Admission to the burning ruins.......

“To inquiring friends: I have troubles today that I did not have yesterday. I had troubles yesterday that I have not today. On this site will be erected shortly a better, bigger, greater Steeplechase Park. Admission to the burning ruins: 10 cents.” – George C. Tilyou

It's safe to say that I'm a confirmed Coney Island-phile. Over the years, I’ve amassed a collection of all kinds of Coney Island-related artwork and ephemera, I’ve railed against the unscrupulous developers (*cough* Joe Sitt/Thor Equities *cough*) that have threatened to do further damage to this already fragile Brooklyn neighborhood, and I’ve documented in photographs many of the visits I’ve made to the place known as “The People’s Playground.” I even worked Coney Island into the plot of the 50,000-word novel I wrote for National Novel Writing Month in 2009.

Recently, I made the decision to put some of my Coney things up for sale at The Sunny Attic -- I have quite a few items that I'm keeping, but it made sense to whittle my collection down to just a few favorite treasures and find good new homes for the rest. Two items have already sold and I will be listing a few more very soon. Feel free to visit the shop and check them out!

I have been in love with Coney Island since the first time I visited it, in 1997, but I think my love for it stretches back even further than that. I can remember an afternoon during my teenage years in the Seattle suburbs…. on the walk home from school one day, I passed an art gallery and saw a really cool painting of the amusement area at Coney Island in the window, complete with the Wonder Wheel and the Cyclone represented. I remember seeing it in music videos, TV shows, and movies, too, and I always knew it was someplace I wanted to go one day.

Over the years, as I learned more about its history, I began to relate to it on a spiritual level. Coney Island is a place that has undergone so many transformations that it’s easy to lose track of them all. Amusement parks came and went, most of them destroyed by fire, but like the mythical Phoenix, the neighborhood and its people always found a way to regenerate. Even in the dark days of so-called “urban renewal,” under the iron fists of people like Robert Moses and Fred Trump, Coney Island remained a place where anyone who could afford the subway fare could go to enjoy the beach, the rides, and the food. I relate to that enterprising, entrepreneurial spirit of independence, of renewal, and of transformation that has drawn so many people there for over a century, because those things aren’t just the story of Coney Island, but they’re the story of myself and my life, too.

When I think of home, I think of Coney Island.