David Witter

It is a cool Saturday night, and the streets around Superior, Chicago and Ashland have been cordoned off for the annual carnival at Holy Innocents Church.

The challenge is issued. "100 shots for three dollars; the red must be completely out to win the big prize. Come on, give your girl something to take home besides tired feet." While the gamesman tries to convince a young man to shoot a target with a makeshift Tommy gun, The Pharaoh's Fury catapults forward, the sound echoing toward you, then away as the ride goes trailing off. On the other side of the grounds The Gravitron makes a slow climb. There is a slight pause as the riders look down at a sea of people beneath them and see little girls eating funnel cakes bigger than their faces and a heavyset man in a Bears jersey, his face illuminated by red and green lights. Suddenly they spiral downward, grabbing their stomachs like they were going to burst through their heads.

The neighborhood carnival is as much of a part of the urban summer tradition as hotdog carts and picnics on the lake. In recent years, the independent carnival operator has had to stave off challenges from corporate theme parks, video games and increased insurance costs. They have also had to overcome the unsavory and often unfair image of the corrupt, tattooed "stick men" and the freaky carnival sideshow popularized by movies like "Carny" and the HBO series "Carnivàle."

Since 1977, Windy City Amusements has overcome these obstacles and then some. Starting off as a single game stand in Anthony Salerno Sr.'s backyard, Windy City has grown into the largest independent amusement company in Illinois, with the best safety record as well. The company owns more than seventy-five rides, food tents, games and concessions, including the Gravitron, The Submarine, and the 65-foot-high Super Loop, each of which cost between $500,000 and $750,000.

"We have three units, each one run by one of my sons, Anthony Jr., Mark, and Michael," Salerno says. "At any time we can be anywhere across the metropolitan area, a neighborhood carnival in Chicago, a larger event in Addison or Berwyn, and we even do the Kane County Fair."

Although health problems have kept Salerno Sr. away from visiting Holy Innocents--his son Mike is running the carnival--the event and the neighborhood are close to his heart.

"I grew up in "The Patch," a tough city neighborhood, between Grand, Chicago and Western," Salerno, who also attended Wells High School, says. "I started working at carnivals when I was 17 or 18 years old and my friend's grandfather owned a carnival near Rockwell and Huron, which is only a few blocks away. He hired me to work the games," Salerno says.

If you've ever gone to a carnival, you have seen "the games." Some of the more well-known include the balloon games where you either pop a balloon with a dart or try to fill it with a water gun, various shooting and target ranges, basketball hoops, baseball speed tosses, and the famous strongman game where you try to ring the bell by pounding a rising object with a hammer. After learning his craft, Salerno went on the road.

"In the winter we went to places like Albuquerque, Tampa, Shreveport, San Antonio, and little towns all over Texas, Arkansas and Louisiana," Salerno says. "Everything wasn't on trailers and hydraulics like it is today," Salerno continues. "We had to pound stakes, put up the tents and games, haul lumber. As far as eating goes you asked around if there was a cheap restaurant in town and had maybe one good meal a day. At night you slept in the trucks if you were lucky and under a tarp if you weren't."

In doing so, Salerno became part of the legendary, and now almost forgotten world of the "Carny." In his book, "Freak Show" (1990, University of Chicago Press), author Robert Bogdan dates the original carnivals back to the Renaissance, where dancing bears, snake charmers and other curiosities entertained both peasants and royalty alike. In the late 1880s through the Great Depression, showmen like P.T. Barnum toured the country with popular exhibits that later became known as the "carnival sideshow." These included albinos, giants and dwarfs, freaks such as the "Frog Boy," "Elastic Skin Man," "Alligator Lady," "Popeye, the Man with the Elastic Eyeballs," and even "The Elephant Man." The sideshow also featured many familiar performers including fire-eaters, contortionists, "The Human Claw Hammer" and "The Human Pin-Cushion."

Starting at the end of World War II, the advent of greater hydraulics and safe, modern technology has made rides like The Pharaoh's Fury and The Gravitron the main focus. These innovations, combined with a more humane society and the ability to view freaks on reality-television shows such as VH-1's "Surreal Life" have taken the sideshow out of the carnival and put it on TV.

"The carnival sideshow as we know it didn't really disappear until the late seventies and early eighties," says Art Kozak, who runs the Tommy Gun Target Game at Windy City. "Actually, it moved to the South, where carnival sideshows ran until the early nineties. Even today there is a town in Florida called Gibbstown where all the retired sideshow and carny folk still live and perform."

Another element of the carnival life that has disappeared is the stereotypical tattooed "stick man" or barker portrayed in shows like HBO's now-canceled "Carnivàle."

"In the old days you would go to a town and find people to work," Salerno Sr. says. "Maybe you didn't know much about him, maybe he looked like a drunk, but he needed work and we needed people so no questions were asked. Now we have to be very careful because communities screen people and we have to make sure nobody is a bail jumper or has a record."

"The whole thing has changed," Michael Salerno says. "Everyone wears uniforms and IDs, and there are strict background checks."

In fact, Windy City has the best safety record in the state, and for that matter one of the best in the nation. Although the company does provide jobs to neighborhood people to work concessions, the majority of Windy City's employees are full-time, including Kozak, who has been with the company since 1986.

This unparalleled record for safety has helped companies like Windy City survive the advent of the large corporate theme parks like Six Flags Great America and Cedar Point. Like a carnival version of McDonald's or Bennigan's, these conglomerates appeal to a homogenous suburban nation with their slick promotions, advertising and mainstream appeal. But besides their tradition and local charm, neighborhood carnivals like those put on by Windy City still have many advantages over the corporate parks.

"Places like this are in the neighborhood, so you don't have to drive fifty miles and wait in line for two hours to park and another two hours to get out of the lots," Michael Salerno says. "You can also be selective about how much you want to spend. Instead of everybody, even parents who don't want to go on rides, spending the $50 or $60 dollars to get in, you can spend as little as five dollars for two rides or $15 on weekends for an all-day pass."

Salerno speaks between short bursts on his walkie-talkie, giving orders to his two dozen or so workers. Most carnivals run from Thursday through Sunday, but Michael Salerno has been working at Holy Innocents for several days. With winding cables running across cordoned-off streets, dozens of trailers, giant lights and humming generators, the carnival setup is not much different from that of a motion picture or rock concert.

"We usually break up a carnival late Sunday night, and then start to set up the next one early Monday," Salerno says as he sits in his furnished trailer. "The rides at the old place are broken down and driven off, and then about ten guys put them up again so that the new show can open up by Wednesday or Thursday."

But on this hot Saturday night the rides are going full force. The smell of cotton candy fills the air and Bruce Springsteen's "Glory Days" blasts over the loudspeaker, blending in with the rolling wheels of the Tilt-A-Whirl and screaming teenagers. Kozak, who is still working the Tommy Gun Target Game, calls out to another young couple. "100 shots for three dollars; the red must be completely out to win the big prize."

The young man picks up the toy machine gun as the red target is propelled forward. Firing away, he obliterates most, but not all of the red spot. "Maybe next time," Kozak says. Instead of the large stuffed lion, he hands the young man a smaller, froglike animal. The man hands the stuffed toy to his girlfriend, and they continue to walk down the midway, past the food, past the games, and past the trailers. Overhead, The Gravitron and the Pharaoh's Fury continue to churn away, lights blinking, teens screaming.

The young man turns around and heads back towards a game called "Fishy, Fishy."

(2005-06-28)

Also by David Witter

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The Death of Neon
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BRAIN MATTERS
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