Transit Museum Takes You to Coney—1930s Style
The Transit Museum hosted a nostalgia ride to Coney Island last Saturday using a train made of 1930s subway cars.
The ride began at the Transit Museum, which is located in an unused subway station in Downtown Brooklyn, then went down the F line to Coney, with a detour over the Fulton Street (A/C) line for switching purposes. On the way back later in the afternoon, the train took a different route, over the Q line.
The cars originally ran on the city-run Independent (IND) system, now part of MTA New York City Transit’s lettered system. Some cars had wicker seats, others had red cushioned seats. While there was no air conditioning, the overhead fans were so fast and efficient that you hardly noticed its absence. The ads in the cars, which dated from the 1930s through the ’60s or ’70s, were mainly public service announcements (“Don’t hold the doors open”) but also included period advertisements for products such as Planter’s peanuts or Heinz pickles as well as pictures of contestants in the famed Miss Subways beauty pageant.