Famous Nathan (36 page)

the fact that employers “sweated” their workers:
Lower East Side Tenement Museum
, “Sweatshops,”
http://bit.ly/1L7Gvg6
.

“shut in the qualmy rooms”:
Jacob Riis, quoted in
The Jewish East Side: 1881–1924
, Milton Hindus, ed., Transaction Publishers (1996), p. 100.

“We place absolute confidence”:
Philip Franklin quoted in
Unsinkable: The Full Story
, by Daniel Allen Butler, Frontline Books (2011), p. 168.

“The scene on Broadway was awful”:
Letter from Alexander McComb to his mother, reprinted in
Lost Voices from the Titanic: The Definitive Oral History
, by Nick Barratt, St. Martin's Press (2010), p. 211.

Chapter 4: The Tenth Ward

money brought to America:
The Immigrant Jew in America
, National Liberal Immigration League, New York City, 1907.

the neighborhood had a population:
“The Tenement House Exhibition of 1899,” by Lawrence Veiller, in
Empire City: New York Through the Centuries
, Kenneth T. Jackson and David S. Dunbar, eds., Columbia University Press (2005), p. 421.

“The rooms were damp, filthy, foul, and dark”:
cited in
A History of the Jews in America
, by Howard Morley Sachar, Vintage (1993), p. 142.

Rent of a tenement apartment:
Lower East Side Tenement Museum
, “Housing,”
http://bit.ly/1K6lLBp
.

Pushcarts were another common neighborhood livelihood:
Hidden New York: A Guide to Places That Matter
, by Marci Reaven and Steven J. Zeitlin, Rivergate Books (2006), p. 167.

A survey of a Manhattan magistrate's court:
The Rise and Fall of the Jewish Gangster in America
, by Albert Fried, Columbia University Press (1994), p. 8.

a literacy test:
“Immigration Bill Vetoed by Taft on Account of Its Literacy Test,”
The Spokesman-Review
, Spokane, Washington, Feb. 15, 1913.

news of the sinking for eighteen straight days:
New York Times
, April 15, 1912, to May 2, 1912.

“The remote cause”:
Titanica: The Disaster of the Century in Poetry, Song, and Prose
, by Steven Biel, W. W. Norton & Company (1998), p. 59.

“For forty years, I've worked”:
“The Tale of the Other Max Garfunkel,”
Lost City
, Feb 28, 2012,
http://bit.ly/1RtO9nq
.

Chapter 5: Nickel Empire

On a busy summer's day:
“How Coney Island Became the Unlikely Birthplace of Outdoor Dining,” by Alex Swerdloff, The Vice Channels:
Munchies
, June 30, 2015,
http://bit.ly/1OZraC5
.

In 1908, Albany established regulations:
“Enforce Law, Hughes Says,”
New York Times
, June 13, 1908, p. 3.

Feuchtwanger supposedly handed out gloves:
Fast Food
:
Roadside Restaurants in the Automobile Age
, by John A. Jakle and Keith A. Sculle, Johns Hopkins University Press (1999), p. 163.

Stevens instructed his staff:
“‘Hot Dog,' This Company Says, After Being in Business Almost 100 Years,” by Gail Collins,
Los Angeles Times
, January 15, 1985,
http://lat.ms/1LzykfS
.

Smallish pork sausages:
America in So Many Words,
by David K. Barnhart and Allan A. Metcalf, Houghton Mifflin (1997), p. 192.

The first verified use of the term:
“Origin of the Term ‘Hot Dog,'” by Barry A. Popik, Gerald Leonard Cohen, and David Shulman, G. Cohen (2004),
http://bit.ly/1Pjkyh6
.

There he first fabricated an innovation: Coney Island: Food & Dining
, by Jeffrey Stanton (1997),
http://bit.ly/1FXRf1z
.

Three years later, Feltman purchased:
Ibid.

“the first Tyrolean yodelers”:
“Charles Feltman Dead; Coney Island Pioneer Who Turned Sandy Wastes into Pleasure Ground,”
New York Times
, Sept. 21, 1910, p. 9.

“shore dinner”:
“Coney Island: The Parachute Pavilion Competition,” by Zoe Ryan and Jonathan Cohen-Litant, Princeton Architectural Press (2007), p. 16.

