My grandparents took their two week annual vacation in Atlantic City. No, not the Atlantic City of glitzy hotels and gambling, but the old Atlantic City of gentility and some semblance of class. In those days the black folks served at dinner, opened the hotel door, operated the elevator, shined shoes, cleaned rooms and lived several blocks from the boardwalk in housing we all concluded was not suitable for us, but obviously their choice of habitat. Come to think of it, not that much has changed. What was that promise if gambling came to Atlantic City?
Each summer one of the grandchildren was taken for the first week of the two-week vacation to stay in the Hotel Morton just a block west of the Steel Pier on Virginia Avenue. Try and find the hotel today and you will end up at the service entrance to the Taj Mahal casino. In those days the hotel room included a full breakfast and dinner. We dressed casually (defined as slacks and a sport shirt, not shorts or jeans or a bathing suit or anything else that today would pass muster for a casual day in the office) for breakfast, we arrived at our appointed time and sat in the same seats each morning, and we had the same waitress (as distinguished from “serverâ€, Don’t you just love, Hello, I’m Jason and I will be your server today, heaven forbid the man is a waiter and the women a waitress). Dinner was formal and everyone above age ten was required to wear a jacket and tie. Before dinner we would sit on the large veranda, listen to organ music, and watch the people walk by on the sidewalk below. The song of the shoeshine man on the sidewalk punctuated the organ music. “You can’t look neat, if your shoes look beat.†If you could sit in the same place today you would hear the clang of slot machines, the screams of winners and (mostly) losers. Say, could you give me that definition of “progress†again. Just for the record my dictionary says in part “gradual steady improvement or to advance toward a higher stage.†Ah, not so much.
Strange what we member after fifty years. I should have that much luck with remembering what day of the week it is. As we sat on the veranda we absorbed the smells of Atlantic City of old. Those smells included salt water taffy, and peanuts being roasted in the Planters Peanut store at the corner of Virginia Avenue and the Boardwalk, and very greasy hot dogs and fries. My favorite aroma came from the donut and pancake shop where I would stand for hours and watch them make donuts in the window, (Ok, perhaps not hours, but it felt like that when I was 10 - either that or I was as dull then as I am now). The shop was located at the entrance to Steeplechase Pier, a few hundred feet south of Steel Pier. Oh, the glorious smell of aged cooking oil. There was this automated system that plopped the perfectly round donuts into the hot oil (no doubt the same oil on my last visit to AC as on my first). The donuts traveled around a large vat moved by man made currents, flipped by a paddle like device and finally were skewered on a long rod by the baker who threw them into a tub of cinnamon or powdered sugar. This was truly a fascinating process for young and old. Although I was never allowed to eat one of those donuts, I can taste them to this day. Little did I know at the time that the closest thing in my life to come to these donuts would be when my wife introduced me to Zeppole. They make up for the lack of automation in the Zeppole process by using the same oil I was fascinated with in the 1950s in Atlantic City. I must admit that on a trip to San Francisco I did find a store with a donut machine similar to what I have described. As may be expected, the thing was miniaturized and the donuts traveled a total of 12 inches as opposed to their AC journey of twelve feet. Instead of an African American baker with a tall white bakers hat, there was a Japanese-American teenager with pierced body parts…not the same. The donuts were an inch and a half in diameter and cost a hundred times as much as the AC version. Nevertheless, there were children pressed near the window in fascination, if they only knew what they were missing.
In 2007 I was in Atlantic City for a meeting. One morning early I walked the length of the boardwalk, looking for memories I suspect, but my reward was more like depression. There is nothing left that even hints at the Atlantic City of my youth. The only recognizable buildings are the (original) convention center and the top two thirds of the Claridge Hotel. Now even Miss America is gone. The Steeplechase Pier and the Million Dollar Pier are gone, the Garden Pier is a wreck and the famous Steel Pier is in name only. Walk on the north end of the boardwalk and you see acres of open space, boarded up buildings and a depressed area where a thriving boardwalk once was. The inlet is no more and the old Captain Starns seafood restaurant is long gone.
As I gazed at the beach just south of the Steel Pier I couldn’t help but see me and my grandparents on that beach many years ago baking the in sun and doing who knows what damage to our skin. Hey, who knew that baby oil and iodine didn’t do the job? I even thought I smelled those donuts now coming from the empty space that once was Steeplechase Pier, well not exactly; a homeless person was perusing a garbage can. Why should anyone care about my memories or the old Atlantic City? I have no good reason unless you share the loss of a time when little pleasures were more important and harder to attain making them that much more worthwhile. Some would call what has happened to Atlantic City progress. I call it symptomatic of our new standards of quality, pleasure and reward.
In the 1950s you had to walk under the boardwalk if you wanted to reach the beach in your bathing suit. Today you would probably get mugged if you went under the boardwalk and why would you, wearing a bathing suit on the boardwalk is an upgrade from some of what you see nowadays.
quinnscommentary.com
Remembering Atlantic City
- QUINNSCOMMENTARY
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Remembering Atlantic City
"The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it." George Bernard Shaw
"If everybody is thinking alike, then somebody is not thinking" Gen. George Patton
Quinnscommentary
Observations on Life. Give it a try now and tell a friend or two or fifty.
