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What did they do for fun?

Having some free time, I went to the Special Collections department at the university library to read a back issue of Virginia Cavalcade and search for clues to the Coney Amusem. I learned many interesting things, but nothing specific about the ghost sign in question, although I could probably find it by lurking around the Historical Society or the Valentine Museum and reading back issues of the Richmond Planet, the newspaper for the African-American community in Richmond way back in the early twentieth century.

I can make some guesses though.

The Coney Amusem building is located facing Broad and near Second Street, which was the heart of the African-American commercial district. I couldn't find any reference to any kind of park in that area, but plenty of references to game rooms, meeting halls, and saloons. For now we'll assume it was a game room and the clientele were probably not white or female.

Other stuff I learned:

In the early twentieth century, the state fair was held right in town on Broad Street where the Science Museum and the big DMV are now.

Around the turn of the last century, leisure activities were segregated by gender. The racial stuff I was aware of, but women didn't really have too many places to go in public back then. Even shopping was kind of segregated, with women going to the big stores on the south side of Broad while the men's stuff (men got bars too) on the north side of the street and other areas downtown. It was a big deal when a movie about venereal disease came to town and women got to see it.

In the late nineteenth century, leisure activities generally involved drinking (no women allowed), church, or hanging out in the street. A few theaters catered to wealthy people. As more cheap movie theaters opened, the trolley lines made it easy to get around town, and the park facilities were developed, opportunities for social interaction and entertainment increased, especially for people who weren't wealthy.

Up into the 1930's, Forest Hill Park used to have a roller coaster, a merry-go-round, vaudeville, and a dance pavilion! You could go swimming or boating in the lake! Today all that is gone. The park, lake, and forest are still there and some old Victorian buildings too. Most of the city parks actually have at least one little Victorian bandstand or some other type of activities building dating from that era, but nothing remains of these more exciting things. So unfair. Summers when I was in high school, my friends and I had evening picnics at Forest Hill Park. The trolleys were long gone then, so we couldn't even do that until we could drive and had regular access to cars. All we could do was eat, hang out, and talk. Once we played ping pong in the parking lot. We had two paddles and a ball, no table, so it was rather haphazard to say the least. I feel rather cheated now that I've learned about the roller coaster.

509 words | June 1, 2005 08:37 PM | Ghost signs