Word: islanders
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Though Cuban cigars are perhaps the world's most revered, the stogie probably didn't originate on the island. Cigar smoking first took hold elsewhere in the Americas-exactly where and when remains uncertain. A ceramic pot discovered in Guatemala that dates at least as far back as the 10th century depicts a Mayan puffing on tobacco leaves bound up with string. (The Mayans may also have handed down the object's name: their term for smoking, sikar, likely led to the Spanish cigarro, from which the cigar takes its name.) When Columbus stumbled upon the Americas...
...ahead of his time as a supporter of health food, exercise and physical culture. He wrote lots of books on health and eventually became a publisher. Initially, there used to be 12 or 20 winter-bathing groups on Coney Island. It used to be a big activity in the early 1900s, but we're the oldest surviving group. For years, our mothers told us that if you get your feet wet during the winter you're going to catch pneumonia and die. And we simply find that is not the case...
...Coney Island years ago, walking on the boardwalk, and I saw these old guys out there, and they were in bathing suits and lifting rocks. And then they went into the water, and I thought, That's really insane - I wanna do that! And I called them up, and they invited me down, and I've been doing it every Sunday during the winter for the past 25 years. Ten years ago, there'd be about eight of us showing up regularly. So about five years ago we reorganized the club and made it more accessible to people instead...
...think the setting and atmosphere of Coney Island has influenced the club...
...think all of us have a special love for Coney Island. For me, it's just kind of been a center of weirdness. [Laughs.] Few places can match that kind of atmosphere. We love the cold water, but Coney Island is really very much a special place for all of us. I know there are development plans going on - they've been going on for years now, and it's changing even as we speak - so I feel sad about that; it won't be the same. Whatever changes do take place out there, as long as there's still...