DO I HEAR A BID FOR ... PLAYLAND?
Closing: El Cerrito museum’s memorabilia will be auctioned
EL CERRITO >> Laffing Sal, a creepy looking 6-foot-10inch papier-mâché character whose boisterous laugh used to horrify kids, stands guard today near the front counter of a makeshift museum in El Cerrito, her recorded cackling now silent behind glass.
Step farther inside this emporium of arcade memorabilia and you’ll see dazzling displays — funhouse mirrors, vintage video games such as Galaga and Centipede, and more than 30 pinball machines, all flashing, beeping and chirping.
This is Playland-Not-At-The-Beach, where a train speeds through Santa’s Village and Mort-the-Spook watches over a room of dark mystery. The name, and much of the memorabilia and decor, are a loving tribute to Playland-At-The-Beach, an early 20th century amusement park near San Francisco’s touristy Cliff House restaurant that closed on Labor Day 1972.
But now, like the old beach Playland, the landlocked version at 10979 San Pablo Ave. will close
as well, in September. But this time, the remnants of that bygone era won’t get collectively packed up like a carnival headed for another journey.
Instead, each item will be auctioned. A few might end up on public display somewhere else if the right bidder comes along, but they most likely will end up in people’s homes.
“It’s bittersweet. This has been a labor of love,” said proprietor Frank Biafore, aka the “Fabulous Fun Facilitator.”
Biafore and his partner, Tim Sauer, spent the past year searching for a new home for their collection after learning the current building will be torn down to make way for 50 apartments.
The Bay Area’s steep rents, especially at places where Playland might have made an ideal attraction, such as the neighborhood around San Francisco’s Fisherman’s Wharf, left them no choice but to shutter, they said.
“We have gone through all the stages of grief,” Biafore said as he walked amid the displays, each tagged with a sticker from Alameda’s Michaan’s Auctions. “Now we are ready for the next step. But we’ve had longtime supporters come in and, literally, get tears in their eyes when we tell them we’re closing.”
A lifetime to create
You could liken PlaylandNot-At-The-Beach to a roadside attraction, except from the roadside it’s not much of an attraction.
Driving past, you might think it’s a nursery school, judging by its rainbow-colored sign. Or a building that houses offices, which it once did when the late Richard Tuck, the founder of this Playland, operated an employment recruitment company in the 9,000-squarefoot space.
Financial success gave Tuck the luxury to collect memorabilia, then to open the nonprofit business in 2008, or what he called his “museum of fun.”
There are posters, postcards and old tickets from Playland-At-The-Beach. About a quarter of the items inside the El Cerrito museum come from the San Francisco amusement spot alone.
An acrylic mural by artist Dan Fontes — on display in the “Board Walk” room — showcases its long-gone attractions, including the legendary “Big Dipper” roller coaster. The 32-foot mural took Fontes and partner Ed Cassel 14 months to create.
Prancing carousel horses, the Giant Camera Obscura that’s still located outside the Cliff House and, of course, Laffing Sal, are depicted on the mural.
“At the time we painted, there were about 1,200 photos publicly available of Playland,” Fontes said. “We scoured the world to find what we could for inspiration.”
The Laffing Sal that once greeted fun-seekers in San Francisco now spooks visitors at the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk, where a sign describes her as a “rare and vintage icon.” The one on display in El Cerrito came from an arcade in Ohio.
San Francisco’s Playland emerged from the concession stands that sprang up during the late 19th century, when the neighborhood was mostly sand dunes and an easy day trip for folks wanting a break from downtown.
Items on display in El Cerrito hark back to those days, such as the woolen bathing suits from Sutro Baths — the former swimming pool near the Cliff House where visitors could take a dip in
saltwater straight from the Pacific Ocean.
The public pool was built in 1896 and burned down in 1966. Its ruins are now within the Golden Gate National Recreation Area.
Along with the San Francisco attraction, the El Cerrito business reflects the lives and loves of Tuck, Biafore and Sauer, who worked and lived together before Playland opened.
There’s “The World of Charles Dickens,” a room with hundreds of “Christmas village” style houses. (Tuck earned a graduate degree on the English novelist.)
Another room, “The Genius of Walt Disney,” features dioramas of Disney films, one of Tuck’s loves.
Biafore’s office, or the “Happiest Place on Eartha,” doubles as headquarters for the fan club of Eartha Kitt, the singer and actress known for the hit Christmas song “Santa Baby.” Biafore is the club’s president,
and Kitt memorabilia fills the office, including a signed peanut butter jar. (Kitt did a TV commercial voice-over for the product.)
Perhaps the most impressive display is “Circus World,” a 300,000-piece toy circus handcarved by Don Marcks of El Cerrito. It took him a lifetime to create.
“I hope it will not be broken up,” Biafore said about the miniature acrobats, elephants and circusgoers that seem frozen in time. “It would be nice to see it all stay together. It would be
a shame if it gets scattered.”
End of an era
“You are closing? No. Why?” a customer who identified herself as Gramma Sparkler asked Biafore recently as her two grandsons played pinball at the museum. “I had no idea.”
“A lot of history of days gone by are here,” she said. “It’s about the times we’ve been here.”
Fontes said he had hoped his mural of San Francisco’s Playland would be snapped up for public display somewhere
else after news spread that the El Cerrito business is looking to move or could close.
Now he just wants the mural to go to a good home.
“I think it’s tragic,” David Weinstein, president of the El Cerrito Historical Society, said about the upcoming departure of Playland. “I really hate to think about it.”
The business was one of the few places where people could go in the city for entertainment, he said, citing Rialto Cinemas Cerrito on San Pablo Avenue as another.
“And it was a museum,” Weinstein said.
So many items fill Playland-Not-At-The-Beach that Michaan’s Auctions decided not to move them to its location in Alameda.
Instead, would-be bidders can stop by El Cerrito from noon to 5 p.m. Sept. 13 and 14 for a preview. The auction will take place 10 a.m. Sept. 15.
Fontes pointed out the auction will happen shortly after Labor Day, or near the 46th anniversary of San Francisco’s Playland closing.
“It’s kind of fitting,” he said.
Biafore does not know what he and partner Sauer will do after the doors are locked for the final time.
His duties at Playland included performing magic shows for kids as “Fabulous Frank.”
“I will probably go back to magic,” Biafore said. “There’s always magic.”