New book reveals Atlantic City Steel Pier diving horse history
For decades, the diving horses of Atlantic City’s Steel Pier captured the attention of generations of visitors to the Jersey Shore amusement town. While they remained a captivating attraction for much of the 20th century, on display from 1929 to 1978 (with a brief revival in 1993), if the diving horses are remembered by younger folks these days it’s thanks to their family-friendly depiction in the 1991 film “Wild Hearts Can’t Be Broken.”
That view of history – based on “A Girl and Five Brave Horses,” the 1961 memoir of former diving horse rider Sonora Webster Carver – “certainly was (seen through) rosecolored glasses,” according to author and animal activist Cynthia A. Branigan.
“I think even at the beginning of the film it says, ‘A true story, based on the life of,’ and it’s completely untrue, oh my God,” Branigan said. “But it feels good. And back when the diving horse act began in the late-1800s, and then they came to Atlantic City in 1929, people didn’t have the same standards that they do today.
“... It certainly enriched Sonora Carver ... to write that book, co-write the book. And then she received a handsome amount for them to make it into a movie. ... In many cases of animal cruelty, there’s money.”
Doc Carver’s High Diving Horses ran shows four times a day, seven days a week, with a brutally simple concept: a horse, with a female rider, jumped off a platform 40 feet high into a 10-foot tank of water. Branigan’s new book, “The Last Diving Horse in America: Rescuing Gamal and Other Animals – Lessons in Living and Loving,” is now available from Pantheon.
Centered on the bond between Branigan and Gamal, the former diving horse who she rescued from a South Jersey auction in May 1980, the book is also a history of the diving horse act; a tribute to Branigan’s mentor and Fund for Animals founder Cleveland Amory; and a memoir for Branigan, who grew up in Lawrenceville, N.J., and went on to found Make Peace with Animals, based in New Hope, Pennsylvania.
The world at large, and Atlantic City specifically, has changed drastically with regard to animal rights in the 41 years since Branigan rescued Gamal.
Just a short boardwalk stroll away from where Gamal was once forced to perform on Steel Pier, for example, there’s now an annual Atlantic City Vegan Food Festival that serves as a gathering for both the compassionate and the curious.
“There’s really no comparison (between then and now),” Branigan said. “... In the last 40 years or so, things have changed markedly. Back when I started, the word ‘rescue’ wasn’t even used, ‘animal rights’ wasn’t even used when I first began. It was ‘animal welfare’ or ‘animal protection,’ and then it slowly evolved into ‘rights.’
“And, of course, the whole discussion ensued about, ‘What are you talking about, the right to vote? Ha ha,’ that kind of thing, when it was first used, the term. But now, people know what animal rights are, that they deserve a life free from pain and exploitation.”
Branigan, a former journalist who has rescued a reported 6,000 wild burros, 4,000 wild mustangs and more than 5,000 former racing greyhounds in the last 40-plus years, discussed the lifechanging inspiration she gleaned from Gamal. “When I got to know him, he was a full-fledged personality, he wasn’t just a horse,” she said. “And the nuances of his character opened to my eyes to what was possible with animals. We kind of take them for granted. And ... (we know) you shouldn’t beat them or starve them or whatever, but there’s more to it than that.”