Down Memory Lane -- On the Las Vegas Strip
by Lenny Frome

Ever wonder what people did before there was Video Poker?

The Year is 1936: When I was a kid, I was a Brooklynite lucky enough to live in Brighton Beach (made famous in later years by Neil Simon). What made me so lucky was the fact that it was just a short walk (in those days) to the attractions of Coney Island. What attractions---the boardwalk, the original Nathan's Famous, the Cyclone, the Wonder Wheel and the world famous amusement parks, Steeplechase and Luna Park. With a few milk bottles (for deposit returns) and a couple of nickels, a kid could have many hours of clean fun in Coney Island. Hot dogs were a nickel and custard a dime, so we had to budget ourselves very carefully, because a very good salary in those days was $18 a week.

Listening to the auction house hawkers pushing "genuine satsuma" and watching the freak house barkers didn't cost a cent. If we stood there long enough we got to see all the show people brought out to entice paying customers. Snake charmers, siamese twins, dog-men and all manner of wonders were there for our pleasure.

Standing under the high peak of the Cyclone (one darn scary roller coaster) listening to the shrieks as the plunge scared the riders out of their minds was also a freebie. We knew lots of ways to sneak into Steeplechase and ride free, also. And a few of the "fun houses" were not immune to our invasions. The term "Video" was an unknown word so adults played a game in which they rolled a ball down a table trying to line up a row of stars. Watching these Fascination players (until they got annoyed) was a cheap pasttime, also. How could anyone forget those days?

The Year is 1966: Years later, a few of us, now husbands and fathers, would ride all the way in from Queens to go to Silver's Baths (real Russian steam rooms, where they hosed you and flayed you). The glory days of "Coney" had long passed, with the demise of the amusement parks and some of the best rides. But there was always Nathan's and what a treat it was to get some steamers or clam broth and a lobster sandwich, to replace the calories we had just boiled away.

The Year is 1996: 2,500 miles from Coney Island, living in Las Vegas, an oasis in the Mojave Desert, where no lobsters grow and even plants get by with great difficulty. But it's Deja Vu when I get out to the strip. Holiday Inn has brought the Boardwalk to the Strip and to boot (with thanks to MGM and Primadonna), the awesome skyline of New York is reaching to the sky behind it. We can again watch the Gypsy fortune teller and target shoot with light guns. There's a Nathan's too, albeit a transparent imitation of Mr. Handwerker's pride and joy, but the "dogs" are just as good even though they are routed through Monte Carlo first.

My grand-daughter, a freshman at NYU's Tisch School, travels to Coney on a project and sends E-mail reports that all is trashy there now. She can't wait to come to Vegas at spring break, so we can show her the world she will never see back East.

Surely, what goes around comes around. The world of 1996 is being introduced to what I never have forgotten, the fun days of 1936. It's a shame that the kids in America cannot know the joys of growing up in what was a less complicated world.

---