Carousel | SPRUIKER: Hurry hurry step this way! The strangest sights on the island. Freaks from the four corners of the world, 40 nickels, one dime a tenth part of a dollar, we’ve got the show if you’ve got the dimes! | 00:00 |
Coney island images | You won’t see it on television, you won’t see it on Broadway tonight… | 00:14 |
Spruiker | It’s show time here at Coney Island. | 00:18 |
Coney island beach | Music | 00:21 |
MAHER: Coney Island is of a different time. A time when life was a little more simple and a little more innocent. | 00:23 | |
People at Coney Island | Today the resort is a mere remnant of its former self But from the late 1800s to the 1960s Coney Island had no rival. | 00:31 |
Excerpt from 1950s Coney Island film | <!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--> | 00:47 |
VOICE OVER FROM FILM: Welcome to Coney Island the playground of the world. | 00:52 | |
CAPTAIN BOB: When this was in the hey day there was nothing like it, it was so crowded. | 01:08 | |
Captain Bob with visitors | But it’s the only Ferris wheel that has those inboard and outboard cars on it, pretty interesting. If you’re afraid of heights, don’t take it. Scared the living daylights out of me taking that thing. | 01:14 |
People sunbaking on boardwalk. Captain Bob walks in b/g | It’s the widest and longest boardwalk in the world. MAHER: Captain Bob is one of Coney Island’s characters. CAPTAIN BOB: We might even see somebody from the 260 Club here today. | 01:27 |
Captain Bob walks | MAHER: What’s that? CAPTAIN BOB: The 260 Club. Those are girls who are under five feet tall that weigh over 260 pounds. I’m not kidding! I’m not kidding! MAHER: A tour guide now in his seventies Captain Bob has been coming here since he was four. | 01:38 |
CAPTAIN BOB: This is where steeplechase was. | 01:54 | |
Excerpt from 1950s Coney Island film | It was a magnificent three arc roman entrance to the entrance to steeplechase. | 01:56 |
The parachute jump it was a lot of fun. 277 feet up from the ground in a parachute that was always open, it had guide wires coming down so you didn’t go flying out to the sea. | 02:10 | |
Captain Bob with visitor | But when this was in the heyday there was nothing like it. | 02:24 |
Excerpt from 1950s Coney Island film | Based on 4th July records 1923 there were five hundred thousand on the beach. | 02:27 |
1955 -- five million on the beach. | 02:38 | |
People dancing on boardwalk | Music | 02:42 |
DICK ZIGUN: You want it to be loud, urban and full of half naked New Yorkers. | 02:44 | |
Dick watches | MAHER: Dick Zigun is Coney Island’s unofficial mayor. Armed with a masters in drama from Yale he’s a passionate spruiker for Coney Island’s past as well as its future. | 02:52 |
DICK ZIGUN: It is the place that invented a lot of what we | 03:04 | |
Dick. Super: Dick Zigun | consider an amusement park. The idea of an enclosed theme park: a Coney Island invention. We invented the roller coaster. We invented soft ice cream, and best of all we invented the hot dog here. | 03:07 |
Spruiker at Freak Show entrance | MAHER: Dick is also the keeper of a cherished Coney Island tradition -- the freak show. | 03:22 |
SPRUIKER: You will see the amazing human blockhead who takes giant spikes whoa like this screwdriver and snaps it right back into the middle of his skull. Aaaaaaaahh!! Yet he lives to laugh and joke about it. I get all wound up when I think about him. Maybe I have a screw loose. Better do the tighten up. | 03:27 | |
Music | 03:46 | |
MAHER: But there’s now a dark cloud hanging over Coney Island’s unique brand of fun and the cheap entertainment its offered to working New Yorkers for more than a century. WOMAN ON BOARDWALK: It was the biggest. It was the | 03:52 | |
Couple on boardwalk | best. It was Brooklyn. It was the energy of New York. And it simmered down because of all of the…. it’s just old. It’s fallen apart. | 04:04 |
Development site | MAHER: Developers have recently bought up much of the land and there are concerns about what next summer might bring. | 04:14 |
DANCE PARTY ORGANISER: We’ve been partying on Coney Island boardwalk for 15 years. You can bring your | 04:21 | |
Dance Party Organiser | kids here, your family here. Your kids can play and have fun on the sand while the parents party and have a good time, enjoy themselves. And once they do redevelop | 04:25 |
there’s no telling whether or not they’re going to continue to let us do this. | 04:38 | |
Hip Hop dancers | Music | 04:42 |
Development site. Areas of Coney Island with shutters down and looking derelict | Music | 04:47 |
DICK ZIGUN: The battle is whether we build new things that are amusement park, entertainment related or whether there’s gonna be a few token rides and then mostly Coney Island turns into condos. | 05:00 | |
Dick | Boo!! Hiss!!! We don’t want that!! | 05:13 |
Captain Bob walks on boardwalk | Music | 05:15 |
CAPTAIN BOB: Yeah we all loved Coney Island, it was the first place ever | 05:31 | |
Captain Bob | that was an amusement park and that has a definite love for everybody here. | 05:35 |
Coney Island rides at night | Music | 05:43 |
Fireworks | 05:54 | |
| MAHER: These are the last fireworks of the summer. For generations of new Yorkers this is how a long Coney Island day ended. But tonight, no one’s sure if the skies will light up again in quite the same way. | 06:00 |
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Credits: | Reporter: Michael Maher Camera: Dan Sweetapple Editor: Woody Landay | 06:20 |