Gwinnett EHC hosting traveling Coney Island exhibit through mid-March

Coney Island — particularly its amusement park — has long been a famous part of New York City’s history, but Gwinnett residents don’t have to travel up north to see it in early 2020.

The Gwinnett Environmental and Heritage Center in Buford is hosting a traveling exhibit titled “Coney Island: Visions of an American Dreamland, 1861-2008” through March 16. The exhibit is a traveling adaptation of an exhibit by the same name at the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art in Hartford, Conn.  It highlights, in three parts, the rise and eventual decline of Coney Island over its long history.

“The exhibit ... brings to life the excitement of Coney Island, showing visitors how its magnetic world of attractions has become a touchstone for American mass culture and popular recreation,” officials at the Environmental and Heritage Center said in an announcement of the exhibit.

While the exhibit may not include a stroll along Coney Island’s boardwalk, or a ride on its infamous Cyclone roller coaster, it does offer a visual history of the resort and entertainment district in New York.

The Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, organized the traveling exhibit in partnership with Mid-America Arts Alliance in Kansas City. Support for it came from the National Endowment for the Humanities’ NEH on the Road program.