The “Prince of Coney Island” is leaving his throne.
Jimmy Prince, a rare throwback to Coney Island’s glory days, this Saturday plans to close his popular butcher shop, Major Prime Meat Market, which has been a staple on Mermaid Avenue since 1934.
When Prince started working there nearly 60 years ago in June 1949, the neighborhood’s seaside amusement district was thriving, and Major was just one of 16 butcher shops along the mile-long avenue — and one of six within a square block.
Today, the store and the 77-year-old Prince are Mermaid Avenue’s lone survivors of its once-bustling past while most of the adjacent amusement area Prince fondly recalls is now vacant.
“I’m going to miss the people the most,” said the always-smiling Prince, dressed in his standard collared shirt with tie and butcher’s apron. “What I’m most proud of is that I never had to get a roll-down gate no matter how rough the neighborhood got.”
As the neighborhood became plagued with drugs and prostitution in 1970s and 1980s, Prince said he never considered closing shop. Longtime Coney Islanders say that’s because even local hoods respected Prince, who would regularly cut customers breaks and let them pay on credit during tough times.
“Jimmy’s a landmark,” Manuel Mayas, a 53-year-old roofer and lifetime Coney Islander, said. “This is bigger than the closing of Astroland because coming here is like to coming to visit your family.”
Prince said his decision to retire now is predominantly about spending more time with his wife, Barbara, and their seven children. The timing is also right, he added, because a city rezoning plan aimed at boosting Coney Island will likely mean the razing of his store, which he runs without a lease, to pave way for more lucrative development.
The butcher shop is like a scene out of the early 20th Century with sawdust on the floor, 1940s crooners blasting on speakers, and equipment almost as old as Prince. A sliding-door cooler is 76 years old, a giant band saw is 75, and a meat tenderizer is 60. Nostalgic photos of Coney Island’s glorious past even flood his storefront.
But the shop’s old-fashioned element is best portrayed by Prince himself, who seems to know every shopper’s name, smiles with every transaction and openly talks about how one of his “greatest pleasures is serving a prime cut of meat.”
Like Mayas, most of the shop’s regulars are blue-collar workers who stop in for freshly cut meat, cold cuts or Prince’s specialty, the “Murder Burger,” a hamburger on a soft roll that is so big the butcher boasts “it’s a killer of a sandwich.” The store has also become a meeting place for residents.
Although Prince has lived in Marine Park his entire life, he says Coney Island “is in [his] blood,” so he will remain active in the area working as a part-time “talking historian” for the nonprofit Coney Island History Project.
“I’m not retiring to take vacations,” said Prince, who’s spent nearly his entire career working seven-day weeks