uncle would hold me inside the motordrome and Lou would come up and eventually slap my hand every time he went around for a few minutes. The show, as all of Luna Park, became more and more deserted as people went to war or worked long hours after Pearl Harbor and the show became a victim of WW II. It was a good life, lots of broken bones when bikes didn’t have enough centrifigal force and came down sometimes on top of the rider(s) but it was a great life. I recently saw a few 1923 and 1929 Indians in the NHRA museum in Pomona, California and was hit hard by the old time memories.

An earlier Coney drome, on the Boardwalk at 23rd Street, made headlines in July 1932 when its oil-soaked wall and gas tanks burst into flames after some boys started a bonfire under the Boardwalk. The blaze spread quickly, destroying blocks of wooden bathhouses and bungalows. The fire caused an estimated $2 to $3 million dollars worth of property damage. The next year, another Coney Island fire destroyed yet another motordrome.

But we were surprised to learn that the popular Wall of Death attraction of our carnival childhood can trace its origins back to a drome which debuted in Coney Island in 1911. The New York Times described it as “the biggest single sensation at Luna Park.” The smaller, portable carnival dromes were inspired by the huge wooden board racetracks for professional motorcycle and auto racing which were popular in the early 1900s. Among the board racetracks were Brooklyn’s Brighton Motordrome (1912) and the Sheepshead Bay Speedway (1919).

Inspiration for the Wall of Death: Cleveland's Luna Park opened in 1906. Its Motordrome was a wood-planked motorcycle speedway. Postcard via The Cool History of Cleveland

Inspiration for the Wall of Death: Cleveland's Luna Park opened in 1906. Its Motordrome was one of the wood-planked motorcycle speedways that were popular in the early 1900s. Postcard via The Cool History of Cleveland

According to the Times, the saucer-shaped drome in Coney Island’s Luna PArk was 85 feet across the top and half that at the bottom and banked at 65 degrees. It featured two racing automobiles attempting to pass each other. “It usually takes about 50 laps for one to do this, and when it is done, the race is over–for twenty minutes–when it begins again.” By the next season, a competing motordrome with racing motorcycles had opened across Surf Avenue on the site of Dreamland Park, which had burned down in 1911. We found a clip about a rider in the Dreamland drome who was mortally wounded after crashing through the top of the track. R.I.P. William Mullen aka Dare Devil Bill, Age 22.