The Electric Egg Cream

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The Loews Kings was one of the most majestic theatres in New York City, in a time when these things were taken seriously; abandoned (photo above) when they were taken less seriously. Located on Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn, it opened on September 7, 1929 and was quickly labeled one of the five “Wonder Theatres” built by Loews in New York. Designed by Rapp and Rapp of Chicago in a French Renaissance style, it was Loews flagship theatre and seated nearly 3,700 people amid an rich and elegant Art Deco interior.

A critical decline in attendance beginning in the 1950s, which only grew worse and plagued the Kings as it struggled into the mid-1970s, forced it to close down. Loews relinquished the theatre in 1977, locked its doors, and left it to quietly and pitiably deteriorate against the hustle-bustle of Flatbush Avenue. The Flatbush Redevelopment Corporation now owns the theatre, and it awaits revitalization: its interior still proudly majestic despite the ravages of neglect, vandalism and time.

View these Flickr images:

flickr.com/photos/marioletto/set…

Stumbling onto Yahoo’s Homepage, what did I find but a tidbit of “news” on New York’s own Neil Diamond and his hit song “Sweet Caroline.” After decades of secrecy, he finally revealed to the world who the inspiration for the song was….Caroline Kennedy. Well blow me down!!! I had thought that everyone (along with his/her dog and cat) knew that one. (I don’t mean to brag, but I knew it since 1969.)

“I’ve never discussed it with anybody before–intentionally,” Diamond told the Associated Press . “I thought maybe I would tell it to Caroline when I met her someday.” Diamond’s chance finally arrived when he performed via satellite at Caroline’s 50th birthday party.

When Diamond was a “young, broke songwriter,” he came upon a photo of Caroline “dressed to the nines in her riding outfit, beside her pony.” He was so impressed with the picture, immediately sensing a song in the “innocent, wonderful” picture, that he eventually wrote one while holed up in a Memphis motel in less than an hour. The rest is history, including a #1 on the charts hit song…and I love that song.

Even though my father, a WWII vet, was renowned in our family for having driven a tank through the gunfire of North Africa to that of Normandy, he never learned to drive a car through the potholes of Brooklyn. As a result, our travels were usually limited to the environs of New York City via the conveyance of public transportion. However, we were, out of necessity, a very imaginative family and could take a short trip and fancy it a wondrous journey.

Probably because our neighbors weren’t as imaginative as we were, the majority began owning cars by the mid sixties. While we were still going to Coney Island, they were going to places like Rye Playland and Rockaway Beach. While we might have made it to Palisades Park, they made it to Disneyland. They were all going somewhere and going there fast; the “frontier lands” of Long Island and Staten Island being hot on their list. Since my family wasn’t going anywhere we decided to stay and observe the evacuation which had started over a decade earlier.

On May 7, 1947, William Levitt began building 2000 ranch-size houses on a tract of land in Long Island, thirty miles from Manhattan. Utilizing mass production techniques, he rapidly built and rented 4000 of these houses to young people (mostly WWII veterans) who were eager to get away from the crowded city and start their own lives. Government financing regulations allowed Levitt to offer his houses for sale in 1948; a small down payment and small monthly payment thereafter. Most of the original renters quickly bought the first 4000 homes and the community called “Levittown” was established in 1951 with over 17,000 homes.

Levittown epitomized the American flight to the suburbs; it was the first of its kind. Accompanied by the postwar “Baby Boom,” it represented the most dramatic shift in population from the central city to the suburbs. As the success of Levittown became more and more far-reaching, home construction soared . Factories were working around the clock turning-out huge quantities of appliances (especially television sets) for the fledgling households. The supermarket replaced the corner grocery store, carrying a more diverse array of food for the suburban family diet. But with the growth of suburbia came the decline of urban areas and inner cities. The American Dream had come to be, but it came with a price.

Eventually, even my father learned to drive and we moved to the suburbs. While we had a nice home, we soon found that we had become a less imaginative family. The “keeping-up with the Jones’” syndrome wasn’t as mythical as we had presumed. But by that time America had gloriously landed on the Moon, yet another frontier that promised to benefit humanity with a marvelous sense of lasting achievement. The 1970s were soon to begin, when even the most humble goals usually glimmered on distant frontiers.

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James J. Claffey, Jr. president of Local One must have been peeking into former Yankees’ manager Joe Torre’s etiquette manual when he proclaimed the following: “We want ‘respect’ at the table,” he said. “If there’s no ‘respect,’ they will not see Local One at the table. The lack of ‘respect’ is something we are not going to deal with.” (my respect-ful emphasis.)

