Coney Island Blog - By Charles Denson

The beautifully restored motor yacht Nellie Bly operated by the Coney Island Steamboat Company is ready to give nautical tours.

Coney Island native Gerard Thornton has returned to his roots and launched the Coney Island Steamboat Company, based in Sheepshead Bay. Beginning Saturday, July 13, the Coney Island Steamboat Company will offer narrated history cruises along the Coney Island shoreline, from Sheepshead Bay to Gravesend Bay. 

Captain Thornton grew up in Coney Island’s O’Dwyer Gardens housing project (where I once lived) and spent his childhood watching ships and tugs at sea from his window. This fascination led to SUNY Maritime College and a thirty-year career as a tugboat captain in New York Harbor. After selling his tugboat company, Thornton Towing and Transportation, he has realized his dream of giving nautical history tours of Coney Island and Jamaica Bay. Listen to Gerard Thornton's oral history

The tour boat is a 50-foot wooden motor yacht named the Nellie Bly. The boat can accommodate up to 49 passengers. A ticket for the two-hour tour is $35 for adults and $25 for children. Veterans and seniors are $25. The tours are available Saturday and Sunday at 11 am and 2 pm. Later in the season there will be fireworks cruises on Friday night and following Cyclones games. 

Thornton named the boat Nellie Bly, in tribute to the adventurous muckraking journalist who exposed horrific conditions at the women’s insane asylum on Blackwell’s island. Bly’s 1889 trip around the world in 73 days beat the fictional account of Jules Verne’s novel Around the World in 80 Days. The boat’s name is a fitting tribute to an early pioneer of women’s rights.

"Coney Island has a remarkable and rich history," said Captain Thornton. "The Coney Island Steamboat Company (CISCo) was established to bring the sights, sounds, and history of the Brooklyn waterfront to life for passengers looking for something a little bit different. Our tours provide narrated backstory to the geography, politics and personalities that shaped the neighborhoods of Coney Island and the surrounding area. We offer a fun and exciting way to explore the southern Brooklyn shoreline in a whole new way." The Coney Island History Project will be collaborating with the Coney Island Steamboat Company to provide archival materials for the tour.

Tickets and information at: www.coneyislandsteamboat.com

-- Charles Denson

Captain Gerard (right), deckhand Tyler (left), and Thornton's son Gage (rear), aboard the Nellie Bly.

The Coney Island History Project will celebrate Coney Island’s 200th birthday on October 28th by displaying and honoring Coney Island’s oldest surviving artifact: the 200-year-old Coney Island Toll House sign that dates to 1823. Please join us! Our exhibition center at 3059 West 12th Street next to the entrance to Deno’s Wonder Wheel Park will be open on Saturday, October 28, from 1 PM – 5 PM. The rain date is Sunday, October 29. Admission is free of charge.

Coney Island first opened to the public in the summer of 1823 when a bridge and toll house were constructed at Coney Island Creek and Shell Road. Only one object from Coney Island’s humble origins has survived for two centuries. That relic is the original Coney Island Toll House sign on display at the Coney Island History Project. And for that we thank Carol Albert, co-founder of the Coney Island History Project, who rescued the sign and had it restored. 

In his film shared above and the following essay, History Project director Charles Denson tells the story of “Coney Island’s Oldest Artifact: How the Coney Island Toll House Sign Survived for 200 Years.”

Coney Island first opened to the public in the summer of 1823. A one-paragraph article buried in the August 18, 1823, New York American breezily announced the opening: “The Road and Bridge leading to this delightful island are now complete. It is open the ocean, with the finest and most regular beach we ever saw . . .” From these humble beginnings Coney Island would soon become the most famous resort in the world. 

Until 1823 there was no public access to the island. Coney Island began as “common land” shared by 39 property owners in the village of Gravesend. The island was a pristine environment known for mountainous sand dunes, a vibrant salt marsh, the sparkling beach, juniper forests, and cool ocean breezes. Coney Island Creek was a popular spot for fishing and hunting waterfowl, but before the Shell Road bridge was built, the island could only be accessed by rowboat. The Island’s only resident was Abram Van Sicklen, whose small farm was located on the creek.

In March of 1823 Gravesend formed the Coney Island Road and Bridge Company in order to provide better access to the island. Shell Road was extended one mile through a vast salt marsh to the new bridge. A wooden toll house and gate were constructed on the banks of Coney Island Creek. Gravesend resident James Cropsey was appointed to operate the Road and Bridge Company. In the first days after the road opened, toll-taker Daniel Morell counted 300 horse-drawn vehicles crossing the bridge.

A simple sign at the toll gate listed the fees to enter the island. These ranged from 5 cents for a “horse and rider” to 50 cents for a “coach drawn by horses.” The sign also listed the “Rate of Toll” for a “Coach, Carriage, Pleasure Wagon, or Sulkey.” In 1829 a wood-frame hotel opened near the toll house. Others hotels and roadhouses soon sprang up around it. By the 1830s, Coney Island had become a popular destination.

