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Coney Island
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As a peninsula in Brooklyn, Coney Island had a beach that was easily accessible to nearly all urban dwellers of The Big Apple (the nickname for New York City). In the 1870s and 1880s, families of relative wealth and social organizations held formal picnics there. Over time, however, the working-class began to invade their space. Unlike the upper middle-class, they arrived for the purpose of informal socializing. Crowds of young people broke homosocial norms whereby men and women confined their interaction to short greetings. Males and females traditionally spent time only with members of their own gender. As the years wore on, however, up to 500,000 people of all ages and all socio-economic classes descended upon the Brooklyn-beach getaway over summer weekends. Consequently, the barriers of Victorian etiquette collapsed. Teenage girls and boys, who traveled to Coney Island by trolley car, started walking together , talking together, dancing together, flirting together and kissing - of course - together. By the standards of the twenty-first century, their behavior was tame. Yet, it was a social revolution at the time, and the social elites condemned the new heterosocial interaction as morally bankrupt. It did not matter, however. Times were changing, and the desire for entertainment was only increasing.
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Steeplechase, Luna Park and Dreamland
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In 1897, George Tilyou (1862-1914) opened up Steeplechase - an elaborate amusement park with mechanized rides, games, a parachute jump and large-scale themes of the world. Visitors could walk from a model of Big Ben to one of the Eiffel Tower in minutes. Afterwards, young men and women on planned or impromptu dates might have gotten on the Barrel of Love or the Wedding Ring. On both of these attractions, the floor tilted to force participants to lose their balance. As a result, both young couples and strangers wound up on top of each other. That was the excitement - spontaneous, light-hearted displays of sexuality bound by humor. As Tilyou based his theme park on the design of the White City at the Chicago World's Fair in 1893, a Ferris wheel was also included. It was located near the steeplechase ride - the core attraction.
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The success of Steeplechase spawned two rival parks. Between Luna Park and Dreamland, the former was more popular. Similar to Tilyou's creation, the new parks constructed mini replicas of famous places in the world. Whereas entrants to Luna Park could visit the Canals of Venice, people at Dreamland were able to walk through a simulated model of Japanese culture. For nearly everyone visiting Coney Island, simulated foreign travel would have to suffice for the real thing. Going abroad was reserved for the privileged few - as it still is today.
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From Dreamland to Reality
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Although Luna Park and Dreamland were newer and more innovative in some respects than the older Steeplechase, Steeplechase proved to be more popular and enduring than either one of them. What accounted for its lasting success? There are two fundamental reasons. Unlike Dreamland, Steeplechase did not have themes with a moral message. The managers of Steeplechase understood the cultural shift toward gender-integrated socializing and expressive entertainment. In having Biblical-based attractions such as The Creation and The End of the Earth, Dreamland had an ideological agenda. The up-and-coming generation wanted nothing to do with the staid mores of the past. They simply wanted to take a break from their long work-weeks and have some innocent fun. Secondly and most importantly, Tilyou only charged 10-15 cents for admission. That allowed the impecunious working class to visit Steeplechase. Due to creating an environment of equal access for both males and females and for all socio-economic classes, Steeplechase was more of a dreamland than Dreamland. No matter if one were male, female, rich, poor or financially in-between, everyone needed an escape. Everyone wanted to get out of their respective ruts, and everyone desired to be entertained.
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Coney Island, Steeplechase and the other amusement parks helped usher in a new era of social unity to one extent or another. It was a process of discovery that we as human beings all want the same things - love, dignity, education and the means to a comfortable living. While Coney Island unfortunately did little to remove the color line that excluded African-Americans, the socialization process of cheap entertainment assisted in dissolving ethnic (i.e. Irish and Italian) and gender stereotypes - which may have been an important first step to seeing beyond race. In a sense then, the countless number of trips taken by Americans to Coney Island proved to be more than just fun and games.
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Key Source
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Kathy Lee Peiss, Cheap Amusements: Working Women and Leisure in the Turn-of-the-Century New York (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1986)
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(Photo: Steeplechase Park - click on to enlarge. To view additional photos of Coney Island, please click onto kleostimes.tumblr.com to the right and check postings for 24 June )
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J Roquen