Merce Cunningham
Merce Cunningham (1919-2009) was an American dancer, choreographer and leader of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company, located since 1971 at Westbeth in the West Village.
Full TranscriptVillage Preservation Oral History Collection
Village Preservation’s Oral History Project includes interviews with some of the great artists, activists, business owners, community leaders, and preservation pioneers of Greenwich Village, the East Village, and NoHo. It captures and preserves their first-person perspective on the important histories they witnessed or of which they were a part.
Click here for an alphabetical list of our entire Oral History Collection.
The views expressed by the contributor(s) are solely those of the contributor(s) and do not necessarily reflect the opinions or endorsement of our organization.
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Peter Cott
Peter Cott (1924-2014) served as the Executive Director of the artist’s community Westbeth from 1970 to 1973.
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George Cominskie
Since 1983, Cominskie has lived in Westbeth, a nonprofit housing and commercial complex dedicated to providing affordable living and working space for artists and arts organizations, located in the old formerly disused Bell Telephone Labs at Bethune and West Streets. In this oral history, he discusses the significance of an affordable housing community for artists, […]
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Ana Steele Clark
Ana Steele Clark worked at the National Endowment for the Arts for over 30 years, serving the organization from soon after its 1965 founding. Her oral history focuses on the NEA’s role in the creation of Westbeth.
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Dixon Bain
Dixon Bain served as the project manager for planning and construction of Westbeth Artist’s Residence in the West Village from 1967 to 1971.
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Matt Umanov
Matt Umanov (b. August 28, 1947) is the founder and proprietor of Matt Umanov Guitars, located at 273 Bleecker Street. Since 1965, Matt Umanov Guitars has been buying, selling, and repairing vintage guitars, and has served some of the biggest names in music.
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Andrew and Romana Raffetto
Romana Raffetto (1931-2018) is the former owner and her son Andrew the current owner of Raffetto Pasta at 144 West Houston Street. A Greenwich Village and New York institution, Raffetto Pasta was founded by Romana’s father-in-law in 1906.
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Gloria McDarrah
Gloria McDarrah (1932-2020) lived in Greenwich Village beginning in the 1950s. She worked in publishing and was married to Fred McDarrah, who established himself as a photojournalist and a leading documentarian of midcentury Greenwich Village. She also worked at the Landmarks Preservation Commission, and promoted her late husband’s body of documentary work.
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Peter Longo
Peter Longo (b. October 22, 1951) grew up in an Italian family in the Village, attending Catholic schools and absorbing the immigrant and Beat cultures that surrounded him. He took over, and still runs, the coffee business his father started, the Porto Rico Importing Company.
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Vincent Livelli
Vincent Livelli (April 9, 1920 – June 21, 2024) lived in the Village for over 100 years. From the 1940s to 1970s, Vincent helped revolutionize the cruise ship industry as a music and dance director. Vincent reminisces about his early years growing up in the South Village as the child of Sicilian and Genovese immigrants […]
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Maria Kenny
The child of Irish immigrants, Maria Kenny (b. October 25, 1963) grew up in the Bronx and Greenwich Village. Her father, Pat, was owner of the Village music club Kenny’s Castaways and a part owner of The Bitter End. Kenny recalls musicians and the scene, and the changed circumstances that eventually led her and her […]
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Colette Douglas
Colette Douglas (November 19, 1926-September 30, 2023) lived in MacDougal-Sullivan Gardens in the 1950s and her oral history tells a classic story of midcentury Village life, from attending Little Red Schoolhouse as a child to witnessing her husband fight the proposed Lower Manhattan Expressway that would have destroyed the neighborhoods of SoHo, Little Italy, and […]
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