The entrance to Coney Island was picturesque, with a canopy of weeping willows shading the toll house, and verdant Coney Island Creek beside it. John Lefferts operated the bridge and tollhouse from the 1830s until 1876, when Andrew Culver bought the property for his railroad. Tolls were no longer collected and the toll house was transformed into a private residence. Culver’s Prospect Park & Coney Island Railroad was later consolidated into the New York City transit system. The F-train now follows its former route.

The toll house fell on hard times. The wooden toll sign, a curiosity from earlier times, remained attached to the toll house. The neglected creek-side structure was forgotten as it fell into disrepair. In 1929 the century-old historic building was finally demolished when Shell Road was widened and realigned. The toll sign was the only thing that was saved.

The sign’s remarkable history and provenance after the toll house was razed can be accurately traced. In 1928 the sign was removed from the toll house by ride manufacturer William Mangels Jr. and displayed in his father’s amusement museum, located one block away on West 8th Street. 

The museum soon closed for lack of interest, and most of its artifacts were sold off. The sign remained at the factory. In 1964, six years after William Mangels Sr. died, his son sold the sign to folk-art collector Frederick Fried, who was also buying up hundreds of artifacts from Steeplechase Park following the park’s closure. Fried stored his vast Coney Island collection in a barn in Vermont but kept the sign displayed on the wall of his apartment on Riverside Drive. This turned out to be fortunate for the sign. In the early 1980s, the Vermont barn burned to the ground, and Fried’s entire collection of historic Coney Island artifacts went up in flames. Fred Fried died shortly afterward. 

Fried’s estate sold the toll house sign to Nick Zervos, who kept it in his private collection. It was not seen again for decades. In 2003 I was contacted by Brooklyn antique dealer Charlie Shapiro who was a fan of my Coney Island book. He told me he had an important artifact he was selling, and asked if I was interested. He said that Nick Zervos had passed away, and his family was selling the Coney Island Toll House sign. The historic sign had finally resurfaced! I told him that I was VERY interested.

I agreed to meet Shapiro at his apartment. After small talk, we entered his kitchen and he pulled the sign out from a narrow space between his kitchen sink and the refrigerator. It was not in good shape. I asked the price and realized that it was beyond my finances but the sign had to be saved. I hated the thought of this historic object being sold into another private collection, never to be seen again. 

Soon after finding the sign, I met with Carol Albert, owner of Astroland. We were in the early days of forming the Coney Island History Project. I told Carol about the historic sign that was stuck in a dank space next to a kitchen sink and was about to be sold off. What was truly amazing is that the sign was accompanied by detailed documentation showing its removal from the toll house in 1928. Carol asked me briefly about Shapiro. I thought that was the end of the story.

Later in the week Carol told me she had something to show me. I entered her office, and there was the sign, leaning against the wall. Carol had rescued it and said that the Albert Family was donating it to the History Project. 

The fragile sign was in a deteriorated state and needed professional restoration before returning to Coney Island. The wood was severely rotted, crumbling, and insect damaged. The sign was in such poor condition that it could not be safely handled or displayed. Carol arranged for a professional restoration, which included new backing, thermoplastic resin injected into the damaged wood, and highlighting the faded lettering with a reversible transparent wash. Ultraviolet light and infrared photography revealed no hidden lettering.

Following the restoration the Toll House Sign was put on display at the History Project, just a few blocks from where it first greeted travelers 200 years ago. The sign’s importance is symbolic. It represents the endurance, continuity, and resiliency of Coney Island. It is the only object that was there at the beginning, the only link to the origins of the World’s Playground. 

U.S. Volunteer Life Saving Corps lifeguards at their headquarters on the beach at West Fifth Street, Coney Island, c.1919.

The current lifeguard shortage in New York City brings to mind the history of lifeguards at Coney Island and the essential role that they play in public safety.

When ocean bathing gained popularity at the end of the 19th century, waves of New Yorkers began heading for Coney Island to seek relief from sweltering tenements. Few of them knew how to swim. The beach at that time was private property and there were no city lifeguards to protect swimmers.

Safety was provided by bathhouse owners who hired private lifeguards that for the most part were untrained and ineffective. There were no standards. Bathhouses hired men who worked cheap and “looked the part.” Former boxers, longshoremen, and weightlifters fit the bill. These unqualified guardians used primitive methods for resuscitation, such as “barrel-rolling,” (rolling a drowning victim over a barrel on its side to remove water from the lungs), a technique that caused more harm than good. Many private guards were drinkers and poor swimmers.

The United States Volunteer Life Saving Corps soon came to the rescue. Founded in 1872, the service established rescue stations all along New York City’s rivers and shorelines. Coney Island’s Volunteer Service life saving station was headquartered in a sturdily built wood-frame boathouse located on the beach at West Fifth  Street. 

At first the volunteers were met with hostility by the bathhouse lifeguards who saw them as competition and a threat to their jobs. They were finally accepted as swelling beach crowds made it obvious that private guards could no longer monitor the safety of hundreds of thousands of swimmers.

