On Saturday we chatted with Luke Stangarone in front of Coney Island USA, where he was cleaning a stained glass window, one of two which the Sheepshead Bay resident is donating to the Coney Island Museum. Rescued from three feet of mud in a Park Slope basement, the windows originally came from Coney Island’s Feltman’s complex, says Stangarone. The tantalizing question is which part of Feltman’s? Stangarone speculates the windows could be from the ballroom or the carousel pavilion. He says that his wife’s relatives, the Whittakers, worked at the Parachute Jump and rescued the artifacts from Feltman’s demolition more than 50 years ago. Can you help identify this window into Coney Island’s past?
Charles Feltman is famous as the inventor of the hot dog, but his entertainment complex on Surf Avenue was multi-faceted and covered a full city block. According to the Coney Island History Project, which has a 120-year-old chair from Feltman’s Maple Garden on display, the Feltman empire included nine restaurants, two bars, a ballroom, an outdoor movie theater, a hotel, a beer garden, a bathhouse, a pavilion, a Tyrolean village, a carousel, a roller coaster called the ZIZ and the maple garden! Since Feltman’s closed in 1954 and was demolished to make way for Astroland Park in 1962, you’d have be over 60 to remember going there. Perhaps someone will recognize the window from family photos that show the stained glass window in the background. Let us know if you have any clues!
Related posts on ATZ…
November 5, 2010: Museum Piece or Obsolete? Old Carnival Games, Stick Joints on eBay
February 25, 2010: Happy Belated Birthday to Coney Island’s William F Mangels
January 19, 2010: Nathan Slept Here! Coney Island’s Feltman’s Kitchen Set for Demolition
November 16, 2009: Rare & Vintage: Coney Island Sideshow Banner by Dan Casola
Amusing the Zillion 