Hi all,

I just got around to reading the local Sunday paper [on Monday, 07Jun],
"The Times-Picayune".  In the section showing articles from 100 years
ago was the following:

    "New York, May 26, 1899---Coney Island property, to the value of
    nearly a million dollars, was destroyed by fire early this morning,
    twenty acres in the heart of the summer resort section, the district
    known as the "Bowery", being reduced to ashes. The 200 buildings
    burned were located between the Bowery and the ocean....the fire
    made shelterless for a time a native and transient population of
    about 8,300....and silenced no less than 100 pianos which for years
    have assisted in merry-making at Coney Island.

         ... from the Daily Picayune, May 27, 1899

I thought the Bowery to be on Manhattan Island, not where Coney Island
is. I'm sure I'm right! Isn't the Bowery where the Atlantic Garden was
that is pictured in the Encyclopedia? It is the picture with the HUGE
Welte Orchestrion that burned. Was this the same conflagration? I
wonder how many of the pianos were automatic?

    Anyway, I thought y'all might like this.

Mr. Berley Antoine Firmin II
Bayou La Combe, Louisiana