The Broadway stage hands strike has been dragging on for nearly three weeks with no end in sight. The clash was a result of Broadway’s record-breaking season that grossed close to a billion dollars. However, the costs of the theatre business combined with Broadway’s high rate of failures (19 of the 30 shows that opened during the 2005-6 season, posted a loss of nearly 100 million dollars) has jeopardized its success. Broadway’s Theatre League is now trying to recoup its losses at the expense of Local One which is just as reluctant to lose or give up anything, all snug as a bug in their relative greed.

Nevertheless, I would imagine that theatre-goers are growing rather weary of seeing synthesized clones of “Les Miserables” or the “Phantom of the Opera” behind the neon glitz and glitter of every other marquee along the Great White Way. They’re also probably bored with the razzle-dazzle tout of hit shows that are supposedly sold-out for 10 years and prove to grow stale in 10 months, if that long. And, last but certainly not least, the kick in the head ticket prices that add an outrageous insult to the unforgivable insult of being duped into sit through this recycled mediocrity.

I would venture to guess that the “lack of respect” Mr. Claffey complains about is scarcer on Broadway than he imagines…certainly not to be found on a bargaining table. I think that respect was first seen when a Jerome Kern first melodiously planted it there and was gradually diminishing since the last days of Rodgers and Hammerstein who had preserved it there. Surely it’s a valuable commodity, much desired even by those who might not know what it really is…or was.

(UPDATE: The strike is finally over…and they lived happily ever after-11/26/07)

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An example of Black Friday’s oftentimes futile and crazed shopping frenzy is exemplified in today’s New York Times:

“Donna Lhopitault, 38, stood in line at the Toys R Us in Times Square for four hours this morning to secure a deeply discounted Nintendo Wii video game system for $250 — more than half the price she has seen it online.”

If someone is determined to brave the cold, brave the crowds, risk death and injury and endless confusion (and all that other exciting stuff), at least make the risk worthwhile: first check-out what’s on-line before racing to get in-line to the lure of a pied-piper’s cleverly played tune. (Let me add the following: For a seasoned New Yorker, the absurdity of being anywhere near Times Square in the dead of night on Black Friday could only be surpassed by being there on New Year’s Eve.)

Coincidence has of late become so commonplace in our thought process that coincidence itself is becoming commonplace. We tend to accept odd and unusual events with a jaded resignation, not only when these events occur separately but also when they’re conjoined (to form coincidence) with others that bear an uncanny association with each other. From the JFK assassination to 9/11, these past 50 years have given coincidence a new meaning and have made it a favorite topic in the realm of conspiracy theory circles and similar venues for discussion.

While Thanksgiving is still in the air with the smell of leftovers and the hype of Black Friday, I’d like to turn your attention to a coincidence that occurred here in NYC. Separate incidents that, while not earth-shattering, are significant in the growing catalog of strange occurrences. I found the following on Flumesday.Com:

“In 1997, during New York City’s annual Thanksgiving Day Parade, a female spectator was critically injured. It was a windy Thanksgiving that year and the enormous Cat in the Hat balloon flying down Central Park West could not be controlled. The balloon was taken by a gust of wind and knocked over a lamppost. The lamppost fell on Kathleen Caronna who was there with her husband and baby boy. Caronna was in a coma for nearly a month. Nine years later, while Caronna was in her Upper East side apartment, an airplane flew through her window, crashed into her apartment and instantly made her the most unlucky person in the history of mankind. Miraculously, Caronna got out of her apartment without injury. The minute mathematical probability of two such events happening to the same person makes this story strange enough. However, the pilot of the plane was a Major League baseball player. Even stranger. The New York Mets medical staff and third-base coach, Manny Acta, inhabit the building. Even stranger. A plane crashed into a building in New York City on October 11th. I find this pretty strange.”

flumesday.comI find this pretty strange myself. While I’m not a statistician, I would imagine that the mathematical probability of this happening would be almost incalculable. However, after living through the JFK assassination, 9.11, and my first marriage, who am I to argue with science?

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The Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade began floating down 7th Avenue in 1924 and, probably to put parade spectators (to wit: holiday shoppers) into a buying frame of mind, was originally called the Macy’s Christmas Parade. There were, however, no huge balloons in the parade’s first three seasons; instead, live animals borrowed from the Central Park Zoo drew in the crowds. While a menagerie of lions, tigers and bears, along with a herd of goats and donkeys, may have been a success among the adults, many children were terrified by the animals, forcing Macy’s to replace them with giant character balloons in 1927.

Between 1928 and 1933, the balloons were allowed to float away when they reached the end of the parade route. Rewards were offered by Macy’s to anyone finding either a whole or partial piece of a landed balloon. In 1947, “Miracle on 34th Street” made the parade famous throughout the world; the film was broadcast on the fledgling medium television the very next year.

The balloon photos on this post are circa 1960, when my parents brought me to the parade. Personally, I would’ve enjoyed the live animals much better because the balloons were the things that scared me!!! Maybe it was because I saw every balloon that was too big to fit into my very small apartment as a potential Hindenburg just waiting to explode. Then again, I was really a dumb kid…what did I know?