Many of the volunteers were WW I Navy veterans: competent, battle tested, and trained to rescue panicky drowning victims, shipwreck survivors, and even horses. They were also champion long-distance swimmers who participated in local contests. Thousands of Coney Island rescues were carefully documented by hand in logs, with the names, dates, and locations of all incidents. 

Ruth Hroncich’s grandfather, Ernest Gross, was a volunteer with the Service from 1919 to 1921, before the Coney Island beach became public. Ruth recently donated her grandparent’s photos to the Coney Island History Project. Ernest Gross lived on Neptune Avenue and met his wife, Ruth Atkinson in 1920 at Weber’s Baths in the West End. They were married in 1925. These family photos document the last days of the Volunteers before the Boardwalk was built and City lifeguards took over safety operations. 
– Charles Denson

Ernest and Ruth Gross, the couple third from left, at Weber's Baths, 1920.

Navy veteran Ernest Gross is third from left in this picture.  The lifeguards would take the surf boat out every day and practice launching through the waves. 

Volunteer lifeguard surf boat in action at Coney Island.

Volunteer lifeguards on the Coney Island Beach, 1920. Ernest Gross is second from right. (Dog at center was not a lifeguard.) The Municipal Bathhouse can be seen behind them. Lifeguards at the Coney Island boathouse.
A page from the 1909 Volunteer log details rescues at locations ranging from Dreamland to West 32nd Street.

Topsy chained and roped for execution at Luna Park, 1903. A large banner proclaiming Luna Park as the "Heart of Coney Island" hangs in the background at upper right.

Luna Park began its convoluted history in 1903 with what is probably the most brutal and horrific event in Coney Island’s history. It was 120 years ago that Luna’s owners sought to publicize the park’s  grand opening by publicly murdering Topsy the elephant, a sad and abused creature who at the time was being used by the park to haul construction materials down Surf Avenue.

Topsy endured a tortured history that began when she was captured in Southeast Asia when only a year old and smuggled into the U.S. and forced to perform in circuses. Sadly, she eventually wound up in the hands of Luna Park’s founders. 

Like many performing animals, she’d suffered a lifetime of abuse from the public and from a series of cruel trainers. She’d recently gained notoriety for killing a drunk who’d fed her a lit cigar. The press dubbed her a "killer," but she was actually a gentle creature who was only reacting to incidents of mistreatment.

Luna’s owners soon considered Topsy a problem and no longer found her useful to them. They came up with a sadistic publicity stunt to get rid of her while at the same time advertising the May 1903 opening of the new Luna Park. They decided that charging admission to the gory public execution of an elephant would get them the attention the park needed.

According to Smithsonian Magazine, the original plan was to strangle Topsy by hanging, but the ASPCA objected, describing that method as “unnecessarily cruel.” Luna’s executioners decided to use electrocution instead. The killing of a tortured animal would be Luna Park’s first attraction.

On a cold January morning, the unsuspecting elephant was led into the park, which was still under construction, and bound with chains and ropes below the framework of the park’s grand tower. Topsy was then fitted with copper shoes, wired up to electric cables, and fed 460 grams of cyanide-laced carrots to prepare her for her fate.

A crowd of photographers and onlookers invited by Luna Park’s owners was soon surrounded by hundreds of spectators who climbed fences or paid to stand on rooftops to get a glimpse of the horrifying spectacle. A film crew sent by Thomas Edison recorded the execution.

At 2:45 a switch was thrown and 6,000 volts of electricity coursed through Topsy's body, toppling her over and killing her. Her Luna Park nightmare had finally ended.

Luna Park opened a few months later to huge fanfare. Ironically promoting itself as the “Electric Eden,” the park had a million light bulbs strung over a small city of fantasy architecture composed of towers, minarets, spires, castles, domes, and globes. What began as a fascination with electricity soon wore off though, and the park lost its luster. By 1911, the park’s owners, Thompson and Dundy, were consumed by personal and financial problems. Alcoholism, fraud, and gambling debts forced Luna Park into bankruptcy that same year. 

New owners expanded the park and brought in some new rides. Luna never really recovered and floundered during the Great Depression. The park then burned down in a series of dramatic fires during the 1940s. Luna Park faded into history, the name used for a housing project built on the site. 

A few years ago a new amusement park in Coney Island resurrected the Luna name. This seemed fine until 2023 when the new park's owners began a publicity campaign implying that they have been in business for 120 years and suggesting that they are the original Luna Park. The media picked it up and ran with it. "Luna Park Celebrates Its 120th year in Coney Island," was a headline trumpeted by Fox News and other media. 

When you appropriate history, you are claiming ownership of that history. It becomes your tarnished past. The new Luna Park has now embraced a tarnished, cruel legacy that brought shame to Coney Island. Appropriating the name means appropriating the shame. There's a terrible tradition of animal abuse attached to the Luna Park name that goes beyond Topsy. Performing elephants, horses, and camels were also mistreated during the park's early years. It's nothing to be proud of. Perhaps it's time for Luna Park to create a Topsy memorial and acknowledge a barbaric event that took place 120 years ago in Luna Park's name. Topsy should not be forgotten.

Topsy's body after execution at Luna Park 120 years ago.