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Last Chance to See Mermaid Parade Before It Turns 30!

Posted in Events, Photography, Visitor Info, tagged Coney Island, Mermaid Parade on June 16, 2011| Leave a Comment »

Lollipop and Candy Mermaids. Coney Island Mermaid Parade, June 20, 2009. Photo © me-myself-i/Tricia Vita via flickr

This Saturday is the 29th annual Mermaid Parade and if you’re anywhere near New York City, you should come out to Coney Island for the day. Take the D, F, N or Q to Stillwell Avenue and arrive well before the 2 pm start of the parade to pick out a spot on Surf Avenue or the Boardwalk.

If you’re in a faraway state or foreign country, there’s always next year. Of course, we’re joking about seeing the parade before it turns 30. The Mermaid Parade is a quirky Coney Island institution that gets better with age. It should be on your list of things to do before and after you turn 30.

Here’s our slide show from the 2010 Mermaid Parade, featuring our view from the judges stand. The pix are posted pretty much in chronological order, from the judges sitting in the empty stand before the parade to paraders walking east on a still barricaded and empty Surf Avenue after it was over.

This part of our post is for a friend of a friend, who is coming all the way from the Netherlands to play in Sunday’s Brooklyn Pinball Championship in Williamsburg. He was looking for “some advice as a tourist” in Brooklyn so here it is: It’s a big weekend in Coney Island, with the first fireworks of the season on Friday night at 9:30 pm and more fireworks on Saturday after the Brooklyn Cyclones’ season opener. If it’s your first time here– or your first time in a long time– check out the attractions and events listing on the Coney Island Fun Guide before you go.

ATZ’s must see-and-do list includes the landmark Cyclone and Wonder Wheel, the Eldorado Bumper cars, the Air Race in Luna Park, the new Sling Shot ride in Scream Zone, Coney Island USA’s ten-in-one circus sideshow, vintage films and photo exhibit at the Coney Island History Project, Tazo the Sea Otter at the Aquarium, the bars and businesses on the Bowery and Boardwalk, the original Nathan’s Famous, and Williams Candy or Denny’s Ice Cream for dessert!

Coney Island Kiddie Park Getting Squeezed by Thor Equities

Posted in amusement park, Amusement ride, tagged Coney Island, Joe Sitt, McCullough's Kiddie Park, Thor Equities on June 14, 2011| 6 Comments »

Ride being dismantled and moved in McCullough's Kiddie Park, Coney Island. June 13, 2011. Photo © Eric Kowalsky

Coney Island had 64 rides when we did our annual ride census in April, but starting this week it will have 62. McCullough’s Kiddie Park, whose colorful banners trumpeting “More Rides” had a dozen rides, is losing two. The kiddie park owner is getting squeezed out by Thor Equities. A section of their park occupied by three rides–the Frog Hopper, kiddie train and boats– is a lot owned by Thor and was subleased to them a few years ago by Norman Kaufman.

Now that the sublease has expired, Thor Equities reportedly offered a new lease with such onerous terms that the park’s owners will not sign it. The three rides have to be off Thor’s property by Thursday, June 16th. On Monday, the little park’s train ride was sent packing. The kiddie boat ride also went bye bye. Meanwhile, the majority of the other rides had to be dismantled and rearranged to accommodate the Frog Hopper, which is staying. McCullough’s Kiddie Park, located at West 12th and the Bowery in Coney Island, will reopen this weekend with 10 rides.

Ride being dismantled in McCullough's Kiddie Park, Coney Island. June 13, 2011. Photo © Eric Kowalsky

The McCullough family is related to Steeplechase Park’s Tilyous and has owned and operated rides in Coney Island for many years and we hope many years to come. In 2005, Jimmy McCullough sold the B & B Carousell, the last wooden carousel in Coney Island, to the City after the death of his business partner Mike Salzstein. You can listen to Jimmy McCullough’s interview about learning the carousel business from his father, James McCullough, who began his career working on the Steeplechase and Stubbman carousels, in the Coney Island History Project’s Oral History Archive.

