'You would see all the steamers come up the river the Hendrick Hudson, Robert Fulton, the Alexander and stop at the park with all the people from the city,' recalled Sal Bottiglieri, 73, who used to work there. 'We would be amused by seeing people enjoying themselves in the dance hall or getting wet on the speedboats. People out from the city thought they were in the country.'

This was Indian Point Park.

Yes, that Indian Point, before atoms were split there to make electricity. Now the only pools are filled with spent radioactive fuel; the water is quite toasty, but no swimming is allowed. Neutrons do all the dancing. A Coast Guard cutter on patrol is the only boat allowed to approach.

How did a nuclear power plant end up in an amusement park? First, understand the park and its tie to the river.

The old Hudson River Day Line opened it on June 26, 1923, at a site that was once a brickyard and farmland. The company named the 240-acre patch of forest 'Indian Point'; it had learned that the area was once traversed by the Kitchawank Tribe and thought the name would be catchy, said Francis Stein, the Buchanan historian. For years, the park was just that.

Carnival rides. Miniature golf. Dances (where the Indian Point 3 control room now sits). A beer hall (where the Indian Point 2 reactor stands). Indian Point drew more than 5,000 people on weekends and hundreds on weekdays.

Mr. Stein's collection of vintage postcards paints a bucolic image of pre- and postwar frivolity so different from the image of the plant today.

But the park began to lose its luster after World War II. The popularity of the automobile, which broadened the choice of day trips and vacation spots, doomed the steamers and, in turn, Indian Point.

'I was disappointed that the park was going,' Mr. Stein said. "It was just such a great place to meet people." By the early 1950's, the owner was looking to sell. Con Edison was looking to buy.

The utility was struggling to meet the growing electricity needs of the region, especially in Westchester County, where the suburbs were mushrooming. From 1950 to 1960, the county's population rose by 183,075, to 808,891, its largest 10-year gain in the last century. That, with the increasing use of appliances like air conditioners and televisions, pushed the demand for electricity higher and higher.

Con Ed needed new plants. But it was already weathering criticism over air pollution from its oil and coal plants. An answer was emerging in a promising new technology: atomic energy. The federal government had begun its "atoms for peace" program to promote the idea that atomic energy could be cheap and was not just for weapons. It was working with a handful of utilities to make nuclear power a reality.

Con Edison put itself in the vanguard in the summer of 1954, announcing that it would develop an experimental nuclear reactor and, a first, do it without government assistance, gambling that nuclear power would prove less costly than conventional fuels in the long run.

The utility focused on Indian Point. There was plenty of river water to support machinery. A rail line ran nearby. It was close to transmission lines. And the village of Buchanan welcomed Con Ed's promises to fix roads, street lights, sewers and expand police and other municipal services.

News accounts at the time suggested that the plant's location outside New York City but not far from it was vital to ensuring that power could be generated if the city were attacked with an atomic bomb, although no utility executive was quoted on that. In contrast to the vociferous campaign to close the plant today, hardly a peep of protest was heard at its inception. The atom was fascinating; awareness of its dangers even in peaceful uses came later.

"At that point, people were just not aware of radiation as a public health problem," said Sam Walker, the historian for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, whose predecessor, the Atomic Energy Commission, approved the plant.

Con Edison proceeded with its plans with little study of the site. The Atomic Energy Commission offered little guidance because it had experience with only one commercial nuclear reactor, the Shippingport Atomic Power Station in Pennsylvania, which opened in 1957, said Philip L. Cantelon, a historian who has studied Con Edison.

"That Con Edison had not carried out any seismological, hydrological or meteorological tests to check the nuclear suitability of Indian Point was hardly surprising," Mr. Cantelon wrote in a paper about the company's nuclear history. "The sudden push toward commercial nuclear power created situations without precedent."

To Con Edison's engineers, he added, "the way to understanding was through doing."

What became known as Indian Point 1 powered up on Aug. 2, 1962, two years behind schedule, reaching full power on Jan. 25, 1963, after problems with its piping were repaired.

So confident was Con Ed of this new technology that it planned to build six reactors here, and later it even set its sights on New York City, where it said its next nuclear reactor should be located to be most competitive with fossil fuel plants. Con Ed proposed a nuclear reactor in Ravenswood, Queens, across the East River from East 68th Street.

That proposal, and later plans to build a nuclear plant on Davids Island, off New Rochelle, failed after a public outcry. Just as Indian Point 1 came online, public awareness of radiation hazards was growing, mainly as reports of radiation fallout from atomic and hydrogen bomb testing in the western deserts and the South Pacific increased. It did not help that Hollywood began picking up radiation as a theme for horror movies about mutated animals, insects and people.

Still, Con Edison pressed on, though its plans for a nuclear plant farm were scaled down.

It opened Indian Point 2 in 1974 and Indian Point 3 in 1976. Both reactors have troubled records, with frequent breakdowns and mishaps, though none that endangered the public, regulators say. It took the accident at Three Mile Island in 1979 to end development of nuclear plants; no plant has been opened in the nation since. That accident also threw a harsh light on Indian Point, with growing doubts that people could be evacuated in a similar emergency there.

Later that year, Robert Ryan, a Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff member testifying in 1979 before a presidential commission investigating the Three Mile Island accident in Pennsylvania, called Indian Point "one of the most inappropriate sites in existence" for a nuclear plant.

Looking back, those in Buchanan who knew Indian Point then and now get a little nostalgic about the park, even if they support the plant today. Many have strong feelings because the plant provided 90 percent of the village's tax base. "I don't think any of us could afford a home here if they took away the assessment from the reactors," said Mr. Bottiglieri, the former park worker. But for Mr. Bottiglieri and others the memories of those summers long ago burn brightly.

I also remember Rye Beach, the amusement park, all the great rides. Is it still there or has time done it's number on it, as with so many other fun things in our pasts? It's good to bring back these memories. Hopefully, good for our mental health (what's left of it)

I do remember my last trip to Rye beach. We sailed a 23' sailboat from Little Neck Bay in Queens to Rye Beach. Dropped anchor. Swam ashore and walked around a bit. The place seemed dead, as I remember.