Stars: 5
Review by: Mandy Apgar
Very wonderful
and an extremely pleasant surprise. Usually I find biographies written
by descendants to be very self serving but this had a perfect tone and
gave an excellent cultural history of Coney
Island and the shore region. When Nathan Handwerker arrived in the USA
he wanted to make good, especially in the restaurant business. Starting
work at age 11 in a bakery he became (some would say) obsessed with the
quality of ingredients and was desperate to
work his way up. Finding jobs at a variety of luncheonettes got his foot
in the door and Nathan indeed was a very hard worker - saving much of
his money for his future goals. Soon the opportunity came when he and a
friend visited Coney Island and Nathan bought
a small section of counterspace intent on selling the best darn Kosher
style hotdogs he could. Ten cents a dog couldn't get him business
though, and he bumped it down to five. Soon the crowds came and as his
business expanded Nathan hired extra family members
as well as the lovely and industrious Ida - a friend of his sister. The
two married and had a daughter and two sons, but Ida stayed by his side
and together the business grew. When a customer scolded him for not
having a sign when he was so famous he put up
a "Nathan's" wood board out, soon expanding the name to "Nathan's
Famous." While his family grew (and bickered) up in back of that ever
expanding counter Coney Island itself changed as the times did too. Soon
Nathan found himself the father of two embittered
sons not fond of the other (the author is the son of one, thusly
Nathan's grandson) and a daughter depressed that she was not allowed a
bigger share of the business. Nathan passed of a heart attack right
around the time fortunes began to turn for his beloved
Coney - the book is very condemning of Trump's father for more or less
destroying the area's culture (which a friend of mine who is the barker
at the freak show says is universal sentiment) afterwards. Altogether a
very good account of a hardworking, albeit
flawed man who wanted to make good.
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