Thank You to Everyone for visiting this Electric Egg Cream thing. I truly hope that you found something enjoyable and/or of interest here that has made (or will make) you want come back again. I can’t begin to tell you how much I enjoy putting these posted thoughts out there…your continued readership makes it all the more enjoyable.

Thank you again and Happy Thanksgiving to All,

Michael & Steffie

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This November 22, Americans will both celebrate Thanksgiving and commemorate the 44th anniversary of President Kennedy’s assassination. I was 9 years old on that remarkable day and no medium, no matter how ingenious or sensational the film or book or whatever, could fully convey the impression left on us who were alive and aware at the time. The sequence of events that highlighted those four days, from the shots in Dealey Plaza to Oswald’s murder to Kennedy’s funeral (the aftermath which affects even today) will be always be remembered by the “baby boomer” generation.

The day was unseasonably warm, even though I had long remembered it as being cold. Maybe because the cold front that in fact moved in that night and into that long, unforgettable weekend overwhelmed it all with appropriate coldness.

Mr. Reichart, my piano teacher, was due at four o’clock for yet another one of my dreaded lessons. I think he dreaded them far more than I did, and was as anxious to see me as finding a fly in his musical ointment. He was a short, reddish-faced man on the nervous side of obesity and despair, with a neck that was perpetually too big for his collar and looked as if it was getting bigger with each visit and about to explode. I think he was German or Austrian, and when I went through his forcefully directed series of scales and chords that would inevitably result in chop-sticks and chaos, his neck took on an even more explosive look.

I may have been thinking of Herr R’s impending visit as I sat in my fourth grade classroom waiting for the three o’clock bell. There was also Thanksgiving (and food) to think about that would arrive the next Thursday, and then Christmas (and, of course, more food and presents), then New Year’s and beyond. My life as a Catholic school kid was basically confined to school and church and (most importantly) play…(and, of course, those piano lessons). I knew little (except for a child’s often distorted view learned through geography and history books) of life outside of Brooklyn, New York…and even that was limited to the blocks within my immediate neighborhood. In the days and ways before Google Earth and Frequent Flyer Miles and Cable TV and the like, a savviness of the world wasn’t as easily acquired by a child (not even by most adults). The West to New York kids meant the “Old West” of movies, television and myth. Dallas, Texas on that Friday (that now seems so long ago) was no exception.

I doubt that I had any clear understanding of death on November 22, 1963. No one that I personally knew had yet died; and those that I saw “die” were always characters on TV shows such as RAWHIDE and THE UNTOUCHABLES, and these were sure to forever return in another role (sometimes in the same series). Even though Pope John XXIII had died that summer, we were led to believe that he possessed extraordinary powers; I simply concluded that death couldn’t have any serious affect on anyone famous or in positions of power. Even though kids my age during that autumn knew the name John F. Kennedy, they were as familiar with him as they would have been with the intricacies of Washington, D.C….but he was a powerful individual and, like Pope John, deserved our respect.

When Sister Margery, who was as emotional as Ming the Merciless, came into our classroom with tears in her eyes, we knew that something serious had happened. Nothing short of our very own Our Lady of Guadalupe being closed down (as in THE BELLS of SAINT MARY’S), a “FOR SALE” sign swinging in the wind, could have elicited such emotion in her. She talked with Miss Madden (our teacher for that year; a Big Sister rather than a Sister to us all) who also began to weep.

Miss Madden finally announced to the class that President Kennedy had been shot in Dallas and was dead. Amidst the genuine and obligatory sobs and moans we soon discovered are expected on such occasions, we felt a sincere grief for someone we had known all along…and would know even more in coming days.

Our dismissal was delayed until it was clear that a state of war didn’t exist (in the event that the Russians were responsible for Kennedy’s killing). When I arrived home, television programming was exclusively devoted to Kennedy’s assassination; there would be much to see on television that weekend, unlike anything seen on it before. Mr. Reichart, of course, canceled my piano lesson but would come (owing to Thanksgiving) the Friday after next. For some reason, he seemed a little more friendly and I a little more attentive to his piano instruction. I could skip TV for now and study piano…maybe I didn’t have forever to practice, as I had once thought.

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Note: Perhaps we over-glorify and overrate JFK and his importance, amid our disappointment with current leaders and their apparent pettiness. Maybe in our despair we attempt to “fill-in” the blank pages of history with hope rather than with fact : idealizing what could have been within the harsh reality of what has turned-out to be. In any event, there shouldn’t be any limits set on the American Dream…tired and worn as it too has turned-out to be.

(For really extensive information on the assassination of President Kennedy, visit The Mary Ferrell Foundation: maryferrell.org)