Singer, musician and composer who lives in Sea Gate
This interview was conducted and recorded in Russian. Read Julia Kanin's transcript and translation below. Интервью проведено и записано на русском языке. Вы можете ознакомиться с траснскриптом и переводом Юлии Ханиной ниже.
Ellina Graypel is a...
Content type: Oral History Item
Musical inspiration and meditation at Coney Island
Cuzzo Sosay is a musician and producer of gangster hip hop, soul music, inspirational music, and R & B who visited the Coney Island History Project this past summer. As a boy growing up in Brooklyn in the 1980s, his parents took him to Coney...
Content type: Oral History Item
Groundbreaking filmmaker grew up in Sea Gate and on Mermaid Avenue
Filmmaker Joyce Chopra grew up in Coney Island and Sea Gate in the 1930s and ‘40s. Her grandparents were the owners of Kalina's Baths on Surf Avenue at West 33rd Street. Chopra describes how she got the acting bug at Lincoln High School while...
Content type: Oral History Item
Brooklyn College history student grew up working in his family's bodega in Brighton Beach
This oral history was recorded in 2021 when Nasim Almantaser was 21-year-old Brooklyn College student. Nasim grew up working in his Yemeni American family's bodega in Brighton Beach and began helping out in the store as a young boy to be with his...
Content type: Oral History Item
The Roller Coaster Reverend shares stories of Cyclone weddings
After Reverend Cliff Herring married a couple on Coney Island’s Cyclone roller coaster, the NY Daily News called him “the Roller Coaster Reverend” and “a card carrying member of the American Coaster Enthusiasts.” Reverend Herring is member #18 in a...
Content type: Oral History Item
Educator at New York Aquarium and passionate observer of Brooklyn wildlife
Jen Kepler is an educator at the New York Aquarium whose titles are Manager of Volunteers and Visitor Engagement and Live Interpretation Manager. The Brooklyn native recalls aspiring to work there ever since her childhood visits to see the beluga...
Content type: Oral History Item
Memories of growing up on West 29th Street and meeting her lifeguard husband on Coney Island Beach
Ellen Abrams' earliest memory is sitting in a wicker carriage and being taken for a stroll on the boardwalk by her mother and grandmother. Growing up in Coney Island in the 1940s and '50s, Ellen enjoyed birthday parties every July on the beach and ...
Content type: Oral History Item
Coney Island native and longtime independent game operator on Jones Walk
Monica Ghee is a Coney Island native who has operated games at various locations in the amusement district on and off for the past 52 years. She recalls some of the games she has worked in the past, including the dime pitch, glass pitch, goldfish...
Content type: Oral History Item
Memories of working a bread route on Coney Island's Mermaid Avenue in the 1950's and '60s
Charles Guariglia's father, Frank, was a "bread man" who delivered Stuhmer's kosher bread to the Jewish delicatessens and shops along Mermaid Avenue in Coney Island from 1947 to 1973. From age 9 until he was a freshman in college, Charles...
Content type: Oral History Item
An actor's memories of growing up in Sea Rise apartments and a souvenir of the Wonder Wheel
Born in Brooklyn in 1988, Emmanuel Elpenord is an actor who grew up in the Sea Rise apartments in Coney Island's West End. He describes the unique design of the high rise building, where he played games with boys from his floor on the terrace...
Content type: Oral History Item