With the advent of World War I:
Coney Island:
The People's Playground
, Mickael Immerso, Rutgers University Press (2002), p. 131.

In 1913, forty-six collapsed:
US Banking History: Civil War to World War II
, by Richard S. Grossman,
EH.Net
Encyclopedia, edited by Robert Whaples (2008),
http://bit.ly/1OZi48s
.

Chapter 6: The Store

“It is blatant, it is cheap”:
Quoted in “Coney Island: The Ups and Downs of America's First Amusement Park,” a documentary film by Ric Burns and Lisa Ades,
American Experience
, enhanced transcript,
http://to.pbs.org/1JSzjjP

The good doctor labeled:
Coney Island,
Immerso, p. 3.

Every year, Feltman's served:
Ibid., p. 131.

Coney Island became the most postcarded venue:
Quoted in “Coney Island,”
American Experience
. See also Laura J. Hoffman,
Coney Island
, Arcadia Publishing (2014), p. 7.

Chapter 7: Ida

Russia's celebrated June Advance:
“Steamrollered in Galicia: The Austro-Hungarian Army and the Brusilov Offensive, 1916,” by J. Schindler,
War in History
, Vol. 10, No. 1 (2003), pp. 27–59.

The navy erected a full-scale wooden mock-up:
“The Battle Ship in Union Square: Building the USS
Recruit
in the Heart of New York City,” by Amanda Uren,
Mashable
(2015),
http://on.mash.to/1OZixYq
.

Fifty to a hundred million victims:
“Updating the accounts: global mortality of the 1918–1920 ‘Spanish' influenza pandemic,” by J. Mueller and M. P. Johnson,
Bulletin of the History of Medicine
(Spring 2002), pp.105–15. See also “1918 Influenza: the Mother of All Pandemics,” by Jeffrey K. Taubenberger and David M. Moren, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2006),
http://1.usa.gov/1LzBCjh
.

“I saw hundreds of young stalwart men”:
The Enduring Vision: A History of the American People
, by Paul Boyer, Clifford Clark, Karen Halttunen, Joseph Kett, Neal Salisbury, Wadsworth (1995), p. 686.

a record 869 New Yorkers died:
“Timeline: Influenza Across America in 1918,”
American Experience: Influenza 1918
,
http://to.pbs.org/1eAB1su
.

Chapter 8: The Frank

The filth, sludge, and scraps:
The Jungle: The Uncensored Original Edition
, Upton Sinclair, Sharp Press (2003), pp. 81–82.

Frankfurter consumption really took off:
“America in a Bun: A History of Hot Dogs,” by Beth Kaiserman,
Highbrow Magazine
, July 10, 2013,
http://bit.ly/1Zebz5o
.

“Mr. Slotkin's first loyalty”: New York Times
, October 31, 1965, p. 87.

Chapter 11: The Count

One of McKane's henchmen:
“K.F. Sutherland Killed by a Train,”
New York Times
, May 21, 1910, p. 1.

Chapter 12: Growing Up Coney

“baby hatcheries”:
“The Incubated Babies of the Coney Island Boardwalk,” by Michael Pollack,
New York Times
, August 2, 2015, p. B2.

summer of 1934:
“50 Police Fight 1,000 in Coney Hot Dog Strike,”
Brooklyn Daily Eagle
, June 11, 1934.

Chapter 13: The Season

New York City's population at that time:
“Population of the 100 Largest Urban Places: 1930,” U.S. Bureau of the Census, June 15, 1998,
http://1.usa.gov/1L7FdzE
.

Master builder and political insider Robert Moses:
“How the Coastline Became a Place to Put the Poor,” by Jonathan Mahler,
New York Times
, Dec. 4, 2012, p. A29.

Chapter 14: The War

Germany abandoned preparations:
The 1939–1940 New York World's Fair
, by Bill Cotter, Arcadia Publishing (2009), p. 55. See also “Reich Withdraws from World's Fair,”
New York Times,
April 27, 1938, pp. 1, 17.

But the Jewish Palestine Pavilion: 1939–1940 New York World's Fair
, Cotter, p. 61. See also “Performing the State: The Jewish Palestine Pavilion at the New York World's Fair, 1939/40,” by Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett in
The Art of Being Jewish in Modern Times
, Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett and Jonathan Karp, eds., University of Pennsylvania Press (2006), p. 98.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt engineered the visit:
“King Tries Hot Dog and Asks for More,” by Felix Belaire, Jr.,
New York Times
, June 12, 1939, p. 1.

