Still Well in Coney Island

It may be silly, but how not connect Coney Island with its extense imagery, produced along the 20th century? This Brooklyn beach is tied to the imaginary of the people here as a dreamland, and it was first conceived like that.
Opening of Dreamland, 1908

This area was known since 1639 by the dutch as a place to hunt rabbits, from which it took the name (konijin=rabbit). It was a resort for fairs and amusements parks since the beginning of the 1900's. The popularity of the place has declined around the 50's, and the area has deteriorated.

Those were the days: Coney Island Beach at the 40's, photo by Arthur (Weegee) Fellig

Although not now in its glory days, Coney Island is far from the dark idea I first have from it, extracted of the movie "Warriors", which depicted the gangland violence in New York 70's.
When I been to Coney Isl. I was expecting to see some of that deluded universe, decadent seaside area, but there is no much of it.

I love this film...

Anyway, the Coney Island of today has no much of old days glamour neither of the oppressive and violent outskirt, and it is not bad place at all. I bet for a lot of new yorkers it may be the best place to relax by the sea they can find at a short distance. But despite of it, in the weekend I've been there the place was quite empty. Of course there were people, but there were no trace of the crowd of one of the pictures above.

Looked like a mix of Miami with the Old West.

I realized quite quickly that they have their own special days 'round there. No problem, thou, but I got uneasy with the guns. Why there always have to be guns?
I am scared of guns.

By the way, Nathan's is the most traditional hot-dog in Coney Isl. and holds the annual hot-dog eating contest. That's what I meant that was not the day.
I am scared of men who can eat their own weight in hot dogs.

Bizarre enough, I barely had reached the amusement park yet...

That's not gentle...

What really impressed me was some sort of loneliness there, mainly because there were no many people around, and amusement parks and beaches without people can be a strange scenery. the machines were working and everything there were set to a crowd that simply doesn't show up.



The machines were ready to go

While I was walking down the beach and stop to refresh, I realize that I was in a filming set. No wonder, NYC is the home of the filming sets, and I believe there is no place in town that had been not filmed yet. But this especial film had a soundtrack so odd, I had to catch up in this little movie to show you, contrasting with the apparent stillness of the beach.



c'mon everybody!

Later on there was an immigrant fair, that I though to be from anyplace in Yugoslavia, but it was indeed a russian raising funds fair. Until we get to the island there is a lot of immigrant communities alongside Brooklyn, that I can broadly imagine ranges from jewish, afro, latin, muslin and asian communities. Anyone left? Eastern europeans, and russians, so there they were, close to Brighton beach making a big noise to get donations. I heard there is a hasidic russian jewish community living there, but those did not look like them.

Russians in Coney Island.

Like anywhere, modernization came to here, and the areas close to the beach are valuable now, it seems. Big blocks has been built as the city grows and pushes the boundaries of imobiliary enterprises.
Big Blocks in Coney Island, but could be anywhere

On my way back I surprisingly found a work of the Gêmeos, the twin street artists brothers from Brasil.
Os Gêmeos in Coney Island

Stillwell? You tell me.