Remembering the Nathan’s legacy

Filmmaker, writer, documentarian and grandson of Nathan Handwerker, founder of Nathan’s Famous, the hot dog fast food chain based in Coney Island, recently published a book “Famous Nathan, A Family Saga of Coney Island, the American Dream, and the Search for the Perfect Hot Dog.” The book, published in the 100th year of Nathan’s existence, is accompanied by a documentary called “Famous Nathan” that Lloyd Handwerker directed and produced. 

Lloyd returned to the town he grew up in and the temple in which he was bar mitzvahed to speak at Temple Israel of Lawrence’s 2016-2017 The Jewish Experience Lunch and Lecture Series on Nov. 18. Lloyd graduated from Lawrence High School in 1974, the year his grandfather died. Nathan’s was founded in 1916.

“As far back as being 10, I asked my parents for a tape recorder,” Lloyd Handwerker said, explaining that he always knew there was something special about the history of Nathan’s and that it should be preserved somehow. 

Lloyd explained that he has been actively researching his family and the Nathan’s Famous business for approximately 30 years, although he has always been interested in the subject. “I always liked listening to him tell his stories,” he said, of his grandfather’s anecdotes.

“Famous Nathan” provides insight into Nathan Handwerker’s experience as a Polish immigrant who came to New York in 1912, and opened the renowned eatery on Surf Avenue in Coney Island four years later without any formal schooling. He was an apprentice to his father, who was a shoemaker, and then he worked at a bakery two years before eventually coming to the U.S. with little money and no knowledge of the English language.

Lloyd collected approximately 300 hours of material for the 86-minute documentary that first debuted at the 2014 Tribeca Film Festival. A DVD was released in September of last year and the book was published on June 21. The book was an out growth of the documentary, as he collected much more material than could fit in the film

He hopes that the book provides readers with an understanding of why Nathan’s is so special and why it became so famous, Lloyd said. He added that he plans to create another book with many more photographs after he is done promoting the first one. 

“What a brilliant man his grandfather had to have been to be able to be successful and manage all of this without any education,” Barbara Braunstein, of Westbury, said, who grew up going to the Nathan’s in Oceanside which opened in 1959. She moved there from Brooklyn when she was 7. She said she was fascinated to learn about the restaurant business and life in the 1920s and 30s. 

“We grew up with it,” Jeff Braunstein said of his interest in the lecture series topic and added that he enjoyed listening to Lloyd speak about his grandfather’s experience as an immigrant from Poland. 

Another Lawrence native, Murray Handwerker, Lloyd’s uncle, served as a former president of Nathan’s Famous before he died in May 2011 at his home in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida. He was 89. He was one of three children and his brother Sol was Lloyd’s father. Five years before he was born in Brooklyn on July 25, 1921, his parents, Nathan and Ida, opened the original Nathan’s Famous. 

Anne Sash, who grew up in Brighton Beach, used to walk to Nathan’s with her friends occasionally. “It’s part of my childhood,” she said, noting that she travels to Nathan’s a few times a year to eat a hot dog.