In Atlantic City: The View from the Porch

It is 11 o’clock on a sparkling summer morning, and over on the Boardwalk they are already crowding into the casinos—thousands of Ali Babas in brightly colored polyesters, searching for treasure in those vast air-conditioned caves. Dice are rolling, cards are turning, and there are hands attached to most of the slot machines, which occasionally gratify with spurts of change. It is the busiest time of year in the new Atlantic City, which has high hopes of becoming the Las Vegas of the East, and the ebb and flow of the surf has given way to an even more soothing sound: great sums of money changing hands.

But on the front porch of Lorna Shuster’s guesthouse, where a few survivors of the old Atlantic City gather, the only thing exchanged is conversation. The name of the place is actually the Montpelier Guesthouse—it is at 7 South Montpelier Avenue—but a passerby would never know. Someone stole the sign a few weeks ago, and Shuster, whose detached, philosophical nature hides the fact that she is suffering from hypertension, does not appear in a hurry to replace it. Why should she be? Her regulars, all Jewish and all from Philadelphia, come back year after year, from the beginning of July through Labor Day, and they know where she is. “My people have been coming to Atlantic City since they were children,” she says, “long before I was here.”

Shuster, 48, and her husband Nachum, 64, an Orthodox rabbi, came from Israel and have owned the three-story house for only eight years. But by local standards that makes them oldtimers. Atlantic City’s history is conveniently divided between B.C. and A.C.—before and after the casinos. Since the first casino opened only three years ago, the Shusters are definitely B.C., and so, of course, are their guests. They are a vanishing breed, living life slowly in a town that wants to move at top speed, watching with dismay as old landmarks give way to new parking lots and glitzy, glass-and-ormolu gaming houses.

Eve Rappaport, 71, and Geetie Strumwasser, 65, who are sisters, have been summering in Atlantic City since they were in diapers. Rappaport’s husband died two years ago, but Geetie’s husband Lou, 66, whom she met on the beach near by in 1933, is with her now. Lou, who was born in Atlantic City, remembers walking on the girders of Convention Hall, where the Miss America contest is held, when it was being built in the late ’20s.

Esther Halperin, 77, who wears the kind of art deco glasses that curl at the sides, spent her honeymoon in Atlantic City in 1925, at a kosher hotel on Virginia Avenue. She had two older sisters, and her parents refused to let her marry before they did, so she was forced to elope. “We only had 2½ days,” she recalls. “We were married on a Tuesday, and I had to be back Friday night to light the candles. My in-laws were very religious.” Her husband, who became a manufacturer of burlap bags, died two years ago. “He loved Atlantic City,” she says sadly. Also at the Montpelier are Mildred Locke, 60, and Bill Joblin, 64, who are dating but have separate rooms. Through a tragic coincidence, both their spouses died of leukemia, and since they had known each other before, it seemed natural that they become friendlier.

In the days when most of the guests started coming, there were many houses like the Montpelier to choose from, and each one had its stalwarts. Joblin used to stay across the street, in fact, at the By the C. There is a parking lot there now, and two houses beside it have also been turned into asphalt. Most people drive to Atlantic City, and parking spaces near the Boardwalk, where the Montpelier is, are at a premium. A fourth house, now empty, will soon be torn down too. The woman who owns it was offered $300,000 last year, Shuster observes, but held out for $325,000. After she closed up last winter, someone broke in and ripped out all her plumbing; rather than replace it, she gave up and sold for $225,000, which was all the speculator was then willing to pay.

“She got greedy,” Shuster explains, “and lost out.” But not entirely: in the ’60s and early ’70s the house would have fetched only $15,000 or $16,000—if anyone could have been found to buy it at all.

Memories on the porch tend to dwell on the glory days, when Atlantic City was fixed in the national consciousness as the middle-class playground, and the “prospect of a stroll on the Boardwalk—better yet, a ride in a wicker rolling chair—warmed the days all winter long.

