How old people from the Miami Beach Jewish community used to hang out in the early 80s

From 1977 to 1986, Gary Monroe photographed the daily life of pensioners from the Jewish community of the South Beach area. Gary's pictures seem to transport us into the everyday life of their daily entertainment, telling about the unique and, unfortunately, gradually disappearing culture of the community.

(12 photos in total)

Source: edition.cnn.com

A woman holds a rope on the beach of Tenth Street, 1980. With a Leica camera in his hands, Gary Monroe has been photographing South Beach life for 10 years. "Then they reacted to the camera quite differently. It was as if everything was open to me, and no one was against me taking pictures of them," he says.

People walk along Sixth Street near Washington Avenue, 1978. Monroe's photographs seem to take us back to that time, telling about the life of the Jewish community, many of whose members went through the Holocaust and Jewish pogroms in the Russian Empire. "I worked without any schedule or plans. I just embodied my ideas in photographs and took each picture with bated breath."

A man in the restaurant of the hotel "Astor", 1984. Monroe himself hails from this part of Miami Beach, and he usually took pictures when returning home from graduate school. "I am a Jew, I know the religion and culture of our people well and I know enough subtleties of Yiddish to win people over. I started taking pictures at the beginning of the fourth decade of my life, so many people perceived me as their adopted grandson," Gary said.

A couple is walking with a suitcase along 15th Street, 1981. "One day I noticed a married couple who seemed to be walking aimlessly down the street. The man was carrying a heavy suitcase, and his wife was walking about ten steps behind. It's such a calm and touching photo."

Group training in the bank building on Washington Avenue, 1980. "If now the beaches of South Beach are mostly visited by people aged 18 to 28, then earlier the average age of visitors was about 81 years. I often visited the beach 30 years ago and remember those times, but now I often get the impression that South Beach never existed in that old form."

People on 10th Street, 1979. "What were the talks about then? Israel, grandchildren and the subtleties of local politics."

A man sits in the sand on the beach of Lummus Park, 1980. "These people once faced the worst manifestations of humanity, but they still smiled and lived a full life."

People gathered together for a ritual family meal, which begins Passover (Jewish Passover), 1980. "South Beach was a place where the Jewish community could do more than just enjoy the weather. People spent a lot of time together and practiced learning religious dogmas together. There were many temples in the area, and many hotels even converted rooms for card games into small synagogues."

Women sitting by the pool, 1979. "I think South Beach was a much more interesting place at that time than it is now."

A man is surrounded by chairs, 1982. Monroe says that today South Beach can be described as a place where "they hang out until the morning, drink a lot of alcohol from huge glasses and are constantly looking for a parking space."

A man is sitting in his room, 1984. Monroe admits that he loves this photo dearly for many years.

People on the beach of Lummus Park, 1977. "I can't even identify the moment that I remember the most. It was a decade of constant admiration. I was constantly amazed, I felt happy and at the same time I felt myself in the center of something amazing, I felt surrounded by the precious heritage of the cultural traditions of my people, which soon, it seems, will sink into oblivion."