Famous Nathan: A Family Saga of Coney Island, the American Dream, and the Search for the Perfect Hot Dog

The story of the hot dog may have begun in the Old World, but its renaissance came courtesy of its immigration to the United States, specifically New York, where the frankfurter evolved from pushcart snack to gourmet restaurant fare. Nowhere did it make a bigger statement than on Coney Island, where the nickel frankfurter turned Nathan Handwerker, an impoverished and spendthrift Polish immigrant with no formal schooling but a nose-to-the-grindstone attitude and dogged determination, into a national institution. Nathan's rags-to-riches story is retold by a grandson who knew the legend but knew little about the tough boss who was fanatical about the quality of his food and the manner in which it was delivered.

Filmmaker Lloyd Handwerker's Famous Nathan was originally a 2015 documentary comprising archival footage and interviews he gathered starting in the 1980s. The written biography is a touching tribute to his grandfather and to Nathan's mythology. It is the story of an immigrant manifesting the American dream on the grandest stage. It is also the classic story of a family torn apart by generational divides: "Take two brothers with different outlooks, values, and personalities and then add in a strong-willed father with very distinct and determined ideas of his own, and there was little wonder that the atmosphere around Surf and Stillwell [location of Nathan's Famous] became increasingly fraught." While casting a more sympathetic eye on his father and Nathan's younger son, Sol, Lloyd remains honest about the family history, giving reverence where reverence is due. Famous Nathan aches with sentimentality and nostalgia for a lost era. --Nancy Powell, freelance writer and technical consultant

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