Miami Beach Memories
A Nostalgic Chronicle of Days Gone by
Biondi, Joann
Hardcover
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BOOK SUMMARY
Miami Beach Memories: A Nostalgic Chronicle of Days Gone By is an oral history of the people and events that shaped this tropical island from the 1920s through the 1960s. To create this engaging and accessible volume, Biondi interviewed 101 residents, fro
BOOK SYNOPSIS
Miami Beach has lots of memories to share. Memories of the 1920s, when Johnny Weissmuller flaunted his freestyle skills at local pools; of the 1930s, when Desi Arnaz strummed his first guitar; of World War II, when Clark Gable romanced more than one local girl; of the Fabulous Fifties, when the Rat Pack owned the joint; and of the 1960s, when Muhammad Ali snagged the heavyweight championship of the world in the Miami Beach Auditorium.
A tiny spit of sand barely 15 miles long and a mile wide, the island is known throughout the world as a tropical haven and vacation playground--a neon-lit Garden of Eden dedicated to the pursuit of pleasure. And yet, serious things have gone on there. Dark things, like the blatant anti-Semitism of the 1930s, that have been intentionally forgotten from the collective psyche. In that sense, Miami Beach is a sandbox full of paradoxes.
To unravel those paradoxes, Biondi interviewed more than one hundred current and former residents of the city: lawyers and land developers, doctors and teachers, artists and politicians, waiters and maids, photographers and strippers, comedians and singers. There's even a Native Indian chief and a former U.S. Attorney General in the bunch. Their personal memories, along with stunning black-and-white photographs, document the island's history in a way no third-person history can.
The many great images include Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Edna Buchanan in a bikini (she wanted to show off); boxer Jack Dempsey holding eight ice cream cones on the beach; the Beatles/Judy Garland/Jackie Gleason posing with hairdresser Ruth Regina (not together, of course); all the strippers in their stripping glory; and tons of evocative family portraits. The book also features social artifacts from the era, including original ID cards that African-American workers were made to carry in the 1930s, war posters, and restaurant menus.
A nostalgic chronicle of days gone by, Miami Beach Memories is a chorus of varied voices and diverse points of view, a mosaic of poignant anecdotes, and an eclectic collage that paints a portrait of what life was once like on this tiny but fascinating island.
BOOK EXCERPTS
Singer Rey Baumel, star of Rey Mambo and his Combo, looks back on the club scene of the 1940s. The 1940s in Miami Beach was a time of great Latin music. I mean great Latin music. It was swinging, and the aura on the Beach was incredible. Had I known then that it was going to be an era, I would have paid more attention. All the best Cuban and Puerto Rican performers were here--Tito Puente, Tito Rodriguez, Xavier Cugat. Desi Arnaz was around now and then, and I remember running into him at the musician's union. He was never considered very good as far as real Latin music goes. But he knew how to front a band, and he was gorgeous.
I started playing Latin music at that time because it was so hot. I changed my name from Marvin Baumel to Rey Mambo because when I called the Miami Herald to promote my act, the guy at the paper said, "You've got to have a better name." So here I was, a Jewish kid from Brooklyn, and I became Rey Mambo, King of the Mambo. I even learned how to speak Spanish. I played with Cuban guys from Tampa. We were performing at Ciro's and Walter Winchell came in to see the show. He made a nice mention of my act in his column and after that I had no choice but to stick with the name. I remember one night when Louis Armstrong went on stage just before us, and Nat King Cole came over to check us out. This was also the time of dance classes. Everyone sent their kids to dance class--cha-cha, mambo, merengue, you name it. I played in the band at a lot of the dance contests and let me tell you, they were rigged. Parents would show up with a group of their friends and make sure they all cheered when their kids came on. So little Harriet Goldstein with no rhythm at all would win the cha-cha trophy. And her parents, who probably spent $18,000 on dance lessons, were happy.
--OR-- Jo Ann Bass, owner of Joe's Stone Crab Restaurant, recounts her family's connection to celebrity culture in the 1930s. As a child my dad hid nothing from me--he taught me how to count by playing gin rummy, and he took me with him to nightclubs. Although he was a restaurant man to the core, my father was really a frustrated gangster. He loved the horses, he loved the fast life, and he loved the aura that surrounded the Mob scene. My Dad had a lot of contact with them [Mobsters]--they owned the meat companies and waste companies that serviced restaurants. Al Capone was a regular customer; when he came in he used the name Al Brown. He and my grandmother were very friendly. He always sent her flowers on Mother's Day addressed to "Mama Joe." My grandmother once threw him out of the restaurant when he showed up with a woman who was not his wife. Even in the 1930s Joe's attracted an eclectic group of people--Al Jolson, Amelia Earhart, Damon Runyon, Calvin Coolidge, the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, Charles Lindbergh, and Anna May Wong. They all came to dinner.
BOOK REVIEWS
"The 1940s in Miami Beach was a time of great Latin music. I mean great Latin music. It was swinging, and the aura on the Beach was incredible. Had I known then that it was going to be an era, I would have paid more attention."
Singer Rey Baumel, star of Rey Mambo and his Combo, looking back on the club scene of the 1940s.
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MORE BOOK INFO
ISBN: 0762740663
ISBN(13-digit): 9780762740666
Dewey Decimal: 975.9/381
Library of Congress: 2006013020
Book Publisher: Globe Pequot Pr
Language: ENG
No. of Pages: 192
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