“Eiffel Tower of Brooklyn”:
Coney Island: Lost and Found
, by Charles Denson, Ten Speed Press (2002), p. 123.

Chapter 17: Roadside Rest

“I didn't want to see Coney Island lose”:
Murray Handwerker interview quoted in Denson,
Coney Island
, p. 76.

“Moses has shrunk”:
“Nathan Handwerker Good Dog,” by Jay Maeder, (New York)
Daily News
, March 31, 1999,
http://nydn.us/1FTYGHb
.

“If I had a brick for every time”:
“The Ray Kroc Story,”
mcdonalds.com
,
http://bit.ly/1dqev3F
.

“one of the many imitators”:
“A Tribute to and Brief History of Our Own Nathan's Roadside Rest,” by Howard B. Levy,
Our Little Town
,
http://bit.ly/1NoLrko
.

“[Nathan] was very concerned”:
“Early History of Nathan's in Oceanside: An Exclusive Interview with Murray (Son of Nathan) Handwerker,” by Howard B. Levy,
Our Little Town
,
http://bit.ly/1GM5HKp
.

Robert Moses and his massive development projects:
Including 4,091 public housing units, 3,629 HUD-subsidized and Mitchell-Lama units, and over 1,000 Astella Development Corporation–built units. See “West of Nathan's: Planning Coney Island's Residential Community,” by Oksana Mironova,
The Architectural League's Urban Omnibus: The Culture of Citymaking
(2014),
http://bit.ly/1NH5xXf
.

“enable Coney Island to fit into the pattern”:
New York Times
, April 3, 1953, p. 1.

Chapter 18: Snacktime

The National Labor Relations Board investigated:
“Nathan's Found Guilty of Unfair Labor Activities,” by Damon Stetson,
New York Times
, Nov. 5, 1970, p. 63.

Chapter 19: Lion in Winter

entered the language in 1947:
Oxford English Dictionary
, citing
Toronto Daily Star
, April 5, 1947, p. 6.

Chapter 20: Endgame

Nathan's Famous and Wetson's merged in 1975:
“Nathan's Builds on Its Core Product, Hot Dogs,”
New York Times
, April 6, 2003; the merger was finally completed in March, 1978: “Wetson's-Nathan's Merger Set,”
New York Times
, March 28, 1978.

 

Selected Reading

Baker, Kevin.
Dreamland
. New York, NY: Harper, 1999.

Cannato, Vincent J.
American Passage: The History of Ellis Island
. New York, NY: Harper, 2009.

Denson, Charles.
Coney Island: Lost and Found
. Berkeley, CA: Ten Speed Press, 2002.

______
.
Wild Ride: A Coney Island Roller Coaster Family
. Berkeley, CA: Dreamland Press, 2007.

Epstein, Lawrence J.
At the Edge of a Dream: The Story of Jewish Immigrants on New York's Lower East Side, 1880–1920
. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2007.

Fangone, Jason.
Horsemen of the Esophagus: Competitive Eating and the Big Fat American Dream
. New York, NY: Crown, 2006.

Frank, Robin Jaffee, ed.
Coney Island: Visions of an American Dreamland, 1861–2008
. New Haven, CN: Yale University Press, 2015

Handwerker, Murray.
Nathan's Famous Hot Dog Cookbook
. New York, NY: Grosset & Dunlap, 1968.

Immerso, Michael.
Coney Island: The People's Playground
. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2002.

Jakle, John A., and Keith A. Sculle.
Fast Food
:
Roadside Restaurants in the Automobile Age
. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1999.

Kasson, John F.
Amusing the Million: Coney Island at the Turn of the Century
. New York, NY: Hill and Wang, 1978.

Marianski, Stanley, Adam Marianski, and Miroslaw Gebarowski.
Polish Sausages: Authentic Recipes and Instructions
. Seminole, FL: Bookmagic, 2009.

Petrovsky-Shtern, Yohanan.
The Golden Age Shtetl: A New History of Jewish Life in East Europe
. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2014.

 

About the Author

Lloyd Handwerker
is the grandson of Nathan Handwerker. A cinematographer and documentary filmmaker, he lives in New York City. You can sign up for email updates
here
.