Joe Sitt, CEO of Thor, on the other hand, has zero rides on his Coney Island property. What he does have is a dismal flea market disguised as a festival because flea markets are not allowed by the zoning. Despite what you may have read in a NY Times puff piece on Sitt, the flea does not feature “upscale product.” What’ll he do with the tiny lot reclaimed from the kiddie park, put in a few more flea market tables?

Joe Sitt is infamous for evicting amusement rides from his Coney Island properties. In 2007, the real estate speculator evicted the Zipper from 12th Street. He also evicted Norman Kaufman’s Go Karts, Bumper Boats and Batting Cages from Stillwell Avenue to “allow the new development to proceed in a timely manner,” but has built NOTHING there except a failed flea market in 2009 and another flea market this summer. (“Thor’s Coney Island: What Stillwell Looked Like Before Joe Sitt,” ATZ, March 3, 2010)

It’s bad enough that the City has let Joe Sitt continue to get away with blighting the amusement area. Why do the New York Times and other mainstream media continue to enable Sitt’s bad behavior with clueless coverage referring to him as a developer? Read the graffiti scrawled on his so-called construction fence: It says “Blight for Spite.”

Coney Island Summer Reading: Dreamland Social Club

Posted in Books, Reading & Writing, tagged book review, Coney Island, Dreamland Social Club, fiction, novel, Tara Altebrando on June 14, 2011| 2 Comments »

The quirky characters and Coney Island setting of Tara Altebrando’s new novel were so engaging that I read it on the subway to and from Coney, and then in a car on the road, in an effort to keep the story from ending.

Who wouldn’t want to belong to the Dreamland Social Club? In this novel for teenage readers, the club is an unofficial group frequented by a freaky clique at Coney Island High School. Among its members is Babette, a goth dwarf who befriends the novel’s 16-year-old heroine Jane with the explanation: “You seem cool. And you’ve got carny blood, even if it’s highly diluted.”

Jane is cool, though it takes most of the book for her to develop a sense of belonging and join the club. She and her brother Marcus have lived a nomadic life with their dad, who has designed roller coasters from Tokyo to Paris. The carny blood that Babette refers to comes from their mom’s side of the family, who were genuine Coney Island characters. But Jane and Marcus have never met their late grandparents and can hardly remember their mother, who died when they were little kids.

As a carny kid and Coney Island devotee, I felt drawn to the story of Jane’s life in Coney, where her family moves after inheriting her grandfather’s house. There’s lots of fun stuff in the attic. Jane soon learns that her grandfather “Preemie” Porcelli got his start in Coney as one of the premature babies on exhibit in Dreamland’s Baby Incubator Show. Her new friends remember him as the operator of a water race game on the Boardwalk calling them in to win prizes.

There’s also Jane’s tantalizing flirtation with Leo aka Tattoo Boy, whose father owns a Boardwalk dive bar that’s being evicted by a real estate developer who has bought up Coney Island. Does the last part sound familiar? The author has done a remarkable job of weaving Coney history and current events—both real and imagined– into a marvelous coming-of-age story.

Among the novel’s memorable details are a carousel horse from the fictional equivalent of Coney’s “B & B Carousell” chained to a radiator, vintage films of Jane’s grandmother who was a “Birdwoman” in the sideshow, and keys hidden away by her mother that still unlock long-vanished attractions. Jane’s family home gives up all of its secrets and Coney Island becomes her real home.

Tara Altebrando will appear at “Great Summer Reads for Teens” with a few other teen authors on Thursday, June 16, from 6-8 pm at Books of Wonder, 18 West 18th Street, New York, NY 10011. Ph 212- 989-3270.

Dreamland Social Club by Tara Altebrando. Ages 14 and up. 389 pages. Published by Dutton Books, 2011. Hardcover, $16.99.