Sources for America’s History: Printed Page 463
19-1 | | Escaping the City for a Fantasy World of Pleasure |
Luna Park at Night (c. 1913) |
This postcard of Coney Island’s Luna Park captures the thrill and wonder enchanting city dwellers as they escaped, however briefly, the mundane and hard-knock lives they endured as part of New York’s working class. Amusement parks like this one treated their customers to dazzling displays, exhilarating rides, and attractions, including Luna Park’s famous “Trip to the Moon.” This postcard image shows the incandescent main entrance to the park, radiant from the million electric lights beguiling visitors into the nighttime revelry.
READING AND DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
This image was the front of a postcard. What conclusions might the historian draw from this artifact, considering its function as a postcard and its depiction of Luna Park? What might have motivated visitors to Luna Park to purchase and use the postcard? What sorts of comments do you imagine senders of these cards wrote?
Examine and analyze the details of the image for evidence of early-twentieth-century ideas about work and leisure. What role did amusements play among the middle and working classes?