Author of two books about Coney Island basketball
Delbert Prince is the author of two books tracing the history of Coney Island basketball and what the sport meant to the community. Prince grew up in Coney Island and played ball on all the local courts. His detailed personal history includes the...
Content type: Oral History Item
Retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel who emigrated from Ukraine to Brighton Beach as a child
Alexander Vindman was born in 1975 in Soviet Ukraine and emigrated at age four with his family to Brooklyn’s Brighton Beach. He shares memories of growing up and going to school in Brighton, being photographed with his twin brother by the...
Content type: Oral History Item
Memories of World War II in Ukraine and immigrating to Southern Brooklyn
This interview was conducted and recorded in Russian. Read Julia Kanin's Russian transcript and English translation below. Интервью проведено и записано на русском языке. Вы можете ознакомиться с траснскриптом и переводом Юлии Ханиной ниже.
Betya...
Content type: Oral History Item
Filmmaker and archivist whose parents collaborated on the film Little Fugitive in Coney Island
Mary Engel is an award winning filmmaker and runs the Orkin/Engel Film and Photo Archive. She is the daughter of Morris Engel and Ruth Orkin, who co-wrote and directed Little Fugitive, which was filmed in Coney Island and released in 1953. The...
Content type: Oral History Item
Growing up in Greece and living in Coney Island's Luna Park Houses since the 1970s
Born in 1941 in Greece, Stella Bacolas shares memories of growing up there during World War II. "I tell my grandchild now, I didn't have my own bed until after I was 15, when I got to the United States." After settling in Bensonhurst, she moved to...
Content type: Oral History Item
At age 103, Coney Island resident shares her memories and secrets to a long and happy life
Born in 1920, Jeanette Bigelson grew up at 62 Cannon Street on the Lower East Side of Manhattan when it was a neighborhood of working-class immigrants. She shares memories of her mother's homemade challah and noodles; friendly neighbors who kept...
Content type: Oral History Item
Memories of growing up in Coney Island and the family business, Shatzkin's Famous Knishes
Mort Shatzkin’s family owned one of Coney Island’s most beloved eateries, Shatzkin’s Famous Knishes. They operated stores at various locations in Coney Island from the 1940s through the 1970s, and Shatzkin's Coney Island Knishes at Kings Plaza ...
Content type: Oral History Item
Growing up in Coney Island and how learning French at Lincoln High School influenced his life
Irwin Temkin shares stories of growing up in the West End of Coney Island in the 1950s and '60s. His family lived on Polar Street, later moved to his grandmother's house on West 31st Street, and finally to an apartment in O'Dwyer Gardens on West...
Content type: Oral History Item
Memories of growing up in the newly opened Luna Park Houses in the 1960s and 1970s
Kathy Fenyves and her family were original tenants of Luna Park Houses' Building 5 with an apartment that looked out on the amusement park. She lived there from 1961, when she was a toddler, until she was 23, and her parents continued to live there...
Content type: Oral History Item
Memories of living in Luna Park Houses and going to Coney Island bathhouses in the 1960s
Karen Wilcox and her family were among the original tenants of Luna Park Houses, moving there from the East New York section of Brooklyn in 1962. "We were the first family to live in Apt 15M in Building 4," says Wilcox, who was 11 at the time. "Then...
Content type: Oral History Item