Quinnscommentary Blog
"If everybody is thinking alike, then somebody is not thinking" Gen. George Patton
Quinnscommentary
Observations on Life. Give it a try now and tell a friend or two or fifty.
Quinnscommentary Blog
- Dweedle Dee
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- Joined: Fri Apr 25, 2008 9:33 am
Remembering Atlantic City
Do you ever think about time travel? What I wouldn't give to be able to experience San Diego back in the 60s. *sigh*
- Kathy Ellen
- Posts: 10569
- Joined: Wed Mar 15, 2006 4:04 pm
Remembering Atlantic City
Welcome to the Garden Quinn....nice to meet you:-6
Lovely memories....I'll have to read your post again and relive my memories of Atlantic City when I was a kid. They were all good memories of AC and Wildwood.
I live not too far north of AC and sometimes travel there when I have friends or rellys visiting. You cannot go a block away from the boardwalk without fears of being accosted. Recently, I strayed just one block away from the boards to check on a restaurant reservation and was accosted 7 times by people trying to sell me things. Thank goodness the restaurant was open and the owner walked me back to my hotel. My family went for dinner there later, and it was a lovely jewel amonst all the thorns.
Lovely memories....I'll have to read your post again and relive my memories of Atlantic City when I was a kid. They were all good memories of AC and Wildwood.
I live not too far north of AC and sometimes travel there when I have friends or rellys visiting. You cannot go a block away from the boardwalk without fears of being accosted. Recently, I strayed just one block away from the boards to check on a restaurant reservation and was accosted 7 times by people trying to sell me things. Thank goodness the restaurant was open and the owner walked me back to my hotel. My family went for dinner there later, and it was a lovely jewel amonst all the thorns.
Remembering Atlantic City
Kathy Ellen;862480 wrote: Welcome to the Garden Quinn....nice to meet you:-6
Lovely memories....I'll have to read your post again and relive my memories of Atlantic City when I was a kid. They were all good memories of AC and Wildwood.
I live not too far north of AC and sometimes travel there when I have friends or rellys visiting. You cannot go a block away from the boardwalk without fears of being accosted. Recently, I strayed just one block away from the boards to check on a restaurant reservation and was accosted 7 times by people trying to sell me things. Thank goodness the restaurant was open and the owner walked me back to my hotel. My family went for dinner there later, and it was a lovely jewel amonst all the thorns.
Right you are KE, I too remember the AC of old, what has since happened to it is such a crying shame! Today, I would never venture off the boardwalk.
My folks used to own a summer home in Tuckerton about 35 years ago, & I used to vist them there every chance I got. As their home was right on a lagoon, with their motorboat moored on a floating dock at the edge of the lagoon. I loved to fish, (funny, my dad didn't) & they loved to eat fresh fish, so it was a win win combination. Anyway, another perk was that Tuckerton was only about a 25 minute car ride away from AC, so I went there as well each visit! My favorate thing on the AC boardwalk was "kohrs icecream cones"! (In addition to the many casinos:wah:)
Lovely memories....I'll have to read your post again and relive my memories of Atlantic City when I was a kid. They were all good memories of AC and Wildwood.
I live not too far north of AC and sometimes travel there when I have friends or rellys visiting. You cannot go a block away from the boardwalk without fears of being accosted. Recently, I strayed just one block away from the boards to check on a restaurant reservation and was accosted 7 times by people trying to sell me things. Thank goodness the restaurant was open and the owner walked me back to my hotel. My family went for dinner there later, and it was a lovely jewel amonst all the thorns.
Right you are KE, I too remember the AC of old, what has since happened to it is such a crying shame! Today, I would never venture off the boardwalk.
My folks used to own a summer home in Tuckerton about 35 years ago, & I used to vist them there every chance I got. As their home was right on a lagoon, with their motorboat moored on a floating dock at the edge of the lagoon. I loved to fish, (funny, my dad didn't) & they loved to eat fresh fish, so it was a win win combination. Anyway, another perk was that Tuckerton was only about a 25 minute car ride away from AC, so I went there as well each visit! My favorate thing on the AC boardwalk was "kohrs icecream cones"! (In addition to the many casinos:wah:)
Cars
- Kathy Ellen
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Remembering Atlantic City
Hi Cars:-4
It's good to talk with you...feel like it's been ages. Hope you and the Mrs. are well. Geeze, Tuckerton is just around the corner, and I've never been there:(
Want to visit the seaport this summer.
I've always felt badly about what's happened to AC...I agree, it was once a lovely place, now it's full of drug addicts and criminals. Take care Cars:-6
Sorry to digress Quinn............
Just read your journal post...you definitely are a funny person:wah::wah:
It's good to talk with you...feel like it's been ages. Hope you and the Mrs. are well. Geeze, Tuckerton is just around the corner, and I've never been there:(
Want to visit the seaport this summer.
I've always felt badly about what's happened to AC...I agree, it was once a lovely place, now it's full of drug addicts and criminals. Take care Cars:-6
Sorry to digress Quinn............
Just read your journal post...you definitely are a funny person:wah::wah: