The Flickr Vintagenewengland Image Generatr

I snapped this black and white with my Kodak Instamatic 104. It's a view of a typical morning at the Crescent Beach.

From the 1950s through 2007, the sand on this beach was annually replenished with sand dredged from Long Island Sound.

Once the sand replenishing stopped, the beach quickly returned to its natural state of barnacle-covered rocks, crevices and became unusable as a good place to swim.

The rock in the center-right was an "erratic", a glacier-transported rock fragment. It no longer exists. I'm assuming that it was carved up by people and used for construction purposes. The Anchor Beach still contains a much larger erratic named The "Potato Rock" on the other side of the beach.

Film was expensive, so as a kid I always tried to get the most out of each roll even if that meant attempting just one more shot after the numbers stopped showing in the little red window in back of the camera. Sometimes it worked and other times, not so well.

As it turns out, the abandoned building which I clearly remembered from the 1970s, but have no photos of, was once Rocco's Apizza and Italian restaurant serving the Woodmont beachside community for decades.

If your browser supports Flickr Notes, I've added a number of them to this photo of downtown Woodmont from the late 1960s.

The camera was loaded up with a 126 film cartridge of Kodak's Verichrome Pan. Back in the 1950s, 60s and 70s, there was a large Russian community in Woodmont. Most lived on Beach Avenue, Mont Street, Hawley Avenue and Village Road. My parents were friends with all of them.

Once a beach resort for tourists from the 1870 through the 1950s, the shoreline was still lined with dozens of 19th century beach cottages. Some were full-time residences and others were summer houses for people from New Haven and even as far away as New York City.

Very few of these cottages still exist as most of them have been replaced with modern houses and McMansions.

If your browser supports Flickr Notes, I've added a number of them explaining what used to be there during my childhood in the 1960s and later teen years in the 1970s.

Yes, I was that nerdy little 8 year old kid who walked around parties with a cheap plastic camera and flash cubes in my red and white checkered shirt pocket to snap photos of people like these two. At the time, they seemed so mod and hip – a role model to live up to when I got bigger! (of course, by the time I reached their age, this look was totally passé since Disco was the big thing).

Personally I vastly prefer the semi-rural environment of this neighborhood as shown here compared to the suburban one today. If you view the photo in large size, you can see two 19th century wooden cottages in the distant left which once stood on Merwin Avenue.

Taken from the bottom of the small hill where the Woodmont Pumping Station stands.

My Dad took this Kodachrome slide using his 1950s Kodak Retina 35mm camera. It's just amazing how much gentrification took place in this neighborhood starting the late 1980s and going forward.

The original 110 film negative is a little blurry from camera shake, so I used Photoshop to make it as Flickr-worthy as possible.

In the background hovers the old and abandoned Sauter Hotel on the shoreline of Long Island Sound, a forgotten vestige of when this neighborhood was a summer vacation getaway for thousands of people between the 1880s and the mid 1950s.

This 110 film photo doesn't capture the cool marine breezes coming in from Long Island Sound across Merwin Avenue to the left of this view.

Since the late 1980s, a large condo development called The Surf Village has occupied this same place.

My Dad probably handed his Kodak Retina camera to a friend, who took this photo. It couldn't have been me, since I was only two years old! As usual, Mom's wearing a little headband and sporting her ubiquitous hair bun.

Some Flickr notes have been added for your convenience.

This 126 film negative scan required lots of Photoshop scratch removal and repair. It's still not perfect, but a LOT better than before. I shot this with my Kodak 104 Instamatic using Verichrome Pan black and white film. Sometimes I feel like I've got one foot in the 1970s and one in today.

Although not completely clear in this 110 film scan, the sign reads...

"Ruby Wino Presents SEABREEZE ESTATES! From $75,000 to $110,00. Choice location! Featuring exclusive Porto-San bathrooms available. Call (203) 877-GYPS."

In 1974, those prices were quite high!
75,000 dollars would be worth $431,853.04 today.
110,000 dollars would be worth $633,384.46 today.

These inflated prices were all part of the sign's humor considering how crappy these houses really were.
They were building one every several weeks.

We biked past the sign for weeks thinking it might actually help in attracting buyers. One day the sign disappeared without a trace. Probably torn down by the construction crew chief. Hope he had a good laugh, though.

In all honestly, this was the LAST thing I expected to find on eBay! We received one of these in the mail when I was 9 years old, but my parents threw it out since they had no desire to join. Membership was expensive at about $1,000 dollars per season in 1968 money.

In 1967, the Surf Club West was built across Merwin Avenue from our house on Rock Street. The modernist architecture was designed by the firm of Harold Roth and Edward Saad.

Previously, a number of somewhat decrepit old 19th century beach cottages occupied the site.

The photo above from the brochure shows the beachside view of the Surf Club's cabanas and dressing rooms on the 1st floor with a staircase leading up to the 2nd floor.

They had really nice pools inside, which my friends and I occasionally sneaked into. (and within 15 minutes were summarily shown the exit by lifeguards). The buildings were all made of aromatic cedar wood which had a very pleasant smell on hot summer days.

My Dad took the Kodachrome slide below in 1974. He also sneaked in to get the shot. Go Dad!

I've always found that there's something soothing in the air near beaches and oceans.

Here's what I found on the internet...

"Ocean air contains a high percentage of ions. These mainly come from ions of sodium, magnesium, chloride and sulphate present in sea water."

Taken with my Nikon FG SLR. The original 35mm negative is a bit scratched, so this enhanced scan from the print will have to do.

Yes, it's blurry, but I've used some new software to make it as Flickr-worthy as possible. I really love the groovy lettering on the giant lottery machine, the traditional popcorn machines, the wood paneling and the 1950s futuristic lighting fixtures which looked like copper UFOs with lightning bolts shooting out below them. Those 1950s style round air ducts bring back memories as well.

The menu in the upper background didn't list anything vegan, gluten-free, holistic, sushi, or any form of Tex-Mex, which hadn't reached the East Coast yet. (burrito.. what's a burrito?)

This view shows the interior of the original Turnpike rest stops as they were designed by architects in the mid 1950s.

Today, all this is just a memory and the rest stops now resemble small mega-malls with numerous restaurants, stores and enormous parking lots.