Did you ever see a maiden in a little rolling chair, Room for two, Sue and you, Hear the salty breezes through her curly locks of hair, Ocean’s blue, so are you.

So began The Rolling Chair Song, but today almost all the chairs are gone, and the best place to find them is in a third-floor lounge at Caesars Boardwalk Regency, one of the eight casinos. “Up until two years ago, they were lined up along the Boardwalk,” says Halperin. “You’d rent one for a season, and you would see all your friends there. I miss that. But they won’t allow anything that will keep people out of the casinos.”

Who “they” are is not stated—perhaps it does not need to be —but the truth is that the casinos do look as if they would be happier in the deserts of Nevada. The architects have all but ignored both the Boardwalk and the ocean in their designs, and one could live for days in most of the casinos and think that the only water around was that coming out of the bathroom faucet. Those waves on the other side of the beach are clearly irrelevant to the casino owners, and they seem to be wishing for someone like Rosie, the waitress in the Bounty commercials, to come along with a giant paper towel and sop up the whole unsightly mess.

The loss of the rolling chairs is not the only thing the people on the porch dislike about the new Atlantic City. Lorna Shuster, for example, is annoyed by the big increase in costs. “We were told our taxes would go down,” she says. “Instead everything has gone up about four times. They lied to us.” “The old people have been thrown out,” adds Esther Halperin. “And they expected to die here.”

Lou Strumwasser is saddened by the single-mindedness of the new visitors. “They’re so intent,” he says. “Everybody’s in a hurry to go to the casinos.” All of the oldtimers are frightened by crime. A week or so ago a woman’s purse was snatched a few doors away. “I used to walk home at 3 or 4 in the morning,” says Locke. “I would never do that now.”

Still, no one on the porch wants the casinos to go away. They all realize that the Atlantic City they knew was doomed long before gambling arrived, and everyone agrees with Strumwasser’s assessment: “This town was dying, not slowly, but rapidly. There was no alternative to gambling.” Some even chance a bit of their own money. Bill and Mildred, who are, comparatively speaking, the house swingers, play blackjack four times a week. The two sisters sometimes play the slots at the Golden Nugget, which is near by. “Always the quarter machine,” says Eve firmly. “Never the dollar.” But Lorna Shuster will not venture even those two bits. She once walked through two of the casinos—and then walked right out. “It was awful!” she exclaims.

While Lorna and her guests have been talking, life in the house has gone on as it always does on such a morning. Eve and Geetie have even taken time out for a quick lunch. They are giving a surprise 80th birthday party for a third sister next week, and plans had to be made. Now Eve is going up to her room to bleach her hair for the occasion. “I’m old,” she explains, “but I still have black hair.”

Others leave for lunch too, while Locke and Joblin walk down to the beach in front of the Deauville Hotel: even on a beautiful day like today it is almost deserted. Other survivors of the ancien régime gather there; and just as they have been every Friday, Saturday and Sunday for the past 25 summers, Don, Fred, Manny and Groggy are on hand to entertain whoever wants to listen. Don Phillips, who owns a chain of beauty schools, and Manny Brahen, who teaches science in a junior high school, live in Philadelphia; Groggy Guervitz practices law in Washington, and Fred Ehrlich is a dentist in Baltimore. All but Phillips are bachelors. But here they are just four happy guys making music on the beach. Don and Groggy play electric guitars, Manny sings the old standards, and Fred—well, Fred blows one of the classiest trumpets this side of Basin Street. After every song, he yells out, “Howdya like that?”

Not too long ago, a hundred or more people would dance around them all afternoon. Now there are only a dozen or so, mostly middle age or older, sitting in beach chairs and applauding with genteel enthusiasm when Fred bellows for a response. “People ask us why we knock our brains out,” says Manny. “We do it because it’s fun. But we do miss the crowds. They used to have such a good time here.”

—By Gerald Clarke